In June of 1961, thirteen couples and their children set sail for Sao Paulo, Brazil with a dream to make the saving power of Jesus Christ known to the wonderful people of Brazil. Three more families joined the team a few years later, enlarging the team to 16 families. Who could have ever imagined what God would do with this team of missionaries? They were profoundly successful, establishing churches all over Brazil and transforming the lives of thousands. Seven years into their work, a historic meeting took place. The resulting goal was to organize an effort to recruit and train missionaries to plant churches in major cities in and bordering Brazil that would serve as centers for spreading the gospel to surrounding areas. In 1976, this strategy was put into place with a missionary recruiting office set up on the campus of Abilene Christian University. The ministry is now located in Addison, TX and is known as Great Cities Missions, but the mission has remained the same: to recruit, train, and care for mission teams called to share Christ with the Latin World.

These 16 families took a great leap of faith 60 years ago, and the Lord has done remarkable things because of that leap. We are excited to announce the Shoulder to Shoulder Endowment, set up by this team’s children, to honor their parents, by funding the work to continue planting churches in Brazil. Thank you for honoring these families and donating to this special endowment fund!   

A Tribute to Maria Dutton

Written by Dr. Gary J. Sorrells, GCM Executive Emeritus and Trustee

Maria Dutton is among the select people God places in our path who seem to always have reflected Jesus. Like, Elizabeth, Mary, and Priscilla, of our New Testament, when Maria met Jesus, her life became brighter and more beautiful as she allowed God to enter and transform her more like Him (2 Corinthians 3:16-18). 

On the evening of January 21, 2024, after 93 years of service, she took her last breath and departed to be with Jesus. 

The talented young linguist, Maria Toledo, was hired by the newly arrived thirteen families of the 1961 São Paulo, Brazil Mission Team to teach them the Portuguese language. What a gifted teacher she was. Not long after, Allen Dutton, a single young man from Abilene Christian College, arrived to begin his on-the-field role with the team. He too enters her class in 1962. The language interest of the young teacher and the new student blossoms into new horizons as they become more acquainted in and out of the classroom. Then roles reverse, and Allen becomes her teacher and introduces her to the language of Jesus. Their relationship moves Maria both toward Jesus and marriage to Allen. As I recall hearing the story, one night after the close of one of their Bible studies, she asked Allen if he would go with her to throw her religious images into the river—she was ready to commit her life to Jesus!

That commitment caused her wealthy father to disinherit her. Through the years as her Christ-likeness began to shine, her father relinquished and opened his heart anew. She later did in fact inherit the family estate near Cabreuva, Brazil and on it she established a Christian Children’s Home which continues to serve Brazilian children today. 

Maria and Allen’s marriage, in partnership with Jesus, has changed eternity for them and for countless multitudes. I didn’t know Maria prior to her decision to follow Jesus and to marry Allen, but met her shortly thereafter in the early 1970’s. It was obvious to all who knew her that her life truly reflected Jesus. Welcome and service always called out from her home. She and Allen, who preceded her in death in October of 2001, spent their lives together as they planted churches and introduced people to Jesus.

They were especially vital to the early years of Great Cities Missions. From the time Ellis and Doris Long opened the doors to the project in 1976, the Dutton’s played formative roles. When the first mission teams were ready to depart for Brazil, the Brazilian government closed the doors for all missionary visas in 1977.  The first church Maria and Allen planted outside of the city of São Paulo was in Porto Alegre in Southern Brazil. There, through the school of their children Cynthia, Allen Jr., and Priscilla, they became close friends with the family of Nelson Veiga—a friendship that grew within the warmth of each family’s home across the years.In government and in public service as a Military Sargent and later as a Colonel, Nelson Veiga was a leader. In 1978, he became the head of the Brazilian secret service in the Administration of the President. It is a remarkable story how God used the close friendship of the Dutton’s and the Veiga’s in concert with family ties of São Paulo Christians Alaor and Miriam Leite to the Brazilian Vice-President. Through a series of meetings with these heads of state and other government officials, a path opened to re-instate visas for the entrance of Great Cities Teams. In those beginning years Maria and Allen and the Leites were constant players in the process of the settlement of new teams into the Great Cities of South America. They also were movers and encouragers as they served Great Cities Missions in early years as Trustees.

Let’s stand with Cynthia, Allen Jr., Priscilla, their families, the grandchildren, and the Brazilian church, as together all of us grieve her loss, honor her life, and rejoice with Maria as she receives her greeting from God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, “Well done, good and faithful servant”.

I would invite you to join with us to celebrate the life of Maria and the 1961 São Paulo Mission Team by honoring her legacy with a memorial gift to the Great Cities Missions Shoulder To Shoulder Endowment that will allow others to introduce young people like Maria Toledo Dutton to the Jesus she loved.     – Gary J. Sorrells