Blessings in the Battles
January 25, 2022
Dear Friends,
Life is a battle! It isn’t ONLY a battle, but it is a battle. We thank the Lord that we are “more than conquerors through him that loves us.” Throughout 2020, the first year of COVID-19 in the USA and in Brazil, people commented on how bad of a year it was, anxiously waiting for 2021 to arrive. During that same year, our ministries and our personal lives were greatly challenged, yet we saw some of the biggest increases we’d ever experienced. Jesus was Lord in that year! Then, 2021 rolled in and the battles continued. We nearly lost our daughter to COVID, we did lose some church members and we had to adapt our ministries in ways that required extra funding while several of our members were out of work or income. The Lord still blessed, and the congregation grew, and more people were baptized, and we were blessed with the gift of an outreach ministry that only came about BECAUSE of COVID. The battles have been real and not pleasant at all, but through them all, Jesus continued to be our Captain and Lord.
This all brings me to the beginning of 2022. It has begun with more battles. At our first Missionary Training Seminar we were hosting volunteer missionaries from several states for two weeks of evangelistic outreach. The first week of Bible study went without a hitch. Then we proceeded to travel with them into the interior of two states to share the gospel publicly in parks and squares. In just a short time more than half of the team developed symptoms of COVID and the trip had to be aborted. Several of the leaders and volunteers are in isolation, even as I write. Charlene and I both contracted COVID for the second time, but by the grace of God, we have fully recovered. We don’t see these circumstances as being signs of another “bad year.” Rather, we see them as proofs that Jesus’ words that, “in this world, ye shall have tribulation” are true. But we also firmly believe that the rest of that sentence He spoke is true as well, “but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” We know we are in good hands. I can’t honestly say, “Bring on the battles,” without trepidation, but I can say that I know for certain that the Lord will be with us no matter what troubles come our way and I joyfully look forward to the victories that will be ours in Christ Jesus.
Oh, and by the way, we are dealing with the issue of not having enough space for the increase in attendance at our services and we have baptized more new converts in the last several months than in any other equal period in our 36 years of ministry. The Lord is so faithful to keep His promises! We love Him and praise Him.
Thank you who pray faithfully for us, and you who give so that we may be here to serve. We know that you are co-laborers with us in what the Lord is doing here in southern Brazil.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
The Lord Used it for Good
December 16, 2021
Dear Friends,
The apostle, Paul, wrote from prison telling his readers to “rejoice always”. If he could say that honestly from a Roman prison cell, then we should certainly be able to rejoice in every situation in which we find ourselves today. We can and do.
We rejoice mainly because we are certain of our eternal salvation through the grace of God and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. We also rejoice because He not only saved us, but also sustains us every single day. These are facts that we can reflect on in any circumstance and find peace and comfort. I don’t want to lessen in any way the value of the knowledge of these truths because, to be honest, I often need to feed my heart and mind on them.
An amazing thing is that the Lord doesn’t stop there! Beyond His saving and sustaining grace, He has been pouring out large and small blessings on us and our ministries. Charlene is celebrating her 60th birthday tomorrow and I’m a little bit older than she, yet we both enjoy wonderful health due to God’s love and care. Our ministries are steadily increasing in the number of people involved and impacted. Certainly, the enemy attempted to hamper or destroy our evangelistic outreach with this horrible COVID pandemic, but the Lord used it for good, just as He promised. Some of our brothers and sisters in Christ were called home to heaven, yes, but that was to their benefit. The Lord even used the quarantines and lockdowns to teach us new ways to minister and touch people’s lives for good.
Our traveling evangelistic team, Projeto Vida, has just returned from their last trip of the 2021 year, and it was very fruitful. The team traveled to the nation’s capital, Brasilia, and was able to evangelize in the public schools in one of the most ungodly regions of the country. Many youth and several teachers/administrators surrendered their lives to Christ because of these efforts. The president himself asked our team to pray for him at one of his public appearances while they met with him and some other evangelical political leaders.
