Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [November 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
November 4, 2013
I really do want to give my ministry trainees opportunities to practice what they are taught, but I wasn’t really planning that the need would be so soon and so personally connected to me. It was only a few days after I shared how I was working to prepare some young men for leadership service when I had to have reconstructive surgery done on one of my knees that will have me off my feet for several weeks. The young man, Alek, that I mentioned in my last letter preached in my place this past Sunday and did a great job. It was his first time of teaching and administering the Lord’s Supper. Another young man, Tony, who I mentioned last month will be performing the baptism of at least 3 new converts. I am grateful to the Lord for providing me with these men, even if my being sidelined is necessary for them to be placed into these ministry opportunities. I didn’t think it would be necessary to lay me aside to provide this training experience, but I’m sure that isn’t all the Lord is up to by doing it this way. I do know that I am not irreplaceable and I actually am happy to see these men embrace these ministry opportunities. I will be more attentive, though, to seek to involve the others on a practical level if it will help me avoid hospital and recuperation time.
On December 1st we will be holding what we hope to be a very fruitful marriage workshop. The breakdown of family values in our culture runs head-on against the innate knowledge that true love needs bounds and principles. This dilemma generates an openness to our efforts to provide the tools and teaching that will help couples find the Lord’s Word as their solution. We understand that they need Christ Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior, but we believe that this marriage workshop is a tool that He has provided for us to get that message across to people who wouldn’t ordinarily set foot inside a church building. We are not tricking anyone. They may come only to improve their marriage, but we seek to lead them to the One who will give them true life, and a better marriage as a side effect. Please pray for us as we invest our time, energy and resources into a God-blessed marriage workshop.
One of our outreach teams just returned from an evangelistic trip into the interior of the state we live in. They were ministering in some public schools and parks through gospel skits, testimonies and preaching. The team was blessed by the response they saw in each place of ministry and by seeing people surrender their lives to Christ. The church they were there to aid was blessed and the group returned home rejoicing. The very morning after their return to the home base, one of the leaders went to a local grocery store to get a few things for his and his wife’s breakfast. As he was leaving the grocery, three young men pulled a knife on him and forced him to give them his wallet and they tried to take his purchases also. He was able to get away without being injured, but they robbed him of his money and most of his breakfast. He was very distraught and especially because he had to return home to his wife with no money and little to eat. He called me while he was still unnerved by the incident and I assured him that we would make sure that he got some more groceries and that we will help them get through the month because of the loss of his money. Our city is getting more and more violent, but we are grateful for the Lord’s constant care and protection. We appreciate your prayers for us as we seek to make God’s word known here.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Sobrado 1, Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [October 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
October 4, 2013
Dear Friends,
So many opportunities surround us that we have to really focus so as not to attempt to put too many irons in the fire. If I had four times the number of committed volunteers than I have now, we still wouldn’t be able to fill every opening that’s available. That is why I must focus on multiplying leaders. My natural tendency would be to run from one urgent situation to the other, trying to handle each need, but I would only poorly address the issue and would soon be off in a rush to poorly address the next urgent situation. The Lord is helping me understand the Apostle Paul’s instructions to Timothy to take what I’ve learned from the Scriptures and teach it to faithful men who will then teach that to yet other faithful men. Alek, Tony, Daniel, Ruvian, Rafa, Brennen, Marcio, Aurelio and Guilherme are several of just such men. I am investing my time, energy and resources in them so that all of us may be more effective in spreading the Gospel and developing followers of Christ. These young men are exciting to train and their exuberance in their walk with the Lord helps me to stay encouraged as I see growth in their spiritual lives. As a result of their increase in knowledge and faith, our church is growing steadily and we are able to plan to launch new churches in the near future.
Two of the men mentioned above, Tony and Alek, are putting audacious faith into practice. They both want to serve as pastor/missionaries, so they are seeking ways to earn a living for themselves and their families, but reduce the hours they have to work at their income earning jobs so that they will have more time to invest into ministry. Tony is praying for a job that will allow him to work about 9 days a month and will still pay about what he makes at present as a mechanic. In order for him to get this job, he had to take a written test (which he already passed) and will still have to take a physical test to confirm the position. He isn’t just sitting around waiting for the Lord to miraculously give him the job, though. He was overweight for the job description and couldn’t meet the physical demands. Ever since he began praying for the job, he has been cautious of his eating habits and has been exercising daily. He has lost over 40 lbs and has increased his overall physical strength. Alek’s job opportunity will require that he pass a very difficult written exam. He has been investing time, energy and funds into his studies to prepare for this test while he prays that the Lord opens the door. They both understand that faith without works is dead. They know that only the Lord can give them these jobs, but they are working diligently to exercise their faith through deeds. In fact, it is because they trust the Lord that they are motivated to prepare themselves to walk through the doors when they open. These men are great examples of the type of leaders we want in our churches. I pray that the Lord will bless their faith and give them these jobs so that they will have more time available for ministry.
