Brazil Mission Report - 2025

About fifteen months ago the Lord spoke something to me that absolutely catapulted my faith. Then Pastor James Bayana visited, and when he and Ian prayed at the end of the service for open doors and portals from the throne, I have not been the same since.

I honestly forgot the exact words the Lord told me, but I sent the message to Ian and said, if you ever hear me complain or doubt the Lord again, throw this back in my face and remind me. And to this day, I have not complained about anything.

The one thing the Lord filled me with, the new oil He poured into me, was faith and peace. And that is exactly what He kept pouring out during the services and the one-on-one interactions since we went to New York City.

On March 6th, 2017 at 2:30 AM the Lord told me, “Your anointing is going to take you places you didn’t realize… Phillip, Acts chapter 8.” And after years of waiting it finally came to pass.

First, I never thought I would ever preach in my hometown of New York City. And I definitely never expected Brazil, and now open doors in Africa. None of that was on my radar. Phillip was having revival meetings, seeing healings and salvations, but the Lord reminded me on this trip that it is not just about the big meetings. The Ethiopian eunuch moments are just as important. And while it was wonderful to minister in several larger churches, it was the one-on-one encounters that carried so much power.

The Woman in the Park

We had some time before the service in Juiz de Fora, so we went to a park. I began sharing my testimony with a group of people who were lined up for a flu vaccination.

There was one woman in particular who was visibly touched. She said she was originally going to another park for her vaccination, but something told her to come here instead.

She said she wanted to hear me preach that night, so we gave her Diego’s daughter’s phone number. She came to the service, received the Lord, and told us she had been dealing with nightmares and some type of witchcraft that had been spoken over her.

We brought her up to the altar and the entire church was praying for her. Her life was totally changed, completely transformed. Now she is already joining a women’s group.

And this is just one woman.

The Woman on the Plane

This is something I will never forget for the rest of my life.

Most of what I had been preaching all week was either my testimony, the message about coming out of the world, “which king do you serve”, and seeking His presence with desperation.

On the plane, the woman sitting next to me was reading a book, and the Lord basically told me she was searching for something. I had to wait until we landed, but afterward I showed her something on ChatGPT and told her I was a preacher visiting Brazil. Then I told her, the Lord told me to tell you that whatever you are looking for, you are only going to find it in one place, and that is His presence. She was so moved. She asked me so many questions and wanted to take a picture of my phone.

When we got off the plane and met my interpreter Diego, we started ministering to her right there on the jet bridge. Even the stewardesses were watching and listening to the prayer. Eventually someone from the gate came and told us we had to clear out because they needed to board the next flight. We exchanged information and went our separate ways.

I think we preached at three churches in Brasília. On the last night, I was sharing testimonies about what happens when you truly enter His presence, how He fills you, not for your own benefit, but so that gifts are released to bless others.

I started telling the story about this woman from the plane, and in the middle of my message Diego suddenly yelled out, “There she is!” He started pointing, saying, “That’s the woman right there!” She stood up, and the entire church reacted. The atmosphere in the room was unbelievable. My heart melted when I saw her.

I called her up to the altar and handed her the mic, and she began testifying. She went out to dinner with the pastor, myself and Diego. The things she wrote me afterward were so beautiful, so powerful, worth more than silver or gold. It was a moment that church will never forget. None of us will.

Here’s what she wrote me:

“I wish I had more opportunities to talk with you all—it was a true blessing. You have been, and continue to be, God's answer for my life. I pray that the Holy Spirit keeps illuminating your path and renewing your mind so you may know God's good and perfect will. May the Lord grant you wisdom. May your journey be filled with peace.”

We had so many moments like this. The big meetings were incredible, but it was the one-on-one encounters, those intimate personal moments, the Ethiopian eunuch moments, that the Lord used to remind me of what true ministry really is.

There are two scriptures that come to mind and came to life during this trip:

1 Thessalonians 1:5
“For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance, as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake.”

Isaiah 61:1–2
“The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, because the Lord has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor. He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound. To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn.”

This trip was not really an evangelistic outreach. It was a time of healing, peace, and His presence, which is exactly what I had been praying for. And the pastors were all reporting the same thing.

Even after the service at Bishop Dario’s church, he said something supernatural had happened. The one thing I was filled with on this entire trip was peace and faith, and that was the very thing being reported in the churches, even back in NYC.

I told Ian that the messages the Lord was giving me were going to cut people’s hearts, and they did. And while I wasn’t laying hands on every church I went to, there were moments where it was necessary.

And when it was, what the Lord did was incredible. There were pinpoint words of knowledge, broken hearts being restored, grief being healed. Pastor Claudio can testify that what was happening was not emotionalism. The Holy Spirit was there, touching people in a deep and undeniable way. Every church kept sending the same reports back to Pastor Claudio. It wasn’t really about my preaching. It was about His presence filling the room.

Diego’s Father

We had a number of salvations. I honestly don’t even know how many. But there was one very special one that I need to share.

Even though Helen was persistent about trying to get her passport fixed before the trip, I knew she wasn’t going. I knew part of my mission on this trip was to pour into Diego and help launch him and his wife into their new journey in Christ because they are called to the ministry. And learning more about his wife Janice, and seeing what the Lord is doing in her right now, just solidified the reason why we all met in the first place, especially considering the dreams Helen had about twenty years ago.

During this trip our long-term purpose became abundantly clear, and now we just need a strategy before moving forward.