Early in January we will be hosting our first missions volunteer training seminar. We expect to have college-aged kids from several different states participating in this two-week training program. We will spend the first week teaching the biblical basis for missions/evangelism and then the next week we’ll be taking them to a city in the southernmost state of Brazil, Rio Grande do Sul. That region of Brazil has the reputation for being the most Satan-worshipping part of the country and we know that that is where the greatest need for the glorious, good news of Christ is. Please pray for our workers and the volunteers as they seek to win the lost for God’s glory.
Charlene and I are so grateful for your faithful prayers, concern, and support of our ministries. Thank you.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Enjoying blessed health! 
Worship Service in Curitiba 
Worship Service in Curitiba
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
Souls Saved, Lives Changed
November 20, 2021
Dear Friends,
The expression, ‘very eventful,’ that some of us use to describe a busy period can be a little misleading. All periods of time are filled with events, be they noteworthy or not. I mention this because I was going to start this letter by saying that this past month has been ‘very eventful’, when in fact, every month is, for every person. So, what I will say is that this past month has been filled with some events that were quite noteworthy to us, and we hope to you as well.
The newly ordained pastor, Cledson, and his wife and volunteer leaders took about 40 of our teens to camp this past weekend and the Lord blessed in a tremendous way. Many of the youth were deeply impacted through the daily study of God’s word and the teaching they received. There were six teens who were baptized as followers of Christ at the end of this youth camp.
This last month we also had the privilege of working with one of the Projeto Vida (Project Life) teams in street evangelism. Our Agape team has been called upon to head up a citywide ministry to the homeless. There are many people, including entire families, that are homeless in our capital city. The weather here is generally cool almost year-round and when it gets cold these folks suffer for lack of shelter and warm food. I took three American pastors who came to visit our work out to the minister among those folks who came looking for help. The Lord worked powerfully to convict and save many of these dear people. While some of our team were feeding them, giving them haircuts, a bath and supplying some with shoes, clothing and blankets, we shared the gospel with them and the Lord brought repentance and faith to several. The Agape team leader, Mateus, is doing a fantastic job of following up with those who surrender their life to Christ. Some of them were addicted to cocaine and crack and several have, by God’s grace, gotten their lives cleaned up and have begun new lives living responsibly and drug free. I was so thrilled to see the Lord using me as a translator for these American brothers and know that His grace is never limited by language or bad choices in the past.
One of our friends and Brazilian brothers has been instrumental in a new church plant in a small town not far from the capital. He asked us and the visiting pastors to bring the message to the congregation while they were here. Their services are in a public-school auditorium on Saturday evenings. Since they don’t have a building yet, this allows the pastor to continue to minister at his sending church for the time being and there is no cost to rent the location. This setup also puts the new church in the middle of the community where they want to make an impact for Christ.
The larger building that we thought that we would be moving our church into last month didn’t work out. It was a little bit of an emotional letdown, but we know that the Lord is in control of all things and that this was not something that slipped by Him. We will continue to look, but we are also actively working on how to hold two services and two Bible study hours each Sunday to deal with the overflowing attendance. We pray for the Lord to give us wisdom and guidance through this process of growth plans. We are also thankful that this is the kind of problem that we are dealing with.
Thank you for your faithful prayers and support. Have a great holiday season.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
Ordinations, Outgrowing Space, & Couples Being Used in Ministry
October 20, 2021
Dear Friends,
I can’t use the word ‘proud’, because it would assume that some credit goes to us, but we are very grateful and thankful to the Lord for our couple’s ministry leaders, Edinei and Debora. The husband, Edinei was an eight-year-old boy when we met him 35 years ago. His dad was an alcoholic and his family had no interest in the things of the Lord. Charlene and I started a children’s Bible club in the garage behind our house and Edinei was one of the first kids from our neighborhood to accept an invitation to come. He started attending weekly and eventually brought several other members of his family. Edinei came to know Jesus as his Savior and Lord and has been faithful in Christian service for all these many years. His wife, Debora, was 11 when we met her. Her father and brother were doing some remodeling work for us on our house. We became friends with their entire family back in 1995 and since then, she, her mother, sister, brother, and several other family members have surrendered to Christ. Both Edinei and Debora volunteer many hours each month in ministering to the married couples in our church and in evangelistic events to married couples. This weekend they are holding a retreat where we will work together to evangelize and teach 30 couples for three days. Charlene and I feel like the two are practically our children, but more than that they are God’s children and our co-laborers in His service. We are thankful for them.
