The church has had experience similar to that of its founder.  It was put out of three rented buildings at the instance of the Vicar, who either forced the owners to eject or he, himself, bought the property.  Finally a man who is not a believer, but whose mother is, bought the present building and sold it to me church.  He is permitting the church to pay for the building in installments of small sums.  At last the church has a place upon which it can rest the sole of its feet and in two years has grown from ten to fifty members.  On the occasion of our visit six more made public confession of Christ before a large audience and were received for baptism.

Out on the cape is a fine lighthouse which we had admired as we came up the coast on the ship.  May it be a symbol of the lighthouse which this church may become to the storm tossed in that section of Brazil.

Of course, persecution is a painful thing for those who are called upon to endure it, but wherever I found those who had passed through afflictions they counted it all joy to suffer for the cause of Christ, and whenever I attempted to comfort them because of their hardships, I came away more comforted than they, for the reason that their joyous willingness to suffer for His sake strengthened my own faith and assured me of the ultimate triumph of the gospel through the labors of such heroic people.  Persecution, while it may temporarily suspend work in a certain place, always defeats its own purpose, and instead of preventing the spread of the gospel, is one of the most helpful agencies in the growth of the truth.

A most encouraging illustration of this fact occurred in Pernambuco in 1904.  There had been a bitter persecution at Cortez, a village not far from Pernambuco.  The chief instigator of the trouble was the parish priest.  The believers were driven out of the town and their lives threatened.  The missionary went and was also driven out, but returned under the protection of some soldiers and conducted gospel services through a whole week in order to give courage to the believers and to demonstrate that the Protestants could not be driven out.  A news account of this persecution was published in a daily paper in Pernambuco.  A boy cut this article out and gave it to his teacher, a priest in the Silesian College.  The teacher read the article and wrote a letter to Missionary Cannada and asked him to come to the college at midnight to explain the gospel.  Two letters were passed before the missionary finally went at midnight to hold a conference.  The priest came out and discussed the gospel with the missionary and then returned to the college, taking with him a copy of the New Testament.  After a month the missionary went again at midnight to the college and the priest came away with him once for all.  The priest went to the home of the missionary and for two months studied the Bible, after which time he was converted.  He at once began to preach the gospel to his friends as he would meet them on