Tribute to João David (Adão)

João David - (Adão)

João David was born October 16, 1947 in Vila Meã, Amarante, Portugal. He had three brothers and two sisters. Only his younger sister is alive today living in an Old Folks home in Gaia/ Porto. His mother died when he was fourteen. She was fifty. His father died at 78 when a train ran over the vehicle he used when selling his wares. He sold bread, and fruit and vegetables.

João studied in a Catholic school with the goal to become a priest. He was abused by the director of the Seminary while at the school at the age of fourteen. He didn’t go on to become a priest. He was drafted into the military after high school when the African wars of independence took place. When he returned from the war in Mozambique, he joined the Marxist/Leninist Communist party and was an atheist. His girlfriend worked for the secret police. João worked as an assistant to an accountant in Porto.

Joâo was witnessed to about Jesus by two teenagers, Ana Gloria and Ze de Campanhã. They were sixteen at the time. He was twenty-seven. It was 1974. They took him around to a meeting in the park in Porto. He got saved and soon joined the local Children of God community. He quit his job to dedicate himself full time to Christian studies and evangelization. His family was not happy. With the help of the local police, they raided the Children of God community home. His brother had a gun. João gave himself up and was taken to a sanatorium for the mentally sick at his family’s request.

After one month, he was released on the doctor’s and his family’s agreement. When he was inside the sanatorium the doctors would ask him, “What are you in here for?” On getting out, João got together his few belongings and headed south to Lisbon. He soon found some Children of God members distributing literature and was allowed to join the community Christian training centre they had.

João witnessed and distributed Christian literature in Portugal and Spain. He married a girl he had won to the Lord in Braga. He was 27 and she was just 18. They travelled together to Brazil where many of the Children of God members went to escape the persecution in Europe and fulfil Mark 16:15, "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature." Life in Brazil at that time was not easy for João and his new wife. They ran into difficult times and separated. João put his heart, mind, and body into distributing God’s word, winning souls.

João lived some 13 years in the Rio Grand Sul of Brazil, especially in Santa Caterina.  During that time, he visited some 1,000 cities in the region. He and another friend would go on distribution trips with tapes and videos. He would distribute in schools and get to pray with the students. He would often travel and sleep all night long to arrive at a city and start distributing. He really wanted to please Jesus and lay down his life for Him.

He was every one's friend and had very few “enemies.” A Portuguese friend said to me the other day, João was one of those rare true brethren who really served Jesus and others. He didn’t have a platform. He didn’t have an agenda. He didn’t have an anterior hidden motive. He didn’t promote himself or anything he said or did. He didn't want your money. He was an example of humility. He was always quoting that saying about, "If you think you’re humble, you’ve just proven that you are not."

I worked with João the past 27 years. It was 27 years ago that João adopted my family as his. My wife and I had combination of 9 children at that time, when our youngest was born. That was just around the time that João came to live with us. He took us on as his ministry and helped us to raise our kids by using his gift for fund raising for our benefit and the benefit of the numerous Missionary projects we supported. He kept nothing back from the Lord and gave all that he had. Just before he died, he gave me the 350 euros he had saved for any kind of emergency.

For the last 11 years he had received a pension. Except for the twenty euros he would keep for himself and the donations he would send to various mission projects, he gave it all. Before the time of his pension, we distributed balloons in shopping malls with DVDs and posters and children’s books. The Lord used João as the financial backbone to our home and support ministry. He believed in Acts 2:44-45, "All that believed were together and had all things common. And they sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need."

In the last years he has supported some of his friends in Brazil who have a Christian radio program. He would faithfully send them help every month. That was João David, always helping others. He didn’t have a way to send the money to Brazil. What did he do? He’d pray and ask the Lord to send him someone with a Brazilian App that could send it for him. For the past year Junior, a Brazilian man, was doing that for him. João would give Junior 10 euros for his trouble. Recently Junior told me, he and his wife were really saddened by João’s death. Though they had known him for a very short time, they said João had had a profound effect on them.

Some years ago, a young couple came to our home asking for João. He had gone to live in Braga for a year as he was needing a change. Normally João would visit them once a month to give them the monthly  Activated magazine. Since he hadn’t visited them recently, they came around to our house 10 kilometres away to see if he was okay. That’s how João affected others. He was sincerely in love with Jesus and wanted to transmit that to everyone he met. He was not obnoxious or self-promoting. His steady relationship with the Lord had a tranquilising effect on those around him. 

He had a weekly prayer vigil list where on certain days he would have prayer vigil for certain people or problems we were encountering. At seventy-five he memorised Psalm 103. I don’t know how he did it. He reviewed his memorized Bible verses and still had many of his Psalms and chapters remembered by heart. He was too good for us and went on gladly to his heavenly reward.

One of the last things he said to his friend David, who was visiting him in the hospital while I was away, “Witness to that lady there,” as he pointed to the woman in the bed next to him. To my wife he said, “Take care of the cat.” That’s João, always concerned about the needs of others, especially the little people, whoever the Lord brought along his path. He would go for a walk and come home with a testimony of how he had led someone to the Lord.

The Bible says, “Except a corn of wheat falls into the ground and die, it abides alone. But if it dies, it brings for much fruit.” That’s the effect that João’s death has had on me. I’m seeing that I am bolder. I have stronger convictions to pray with others, to speak up and witness about the Lord. I want to be a better example of the love of Jesus. I want to be more like João, who reflected Jesus in so many ways. God bless his soul, as he receives that crown that God has laid up for him, and all those that believe and await His appearing.

Maria Rolanda, a friend, called me and said she had had a dream with João. She emphasized that she doesn’t normally have a dream that she remembers. She saw a beautiful blue throne with Jesus sitting upon it. And there was João, sitting at Jesus’ feet.

Well done, João. Well done. You have entered into the joy of our Lord. All the time, I thought I was teaching you, but in truth, it was you, that was patiently teaching me. Until tomorrow, João, if God wills. Until tomorrow. As João would say, “Até amanhã, se Deus quiser, até amanhã.”

Joáo in December 2025.

Joáo the morning he came out of the hospital after the first emergency. They didn't find the urinary tract infection and thought he had entered into sudden dementia.