This next Sunday we’ll have the privilege of ordaining two young men to Gospel ministry, Cledson and Adriel. Cledson is our youth minister and has been doing a fantastic job together with his wife, Fabiane. Our youth group has grown from 8 to 35 under their leadership in the last year.
Adriel and his wife, Lorena, are our traveling evangelistic team leaders. That ministry is made up of 12 volunteers who travel by a 15 passenger van throughout Brazil and South America taking the gospel to public schools and parks. Adriel has proven to be a wise leader to his team and a very effective evangelist to students and adults. It will be a joy and blessing to ordain these two men as dedicated servants of the Lord in spreading the gospel and discipling converts.
October 12th is a national holiday in Brazil (a patron saint’s day). Informally it has become “Children’s Day” for more commercial reasons. For whatever reason the day is celebrated, we took advantage of the long weekend to do a special event to attract families with their kids to our ‘Children’s Day’ gospel play. Our drama team worked for many weeks in rehearsals and stage preparations to perform the play in two services. The team did an outstanding job, working with a great attitude and sweet spirit despite the long hours and the personal cost of travel back and forth to practice for several weeks. The Lord blessed and we did have one 11-year-old boy make a public profession of faith in the Lord. The folks who were on the team were also greatly motivated by their participation in the event and the great reviews from those who watched. In fact, someone who saw a video of the presentation who attends a different church has asked our drama team if they would give the presentation at their church as well.
The Children’s Day presentation also helped us to come to a huge decision. We must move to a larger building. For the event we just held, we asked the church members to divide into two groups in order have a smaller congregation at each presentation, allowing the people who would come as guests to have a seat in our crowded auditorium. It helped some, but our last service was stilled packed to the max. This with only half of our regular congregation in each service and more than 30 workers behind the curtains engaged in the presentation. We are presently in the process of signing papers on a larger building. We pray the Lord will guide and provide as we seek to grow this church and as we train leaders to go out to begin new works as well.
We are super excited with all that the Lord is doing through and in us.
Thank you for your prayers and concern for us.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
Praying for a Young Teen to Stay Faithful to His Savior
September 22, 2021
Dear Friends,
I just came home from a visit with a 19-year-old young man who is reaping some results of bad choices. In case he or a friend reads this report, I will refrain from printing his name. In my conversations with his mother, his grandmother and with the young man himself, I can understand a lot of the factors that contributed to his getting onto the wrong path in life. His father has been a drug addict most of the son’s life and his parents eventually divorced and he has been without a father present in the home for several years. I had this young man as a student in my English classes a few years ago and I discovered that he is very intelligent and has a captivating personality. What I see in him is a lot of potential, but a lack of self-discipline and a lot of pent-up anger. Instead of applying his intelligence and natural charm to a constructive lifestyle, he has made a series of terrible choices. To assuage his anger about his absent father and lack of the nicer things in life, he chose to use marijuana and other drugs. His habit increased but his income didn’t, so he resorted to another horrible choice, to sell drugs to afford more. He got caught by the police and went to prison. His sentence was 5 years.