That said, Diego was a vital part of this mission, because he was able to translate with the same tenderness and passion that I was speaking with. Nothing was lost in translation.He told me about his family. Both his parents are alcoholics, and his sister is a very successful OnlyFans model. In his mind, his whole family was lost and beyond God’s reach. I encouraged him to invite them to one of the services. I even told him exactly what to say.

When he called his mom, she was drunk out of her mind, slurring her words. He kept trying over a few days, but the response was always the same. I heard the conversations myself. We actually went out to dinner with his sister, who honestly seemed like the nicest person, but she is just wrapped up in sin. And his father seemed like the toughest one to reach. He was cold, very hardened, and hated anything to do with church. But he was the one who showed up to the service.

When it came time for the call of salvation he didn’t come to the altar, so I went to him and started ministering to him. He broke. He was crying like a baby when he received the Lord. Diego told me he had never seen his father show any emotion other than anger his entire life.

A few days later his mom called and started asking about Psalm 91. I was telling Diego what to say back to her, and then she began asking for prayer. The restoration of his entire family literally started happening in real time.

And it is only a matter of time before his mom and sister come to the Lord.

“You can reject the truth, but you cannot outrun it. Judgment is eventually coming.”

This was something the Lord gave me at the very beginning of the trip, and I felt compelled to share it many times during the four weeks in Brazil.

College Campuses

Whatever I put down on paper will never fully capture what was happening in the Spirit on both campuses. We had a meeting outdoors in what looked like a small amphitheater. Most of the people who showed up were already walking with the Lord, but while we were waiting for the guitar player, I noticed a group of kids smoking pot and rapping to music.

All fifty to sixty people who were waiting for me to speak watched me walk straight over to those kids and start witnessing to them. I shared my testimony, and sure enough, they ended up coming over and sitting down to hear me speak.

I continued sharing testimonies, and honestly, all of my attention was on those kids I had just reached out to. Then someone came over and pulled all of them away right before I got to the best part of my testimony.

After I finished speaking, people did get saved, but I told the crowd, “Do you remember those kids who were here earlier?” I said, “One man plants, another waters, but it is God who gives the increase.” Then I told them it was now their responsibility to go fishing based on what I shared with them. Those kids who left early? It was now their job to go after them.

I didn’t even realize it at the time, but Diego later showed me that after we prayed for everyone, and while I thought people were just heading home, these college students immediately went out and started sharing the gospel across the campus.

I was shocked at how quickly they went to work.

Your Encounter Outweighs Your Credentials

This was something the Lord spoke to me on November 2nd and told me to share with everyone.

Their encounter with the Lord’s presence will fill them with everything they need to minister to the hurting, the sick, the broken, and the searching. They don’t need a title or a theology degree to move in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Ephesians 3:20  “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,”

This verse came alive in one very unexpected way… the youth!

I still can’t fully explain it, but at every church we visited I was surrounded by the youth, ages twelve to twenty.

On one occasion, an eleven-year-old girl who spoke perfect English pulled me aside and kept thanking me for coming to her church. She told me she understood everything I shared about seeking the presence of God, and she couldn’t stop thanking me for coming.

A twelve-year-old boy came up to me at the end of one of the services, grabbed me, and said, “You were such a blessing to me today. Thank you so much for speaking at our church.”

At one of the services the lights and all the power went out. It was a pretty big church, but without hesitation everyone there turned on the flashlights on their phones and pointed them at the front, and I just kept on preaching. I was teaching on what to expect in His presence, that worship is not a one-way street. When we worship Him in spirit and in truth, the love is reciprocal. The Lord pours out His love, He fills us, and then we pour out into others outside the four walls of the church.

At one of the barbecues for Pastor Claudio’s church, I was completely surrounded by the youth, and we ended up talking for almost two hours.

That’s when I met someone very special, her name is Anelise, and she is the daughter of one of the associate pastors. She, Diego, and I became close very quickly. She started following us to the services and even to dinners with pastors. She speaks perfect English and was translating for me from time to time, but all of us could tell that something was happening, not just with us, but with the youth as a whole. This ignited the beginning of a larger youth strategy that we are going to implement as soon as possible.

On my last night, I preached at a church where there was a true movement of the Spirit. Afterward, when we went out to dinner, I started telling the pastor everything that had been happening with the youth.

When I shared some of the plans we were thinking about, he said he wanted to be part of the meetings we will be streaming to Brazil.

Then something happened that really moved me. One of the young guys asked the pastor if he could switch seats with him so he could talk to me. He had heard that I love cooking, so we started sharing recipes back and forth. The pastor looked at me, pointed, and said, “Now I’m seeing this in real time.” The amazing part is that this kid didn’t even speak English.

In short, I will be streaming youth meetings to a number of churches next year. I spoke with Pastor Claudio and his youth minister, and they were all for it.

Plus, Pastor Claudio’s former youth pastor is now working with Pastor Castro while attending Christ for the Nations, and we will be working on a strategy for his youth as well.

All of this is designed to do one thing, to get these kids into a position where they can start moving in the power of God outside the four walls of the church.

Lastly, and I’m not going to go into great detail here, but after visiting two orphanages, I now fully understand why the Lord connected Helen and me with Pastor Claudio, Bishop Dario, and some of the other pastors, but especially Claudio.

And it is centered around the orphans.

I have a clear understanding of both the short-term and long-term objectives, and they line up exactly with what the Lord showed Helen and me over twenty years ago.

This trip was literally an eye-opener in more ways than I can count.