The Alpha team bus that was damaged in the accident last month will require some extensive and expensive repairs. The initial estimate is around $7,000. The Alpha team missionaries borrowed the Logos bus that was not scheduled for interstate travel and continued their journey to Rio de Janeiro to minister in spite of the trauma and sadness they suffered from the death of the other vehicle’s driver and passenger. The Lord blessed their three weeks of ministry and evangelism and many people became followers of Christ. We still need to do the repairs on the Alpha bus and will need the funds to do so. If you sense that God would have you to contribute to this need, please label your gift, “Alpha Bus”. It would be greatly appreciated and used to take the gospel to the lost in locations where there are no churches.
Charlene, Brennen and I are very grateful to you who pray for us and who give financially that we may live and serve the Lord in southern Brazil.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Sobrado 1, Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
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Prayer Request: Projeto Vida Wreck in Brazil
From Bobby Wacaser, Missionary to Brazil on September 11, 2013
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, please pray for our ministry partners, Projeto Vida! I just got word from Pastor Paulo that our Alpha team was involved in a collision with a small delivery truck. The driver and the passenger in the truck were killed. On our bus/motorhome there were some cuts and bruises, but nothing extremely serious.
Our prayers are with the families of the occupants of the truck. May the Lord comfort them and use this event to help them find Him to be their only source of strength and hope. Our prayers are with Victor, our driver who is terribly shaken by this event and all the other 12 missionaries who, too, are understandably distraught at this time. Thank you for your prayers.
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Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [September 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
September 9, 2013
Dear Friends,
Charlene and I had to make an emergency return to the USA because of the accidental death of her oldest brother, Wayne Adams. Charlene and her family are being greatly comforted by the Lord’s grace. I took the opportunity at his funeral service to share the gospel and preach the Word of God. God blessed and touched Charlene’s youngest brother’s (Kelly) heart. Both I and another brother-in-law shared the gospel with him on a couple of other occasions during our short stay there in Georgia. We are praying that Kelly will fully surrender his life to Jesus as Lord and Savior.
We have returned to our work in southern Brazil where the Lord continues to bless. We have had new visitors at virtually every service for the last several weeks. We are also seeing a greater commitment to involvement and Bible study in the lives of those attending regularly. We held what we call “WordFest 2013”. This event is a challenge for the members to read a full book of the Bible (on this occasion it was Deuteronomy) in a 3 week period of time, and to memorize a full chapter of the Bible (Psalm 136) during the same time period. We had about 50 percent of the congregation to successfully complete the challenge. This was our first WordFest at the new church and we are hoping to have a better rate of participation and completion on our next one. Still further, we saw and heard of the blessing this feasting on the Word brought about in the lives of several of the participants.
Our winter is gradually coming to an end. Amazingly in our city we saw snow for the first time since coming here in 1986. We had heard that snow fell and “stuck” back in 1975, but we it hadn’t snowed here since then. It must be that global warming junk that caused it. Now that warmer weather is moving in, we should also start to see even greater increases in attendance at our services. The longer days will also allow us to get out on the streets and find more people available with whom we can share the gospel. Our missionary interns (3 youth from the USA) left a few weeks ago to go back to college. Their stay with us was a blessing to us and we hope it was to them also.
One of our Projeto Vida evangelistic teams will be leaving tomorrow to go to some poor neighborhoods in Rio de Janeiro for 3 weeks. There will be around 14 volunteer missionaries traveling in the motorhome/traveling headquarters. They will be assisting a local Baptist church there in taking the gospel into the public schools and parks. Since I last wrote to you a couple of months ago we have presented the Word of God to over 10,000 people through skits, testimonies and messages preached. Many individuals surrendered to Christ as their Lord and Savior.