I had shared the gospel with him when he was my English student and, while he was in prison, he began to read the Bible vigorously. The Lord had mercy on him, and he came to a saving relationship with Christ. His behavior and his attitudes changed, and he was released from prison for good behavior after five months of serving his five-year sentence. He is on probation and must use an ankle monitor, but at least he is not still behind bars. My visit this morning was occasioned by a plea from his grandmother, who is a member of my church. She had started to see her grandson begin to make some bad choices again and she’s afraid that he’ll end up back on the same terrible path he was on before. I had a great conversation with him, and I believe that the Lord used me to help him work out some practical steps for him to avoid the pitfalls that led to his earlier situation. The great difference now is that he is a true child of God through faith in the Lord and he has the presence of the Holy Spirit to empower him to make right choices and to hold to them. On a very practical level, I am going to go and pick him up and take him to church this weekend to meet some dedicated youth that will be glad to befriend him and help him leave behind those bad habits and develop healthy new ones. As you think of him, please pray that he stays faithful to his Savior.
All praise to God, the COVID cases have nearly disappeared from our area and this has led our schools to have regular in-person classes again. Our evangelistic teams are getting invitations from several schools to come and minister to their students and staff. I know this sounds odd for public schools, and it is. The main reason this is happening is the work of the Lord, of course. On the human level, our strategy is helped by having “insiders” in some of the schools. Last week was one such case. A member of my church is one of the assistant principals and she presented to the head principal proof of our team’s track record of working with students who were unruly and problematic before, but who became well-behaved and cooperative after our evangelistic program in their school. We are excited that our team is getting more and more of these opportunities. Our volunteers are thrilled that they are again able to share the gospel nearly every week with hundreds of students and their school staff.
Please keep us in your prayers as we seek to honor the Lord with the opportunities afforded us. Thank you for your concern and faithful prayers on our behalf.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
Healing Grace and Souls Saved
August 27, 2021
Dear Friends,
Charlene and I got a message from our daughter, Jessie, early in August telling us that she had COVID. She had been working at camp with a group of youth from her church the week before. Several members of her team had contracted COVID about the same time as she. Charlene and I have both had the virus, so we know it is a serious illness, but we both recovered quite well and were expecting that Jessie would do the same. After a week of Jessie getting sicker and being admitted into the hospital, Charlene and I decide that we should travel to Tampa, Florida to give our daughter some moral support. We wouldn’t be able to visit her in the hospital, but she would know that we were near. The day we arrived in Tampa, Jessie’s doctor called me and told me not to lose hope, that there were still a couple of things that they could do to try to help her. We didn’t even know that she was so sick that we should lose hope in the first place! The doctor made it very clear that Jessie was struggling for life. After getting off the phone with the doctor, Charlene and I nearly lost it. We cried like we have never cried before. Our baby girl was hanging in the balance of life and death and we weren’t even aware of it. In my prayer immediately after this call, I confessed to the Lord that I trusted completely in Him and that I knew that, before Jessie was my girl, she was His girl. I did also share with the Lord that I didn’t feel like I was ready for Him to take her home yet. I asked Him for mercy and healing grace. After our personal prayers, I contacted our sending church’s pastor, Darrell Messer, and the executive secretary of Baptist Faith Missions, Dave Parks, and asked them to spread the news of Jessie’s condition with everyone they could. I also contacted my church in Brazil and our ministry volunteers from Projeto Vida and asked them all to pray earnestly for Jessie’s healing. Folks, let me say to the Glory of God, He began immediately to bring healing into Jessie’s body. The very next morning, Jessie’s doctor called me again and told me that she was improving quickly. The next day she messaged me to say that if she continued to improve at the rate that she was improving that she would be released from the hospital in two to three days. It wasn’t two to three days, the next day she was released to go home. She was given some medicine to continue taking at home, but she never went backward after those prayers began to be offered on her behalf. Six days after the doctor first told me how sick Jessie was, she was already home from the hospital and back to work! Our God is an amazing God. He hears and He answers prayer. We know that He would still be God and He would still be good if He saw fit to take Jessie on to heaven, but we are extremely grateful that He had mercy on us, her parents, to heal her and give her more opportunities to serve Him here in this world. We praise His Name! We know that some of you heard of Jessie’s condition and prayed for her healing, and we want to take this opportunity to thank you for your earnest and effective prayers.
