Flies from the heavens

Bennie's Cessna 206 docked on a river where we fished.

When I first met Pastor Bennie I wasn't sure what to think.  He's still a bit of an enigma, even after (or maybe because of) all the stories I've heard about him.  Like the time he tied a live pig on the top of one of his airplane's floats, only to find it dangling at the end of the rope mid-flight.  I'm not sure what happened to the pig.  Bennie, on the other hand, is still going strong after almost 50 years of missionary service in Brazil.  He and his wife have overseen the planting of over 400 churches in the Amazon basin.  Bennie was a float-plane pilot before he moved to Brazil from Canada, and he continues to use aviation to help train leaders, visit churches and oversee the many believers that live in the many backwaters of the Amazon river basin.  

For several years, Asas de Socorro has been maintaining Bennie's Cessna 206 and 172, both float-planes.  For the past couple months we have been rebuilding the floats of his 172.  It's a big job, drilling out and replacing around 8,000 rivets.  We've been working with a parts supplier out of Canada and when one of their employees learned about what we were doing he decided to come down to Brazil for 2 weeks and help us with the project.  While the rebuild project has been time consuming and tedious, it's such a practical way that we are able to help Bennie and his ministry - saving him tens of thousands in dollars. 

 

Jason, who visited from Canada to help with our project, myself, Joel, and Ryan, fellow mechanics, riveting on one of the floats.

All of the old skins and parts removed from the floats, most of the parts were replaced due to 40 years of wear and corrosion.

A couple of weeks ago my father-in-law Larry and I got the chance to go fishing with Pastor Bennie.  He appears to truly delight in taking visitors on trips to the interior in his plane to secret fishing spots that he has learned about over the years.  Being from Canada, he is a fly fisherman and ties his own flies.  Over the years he's come up with a fly that the Peacock Bass can't resist.  He told us how he always takes a can of the flies with him on flights.  When he sees someone paddling a canoe on a river below he swoops in low (probably scaring the daylights out of the unsuspecting paddler in the process) and drops a jar of his special flies.  In the can is a note inviting them to his church the next time they are in town.  He says he has lost track of how many people have come through their church and eventually come to know Christ, all because of the fishing flies from the sky.

  

Larry and I on our fishing expedition.

Sometimes I can lose sight of my role in the big picture of mission work here in Brazil.  I'm reminded though, that God has called each of us to do our part in reaching the lost, and no matter our role it is equally important.  Whether it is driving rivets into floats, tossing flies out the window or, like so many of you, supporting us through prayer and financial giving.