Piracãoera Water Filters

Last weekend I had the privilege to taking my first water filter boat trip out on the Amazon River.  One of the ministries at PAZ is to provided biological water filters to families in locations where there is no access to a clean water supply.  These are often river villages that are located in the flood plane of the Amazon River or a tributary.  Normally water is  taken from the River itself and used for drinking, cooking, and cleaning.  This water is so contaminated that its use often leads to continuous health problems for the villagers and even death in some cases.

PAZ will use these filters as a means to enter a village and share the gospel.  One advantage of these filters is that they require maintenance and thus follow-up visits with the owners.  Local PAZ river workers are then able to return to homes and continue to visit with these families, having multiple opportunities to share and pray with the families.

The villages of Piracaoera and Urucuratuba are located on an island that does not normally flood.  Therefore, many of the filters in this village are located outside of peoples homes, and not inside of the homes.  (Although this year, this would not have mattered anyway because the water was so high that is was inside the people’s homes anyway.)  Many filters were overturned by the flood waters and thus left inoperable after the water receded.  In order to function properly,  special sand and rocks mush be used in the filter, layered in a way that promotes the proper biological process to take place that cleans the water.

Our visit to these villages was three-fold.  One, we delivered new materials to fix the filters in the villages.  Two, we helped to train a couple new workers in the villages to be able to perform the maintenance on these filters.  And three, we split up in teams and went around to perform maintenance ourselves.

This was a great learning experience for me in a couple ways.  I got to  learn how to set up a filter and was immersed in Portuguese for several days.  I appreciate time spend with teams of Brazilians as it really gives me perspective on the culture.  I also learned that this month, PAZ has built and installed its 10,000 filter!  Praise God!  Thanks to any of you who have been a part of this ministry!

I trust that the Lord is using this time of training and preparation to bring  forth his gospel message in these villages.  I believe that people will continue be filled with the life-giving well of water in Christ Jesus!  Please pray with me that the Lord will continue to bless this ministry and all that been done through it!  Amen.

 

Drinking from the well of life,

JAE