Pastor Paulo Novaes, the main leader of Projeto Vida, had a serious automobile accident a few weeks ago while returning from a weekend of ministry and a wedding he officiated. He had spent 3 days and two nights in strenuous ministries and was exhausted, but felt that he needed to return to our home base by the beginning of the following week. While driving in the mountains, he dozed at the wheel and hit an embankment and flipped the vehicle on its top. By God’s grace no one was seriously injured. He did suffer a head laceration that required 17 stitches to close, but thankfully, nothing more serious happened. His wife, Luiza, uses a pacemaker and was accompanying him. Also his sister-in-law, who has a transplanted kidney, was with him and neither was seriously injured. There was another young man, Daniel, who was in the front seat and he also escaped injury. The gravity of this accident and the total destruction of the vehicle only prove that the Lord was protecting them. They all are greatly used in taking the gospel to thousands and their death would be a great loss to our ministries. We are thankful for His gracious care and protection.
Thank you for your constant and effectual prayers on our behalf.
May the Lord bless,
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
robertmw[at]brturbo.com.br
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Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [July 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
July 4, 2013
Dear Friends,
We are in the middle of one of those experiences that we have been privileged to enjoy several times since beginning our ministry in Brazil. On several occasions we have been asked to host individual youth in our home who were sensing a call from the Lord to use their life in missions or gospel ministry and who wanted to have a cross-cultural experience to validate that call.
This summer (our winter in southern Brazil), we are getting that privilege threefold. We are hosting two teenage girls from the Tampa, Florida area and one young man from the Houston, Texas area. I am going to let them share with you a short report of their experience as they traveled and ministered together with our outreach ministry, Projeto Vida, on a three week mission trip to the cities of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo. They traveled with a team of 12 Brazilian missionaries in a motorhome, which was their “home” for three weeks.
Carley Clark (age nineteen from Brandon, Florida)
“And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name. And daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ.” (Acts 5:41-42)
When I first came to Brazil in 2010, I began to feel the call to missions. Every year that I came back to Brazil with my student ministry, the call became stronger and stronger. In August of 2012, I felt the Lord calling me to come to Brazil for a summer to experience the true life of a missionary–not just the week-long trip that I had experienced several times before. I thought that I was prepared for everything until I went on a three week long trip with Projeto Vida to Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo.
The Wacasers’ summer interns! The last girl on the right is Rachel Weaver, another intern, but she’ll be around for 10 months, not just the summer.
Our first week in Rio was really great. We were able to witness to a lot of people and many people from the church responded to the call to missions. We left this church to go stay at a camp for what I thought was a couple of days, but turned out to be for a week and a half. The camp that we stayed at was in rough state. The room that the girls stayed in had dirty concrete floors, the bathroom was disgusting and had no doors to the stalls or the showers, and there were spiders and bugs everywhere. I was not excited to spend the next few days here. The next morning, I woke up with an eye infection, a cold, and what seemed like a thousand mosquito bites all over my legs. I was really missing my family, and I had no way of contacting them. I was also on clothes washing duty, so I spent the day with a few others washing the clothes of fifteen people by hand, and later that day I took a freezing cold shower.
While thinking about how awful my circumstances seemed to be, I thought back to my devotional time a few days before where I read about how the apostles were beaten and left rejoicing because they were counted worthy to suffer for the Name. Day after day, no matter what their circumstances were, they preached the gospel, and that is what we are called to do. I realized how selfish I was being and that I needed to rejoice that I am counted worthy to suffer for the gospel. When I take an abundance of cold showers- I rejoice. When I have an eye infection and a cold- I rejoice. When I have to paint Spiderman on a little boy’s face who probably hasn’t had a shower in a week- I rejoice. I’ve learned that missions is not easy. It’s not glamorous. It’s exhausting. But it’s worth it. We are called to spread the love of Christ to the nations and I rejoice that God has chosen me to share His Name to the people of Brazil this summer!
Paige Rechsteiner (age 19 from Tampa, Florida)
One of the days when we were in Sao Paulo we went to an area with favelas, which are like small shacks stacked on top of each other. This area was known for being rough and for drug trafficking so we decided it would be best if no pictures were taken. Two other girls and I were face painting for the kids and it was awesome to see that a simple design on the children’s faces would make them so happy. Few of the children had nice clothes and they didn’t smell very good, but God reminded me how dirty we are with sin. We are filthy and smelly in His eyes, but God still looks to us with open arms and a loving heart, which is exactly how He wanted us to look at those children. No matter how dirty or smelly they were, I still wanted them to come to me and talk to me. And when they saw their face colorful with paint, they were happy and all of their smiles that day made being there worth it.
