SÃO PAULO, Brazil – Maria swore like a sailor and used cocaine. Her boisterous behavior made her a familiar face, and voice, in her 8,000-person community.
“You couldn’t miss Maria, even from a distance, because you could hear her from a distance. She was loud and rambunctious,” Eric Reese said.
Eric and his wife, Ramona, serve with the International Mission Board in São Paulo, Brazil.
Eric met Maria in a favela, or slum, where they were experiencing an “evangelism explosion” due to a soccer ministry. As interest in the Gospel grew, Eric decided to start a church in the community.
The favela is controlled by the largest and strongest drug cartel in São Paulo, and finding favor is key for ministering in the area. Eric asked cartel members if he could use a building they own. They agreed to let him use the building one Sunday a month.
Several months later, cartel members told Eric the church could no longer meet in the building. Eric learned that the community’s drug use had decreased since they started attending church, which cut into the cartel’s profits.
“When you tell people about Jesus, lives change,” Eric said.
Eric knows from his 17 years of working in drug communities in Rio de Janeiro that there is a golden rule to live by with drug cartels — don’t mess with them, and they won’t mess with you. He was walking a fine line.
He asked if they could meet as a Bible study instead of a church, and the cartel agreed.
“Hey preacher, what do y’all do in there?” Maria asked Eric one day.
He explained that they study the Word of God.
“But you ask for money too, don’t you?” she asked, skeptically.
Eric assured her that they do not.
He said sharing the Gospel of Jesus has been hindered in this community because groups touting the prosperity gospel come asking for money.
Maria also voiced her amazement, and confusion, at why an American would come to a community that is so dangerous.
“I just love people. We believe that God says when we love God, we love people. That’s just what we do,” Eric replied.
He invited her to come to Bible study and see for herself.
Their Bible studies are conversational, and Maria jumped right in with questions. However, before the meeting ended, Maria stormed out of the room with no explanation.
Eric later learned she felt like swearing at one of the attendees, and she didn’t want to live like that anymore. Maria thought the woman was trying to tell her what to do, and “nobody tells her what to do.” She left before a word she’d regret could escape her lips.
“Preacher, I’m trying to stop cussing,” Maria told Eric one week. She told Eric she hadn’t sworn in a week, except for one time.
Eric asked her who told her to stop swearing. He hadn’t mentioned it during their Bible study.
“When you prayed the other day, I just felt like something said to me I should stop cussing,” Maria responded.
Eric explained who the Holy Spirit is, and that He was the one who convicted her.
“I believe that was the Spirit of God showing you there’s a more excellent way to live,” Eric told her.
Maria also decided she wanted to stop taking drugs, and she started attending a church in the neighborhood.
Every week, Eric shared the Gospel and gave an invitation. One of those weeks Maria chose to make a commitment of faith.
“Please come into my heart and save me, and if You’re real, help me not cuss and not smoke,” Maria prayed.
She shared her testimony the following week at Bible study.
“I curse and I smoke. “Y’all know that,” Maria admitted to the group, eliciting chuckles from the attendees.
Since she started coming to the Bible study, she told them her heart changed. When she heard Eric’s invitation to follow Christ the week before, she decided she was ready.
“I went home, and I just prayed, ‘Lord, help me, and come into my heart and save me,’” Maria told the group. “I want you guys to know I ain’t been crushed. God, please just keep me that way.”
Maria gave the invitation that week.
“I would recommend to any of you ladies or men here that have not given your life to Jesus Christ, do that now,” Maria said.
Eric said, “Maria started sharing as if she’s been in the church 10 years!”
He coaches believers on how to share their testimony, and Maria shared as if she’d already been taught.
“It was such an impact on the community,” Eric said.
Maria made the decision to marry her long-time boyfriend.
Ministry activities in Maria’s community have halted because people were getting killed every other week.
When someone is killed in the favela, the bodies aren’t picked up right away. Bodies can lie there for eight or nine hours before a truck comes, Eric explained.
One Tuesday, as Eric was walking into the building for Bible study, he saw a crowd gathered around the body of a young man. He worked for the cartel but had smoked drugs he was responsible for and couldn’t pay up.
Attendance at Bible study went down.
One woman in the area was killed because she started dating a police officer. A drug leader was arrested around the same time, and the woman’s relationship with the police officer was associated with the drug leader’s capture.
The cartel makes its own rules in these favelas. There is no forgiveness for anything considered worthy of death. This includes messing with their money and having conversations or any sort of relationship with a police officer.
More members of the Bible study stopped coming after the woman’s death.
Although the Bible study isn’t taking place anymore, Maria is still attending church with her husband.
“Everybody in that community has taken note of Maria,” Eric said. “In a lot of ways, she’s almost become a walking missionary in that community.”
“She is madly in love with Jesus, and she is helping serve food to other kids and other poor communities where we minister,” Eric said.
*Name changed for security
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