We are also happy to share that our evangelistic outreach teams are being able to get back into the public schools and parks here in Brazil. This past week they ministered in a small town about halfway across our state toward Paraguay. The Lord blessed and there were over 20 professions of faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Many of those who surrendered to Christ had never heard a clear presentation of the gospel. The team’s volunteers were amazed at how the Lord used them to minister to people who felt hopeless. We pray that the doors of opportunity will remain open and that no more lockdowns will interfere with being able to get into the public schools and town squares with the message of God’s love.
We serve a mighty and good God, and we are grateful. Thank you to those who pray for us and give so that we may continue to serve Him here in southern Brazil.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
A Soldier Called Home
May 28, 2021
Dear Friends,
In a letter I wrote a couple of months ago I told about a dear couple, Emmanuel and Maria, who had retired from their secular jobs to engage in fulltime evangelism. Both, they and their grown children all contracted COVID in March and were treated with medications to recover. All six of them recovered from COVID, but sadly, Emmanuel suffered heart failure due to pre-existing conditions and the Lord saw fit to take him on to heaven. His family and our church family are very sad that he is no longer with us, but we do rejoice that Emmanuel has finished his race and is enjoying the presence of our Savior. Even while he was in the hospital he was a soldier for the Lord. Four people who were either roommates or visitors came to know Christ through his testimony and that of his family as they shared their faith through the gospel.
Nearly a year ago, a teenage girl who attended our services turned to Christ and was baptized. Her parents are divorced and she divides her time, living with both parents for a couple of weeks at a time. Both of her parents have been Spiritists (demon worshippers) all of her life. When she first wanted to be baptized, her father wouldn’t allow it. She respected her father’s will and waited to be baptized until he gave his permission. Her changed behavior after her conversion was so stark that her father was convicted of his own need for forgiveness and just last week we baptized him after his surrender to Christ! It is amazing to see how joyful this man has become. We are now praying for the girl’s mother to come to Christ also.
Charlene and I want to thank you who pray for us faithfully. We see constantly evidence of God’s blessings upon our health and fruit in our ministries and we are grateful to you who pray and give that we may continue serving here in Curitiba, Brazil.
In Christ’s love,
Bobby and Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
Major Adjustments in the Last Year
Charlene Wacaser has served the Lord with her husband Bobby as a church planter in Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, since
1985.
Hello, dear friends,
It has been just a little over a year now that our life routines were drastically changed. With several lockdowns and worship services online only, I had to make some major adjustments. Added to this, our region went through a yearlong drought and water was rationed. The supply was cut off every thirty-six hours for thirty-six hours and I had to schedule my cleaning routine such as washing dishes, laundry and baths.
Our outreach ministries were also affected. We had to discontinue our English classes and suspend our children’s Bible classes. What I had to do was to learn how to teach and counsel through the Internet. That isn’t really how I prefer to communicate with others, but I had to adjust to the new restrictions.
Our fortieth wedding anniversary came around during this period and we had planned to take a small special vacation, but because of travel restrictions we had to stay home and be creative. It actually turned out pretty nice. Bobby helped me prepare a very nice romantic dinner and we thoroughly enjoyed our special day together.
Our grandson, Jayce, is now three years old and we miss him greatly. We thank God for the technology that allows us to interact with him and our children, even though we can’t be with them as often as we’d like. At least he knows us and recognizes us by sight and the sound of our voice.
My main prayer request is that I will stay encouraged in and through these new challenges. I need the Lord’s wisdom to know how to be effective for kingdom work with a whole new set of circumstances. I am very grateful to you who pray for us and support us faithfully.
Charlene Wacaser
Contact Info:
Bobby & Charlene Wacaser
Rua Laudelino Ferreira Lopes, 279
Sobrado 1, Novo Mundo
81050-310 Curitiba, PR. Brasil
Phone: 55-41-99899-2333
bobbymichael_1@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online
Read more
