Every Monday morning, newspapers splash the grisly reports of new killings from across Brazil. Maria Santos breathes a prayer of thanks that her son Roberto's name is not among the weekend's dead. But next Monday, it might be different.
Nearly 600 children are murdered annually in Rio de Janeiro alone. Police, attempting to combat drugs and crime, have declared war on teenage gangs. Private vigilante groups shoot teenagers in military-style executions. Teens kill each other in gang vendettas and drug wars. Even for Christian kids, sexual immorality, occult spiritism, depression, drug use, and materialism threaten to unravel their commitment to Christ.
At one time, Santos focused her prayers solely on her son. But now she prays alongside 15,000 mothers in the growing movement "Wake Up, Deborah," which is rallying the church to the spiritual potential within Brazilian youth. The group's name is inspired from the uncertain and troubling period in Israel's history noted in Judges 4 and 5 when the prophetess Deborah woke up the Israelites against their oppressors.
What distinguishes Wake Up, Deborah, from Moms in Touch and other prayer groups is its pledge, adapted from Hannah's vow in 1 Samuel: "O Lord Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant's misery … but give her a son, then I will give him to the Lord for all the days of his life."
Wake Up, Deborah, members pledge to pray at least 15 minutes a day that their children will become not only Christians, but missionaries—to their communities, to Brazil, and to the world.
Ana Maria Pereira, director of the program, came up with the idea from the Global Consultation on World Evangelization (GCOWE '95) in Seoul (CT, July 17, 1995, p. 53). There, when 60,000 South Korean youth pledged themselves to world missions, a footnote on the program read, "Thank you to all the mothers who prayed." Pereira and her husband, Jeremias Pereira DaSilva, a Presbyterian pastor, dreamed that mothers in their city, Belo, would pray for Brazilian children to become missionaries. When 600 women showed up for the first planning meeting, Pereira knew she had touched a spiritual nerve.
In the two years since its inception, Wake Up, Deborah, has spread throughout the country of 140 million to all social classes and to Indian, black, Asian, Spanish, and European believers. Whether home is a shanty or a mansion, Pereira says, "No one prays for a son like Mom." Each day, hundreds of new pledges jam her mailbox.
Participating moms meet monthly in 600 churches, from small village chapels to mainline edifices. In a typical 90-minute meeting, moms and repentant offspring share testimonies and encourage other moms not to quit praying for their kids.
Wake Up, Deborah, is aligned with the AD2000 and Beyond movement, a loose network dedicated to establishing an indigenous church among every ethnolinguistic people by 2000. AD2000 sponsored the GCOWE '95 conference where Wake Up began. Argentinean Luis Bush, AD2000's international director, had been a teenage gang leader on the streets of São Paulo, Brazil.
"Women don't have a second-hand calling," Pereira says. "Multitudes are walking toward hell. Our prayers can change the direction of the world."
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Leader explains why the movement is seeing its biggest membership bump in 30 years and its mission for the years ahead.