Trent Smith (age 20 from Lufkin, Texas)
My first trip with the Alpha Team of Projeto Vida to Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo was incredible! I met the team in Rio during their time of rest after they had already worked with another church the week before. It was nice to arrive during their days of rest as it gave me an opportunity to get to know the people that were with Alpha team. It also gave me an opportunity to learn some skits that we would perform before we went into schools.
There are two things that stick out in my mind about the trip that are special to me. While we were putting on a presentation in a school in Rio de Janeiro, I was praying for the people that were present and listening to the presentation. I looked up and noticed that many members of the team had their head down and were praying for the presentation as a whole as well. This happened without any prompting from the leaders of the team. It was a blessing to see people responding to the Spirit prompting them to pray!
The other moment that is really special to me happened on our first night in Sao Paulo. Daniel and Victor, two of the leaders, had asked me to play guitar and sing a song at the end of the church service that we were attending. I was feeling really negative about the whole thing. I’m not really sure why, but I just kept thinking, “They aren’t going to understand the words because I’m singing in English.” And I just thought that it was going to be awkward with no actual worship taking place. As I began to sing, everyone present began to sing along in a beautiful mixture of English and Portuguese. God was able to use me, despite my bad attitude, to lead people to the throne in worship. I was floored. That is a moment that I will never forget.
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
robertmw[at]brturbo.com.br
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Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [June 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
Dear Friends,
I’m not writing to make you envious, but I can’t help but mention just how wonderful everything is these days. Everyone in the family is doing very well physically. The weather here is as close to ideal as I could want it and all of our ministry efforts are producing encouraging results. I trust that you can rejoice together with us for these blessings.
We celebrated another baptismal service recently and we have another young lady who will be baptized this coming Sunday. We are so happy to see how the Lord is using His word to transform the lives of several of our new brothers and sisters in Christ. Just two weeks ago a teenage girl had nearly fallen into the world of sexual promiscuity, but the Lord used a series of events and our team leaders to rescue her from that and get her onto the path of obedience and joy in living for Christ. It is nothing short of amazing to see how different her level of happiness is since surrendering to Christ and fleeing immorality.
A young father of four, named Germano, almost lost his life recently when he was shot twice in a bar room fight. This fight occurred just one day after he had brought his kids to our neighborhood outreach “shin-dig”. While Germano was in the hospital his kids asked their grandfather to take them back to the church where they had been so warmly received on the following Sunday, so he did. The kids haven’t stopped coming since and, once Germano recuperated sufficiently to walk, he began to come with the kids to services. He told me last week how thrilled he is to see God at work in his life and how thankful he is for the grace of the Lord’s mercy and forgiveness. I expect that I’ll be performing another baptism in the very near future.
We had a Brazilian holiday just recently and we took advantage of it to have a “family day” at our church building. One new member specializes in Brazilian “churrasco” and insisted on preparing the 70 lbs of slow-grilled beef ribs. He and two other volunteers came out at 4:00 a.m. to roast the meat for 9 hours. We encouraged our members and visitors to invite their un-churched friends and family at no cost to enjoy the day of fun, games and fellowship. We had a great turnout and several of those have since returned to our regularly scheduled services.
Charlene, Brennen and I thank you so much for your prayers and faithful support so that we may continue to be used of the Lord to make His love and glory known in southern Brazil.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
robertmw[at]brturbo.com.br
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Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [April 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
Dear Friends,
I want to start with some really great news! Next Sunday we will be baptizing 4 new converts. The Lord is blessing our efforts as we seek to share the gospel in our new community. We have seen a steady increase in attendance in our services and we hear great testimonies to what God is doing in the lives of those who are applying the messages from God’s Word in their lives. We have nearly completed the construction on the building, needing only to place the final one third of the ceiling tiles by the end of this week.
The group of teens from Bell Shoals Baptist Church in Brandon, Florida came last month and worked diligently sharing the gospel through skits and personal testimony. There were 55 of them, including their adult sponsors and we were privileged to have our daughter, Jessie, come with them as our translator coordinator. Our translators here in Brazil also did a wonderful job of voluntary service for nearly a week. The Lord used all the effort and dedication to bring many people to Christ in the public schools and parks. During the week, the group as a whole was able to share the gospel with over 4000 individuals. Projeto Vida, our outreach partners, served as an essential element in transporting the teams, providing the public address system and also prepared the meals for over 100 people twice daily. The service of hosting this group of young people each year has yielded marvelous results. Several of the teens who have come in the past years have since accepted the missionary call for overseas service. Also, many of those who have received Christ as Lord of their lives through their gospel presentations are now faithfully involved in local church ministries. We have another group of youth coming in August of this year from the Houston, Texas area. We are looking forward to seeing how God will use this group also for the glory of His name and for the salvation of many lost ones.
We had a mountaintop experience around the middle of the March, literally. As often as possible we schedule a mountain climb with those who’ll accept the challenge. Our purposes for these excursions are: 1) to provide an opportunity to establish a deeper friendship with folks who aren’t yet attending church, 2) seek to display our relationship with Christ in an “outside the church building” environment, 3) motivate both our church members and prospective converts to take care of their bodies through strenuous exercise, 4) teach all the participants to appreciate and praise the Lord for the beauty of His creation; the lovely mountains, rivers and forest around us. We have discovered that these mountain excursions serve as a good way to invite non-church goers to a church event that doesn’t seem threatening or “churchy.” Once they have participated with us on one of these climbs, they almost always follow up by coming to our church services.
Our American Football training camp is coming up in early June. We are still hammering out the details so that we might make the best use of the personnel who’ll be involved. We have the participation of at least one former NFL player (Johnny Mitchell – former Dallas Cowboys, and New York Jets), his brother, Gregg Booth – former Arena Football. We still have opportunities available for high school and college coaches and players to teach and execute the skills of the sport. Please pray that the Lord would give me wisdom on how to best administer this training camp for the spread of the gospel among the Brazilian athletes and their families and staff.
Thank you for your faithful prayers and support.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
robertmw[at]brturbo.com.br
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Missionary Update: The Wacasers in Brazil [March 2013]
Bobby, Charlene, Jessie, and Brennen Wacaser have served the Lord as church planters in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since 1985.
Dear Friends,
In just 2 days (March 9th) I will have one of the greatest pleasures that I can imagine – to have my wife and 2 kids working together with me side-by-side sharing the gospel with the community of people the Lord has placed me in. My daughter, Jessie, will be arriving with a group of 55 youth and their leaders from Brandon, Florida to minister in our community for one week. Jessie serves as the coordinator of my group of translators. My son, Brennen, is only 15, but has been helping as a translator for over 9 years. He has been getting more excited by the day as we await this group of dedicated youth. I can’t even begin to describe how much of a joy it is to work together with my wife, Charlene. For you who have met her personally, it is easy to understand my feelings. Her sweet disposition and tireless work ethic keep me motivated even when I feel like I can hardly keep going. I never cease to be amazed at how the Lord takes the humble and meek to display His greatness and power, and not our own. We will have three of the Project Life teams working in and around our community for a week trying to reach every house and individual with the love of Christ. Our New Church will seek to follow up on the results of this week of outreach ministry by the visiting group from Bell Shoals Baptist Church.
I am still praying and hoping to be able place a competent leader at the head of a new mission point at Corbélia, a newly established community on the outskirts of our city. The man and his wife, whom I had hoped would accept this challenge, have declined stating that they didn’t think they were quite ready for this level of responsibility. I have another young man and his wife in mind for a more distant future leadership role, but they are key parts of my team at the new church and I wouldn’t like to see that workforce depleted at this stage. Please pray that the Lord would give me wisdom about who and when I need to really invest into planting a church in that community.
The progress of the plans to evangelize and disciple through American football is moving forward steadily. Once again I would like to encourage anyone with experience in football and would like to use that experience for sharing the love of Christ to contact me as soon as possible. Also, the team who will be coming to donate their time, expertise and spend the funds for travel and lodging need football equipment to bring with them. If you have good used equipment, or know where we can get some donated for this purpose, I would also appreciate your contacting me. With the date of this ministry coming up soon, I must ask you to act soon.
Today the material needed to put the ceiling in our new church will arrive. Also, the painter of the sign on the front of our building is working as I write and that job should be finished in two days. The Lord has greatly blessed. We are completing the finishing touches on this building and we’ve been blessed to reach this point without incurring debt, except the debt of love to God and to those who gave sacrificially to make Christ’s name known and praised by many.
We are grateful.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby, Charlene and Brennen Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279-1
Bairro Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR Brasil
(813)436-9980
robertmw[at]brturbo.com.br
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