A Day In The Life

Here is a small, yet very detailed, picture of what our days have looked like since being in Recuay. Most days since being here have looked very different. This is an account of what our Friday looked liked.

8:00am- Wake up. *An hour before the alarm goes off because we went to bed at 9:30pm the night before.

8:10am- Put on shoes and sweatshirt to walk outside to the bathroom.

8:15am- Make coffee. (It is probably going to be a long day)

8:20-9:00am- Eat breakfast and spend time with the Lord.

9:00am- Begin preparing to take a shower.

9:15-9:35am- Shower. (Little water pressure makes washing your hair a long process.)

9:40-10:00am- Get dressed and stand in the sun to try and regain warmth.

10:00-10:15am- Walk to the market

10:15-10:45am- Buy fruits and veggies for dinner.

10:45-11:00am- Walk home with groceries.

11:00-11:25am- Wash and put away food.

11:30-12:00pm- Sit around the kitchen table and chat about the day.

12:00-12:30pm- Sit on the back “patio” in the sun and read.

12:45-1:00pm- Walk to Humberta’s for lunch

1:00-2:00pm- Eat lunch. (Aguadito de pollo, lentils, rice, chicken, apple cake, and agua de maracuya)

2:00-2:15pm- Walk back home.

2:15-3:00pm- Read, journal, stare at the wall.

3:00-3:20pm- Wait for Humberta to come with a Komby. *public transportation

3:25-4:00pm- Travel to Utcuyacu. (For a bible study that was supposed to start at 3:00pm)

4:15-4:30pm- Play volleyball with kids of the community.

4:30-5:00pm- Bible study with ladies of the community.

5:00-6:00pm- Travel back to Recuay. (Via foot, taxi, and komby)

6:00-6:30pm- Recount the day, think about tomorrow, plan dinner.

6:30-7:00pm- Cook dinner.

7:00-7:30pm- Eat dinner.

7:30-8:00pm- Clean up and practice Spanish.

8:00-9:00pm- Sit around the kitchen table (because the kitchen if still warm from cooking) doing random things like, talking, reading, journaling, and making a grocery list.

9:00-9:30pm- Brush teeth, put on warm clothes, and get in bed. (The sun has been down for nearly three hours)

Next week will hopefully provide more structure and an actual schedule. Wednesday we will begin teaching in the schools. Tuesdays , Wednesdays, and Fridays we will teach English and Bible at Javier for an hour, and Mondays and Thursdays we will do the same at Utcuyacu. We have visited both of these schools this week and both the teachers and the students are very excited for us to begin coming on a regular basis. Friday afternoons we will also be going to Utcuyacu to lead a bible study with some of the ladies in the community. We went yesterday to meet them for the first time and they all seem very hungry for the word. It is likely we will also be planning something for the children at the same time, because they just roamed and played about as we did bible study with the ladies.

Today as we walked to get a taxi we met two little girls who live near us. They immediately knew who we were because the missionaries from the summer had told them we were going to be here for four months. They were very bright. They sang us several songs the summer missionaries taught them and told us how about how they had bible study every Monday night this summer in the house we are living in, with about fifteen other kids. We are hopefully going to meet these other kids on Monday and maybe begin to make plans to carry on this bible study for the next four months.

Things you can join us in praying for: boldness as we meet new people every day, courage to speak and learn a new language, wisdom and discernment as we discover our purpose in ministry in this new place.

Lindsay and I in front of my house before they left to go back to Lima

The beautiful mountains from Utcuyacu

My backyard

        

Exalt the LORD our God;

bow in worship at His footstool.

He is holy.

Psalm 99:5

Bienvenidos al Perú

A week ago today I was boarding a plane in Atlanta for Santiago, Chile, where eight other Hands On students and I spent five days doing orientation.  We did everything from buying and preparing food from a local market, meeting random people at a local mall, to attending a local Spanish church service. We also got a lot of information about what the next four months are going to look like for each of us and tried to learn as much about South American culture as we could.  All in all it was a great time to bridge us into this new culture. Yesterday the nine of us all parted ways and flew to the places we will be serving the rest of the semester. I really enjoyed spending time with other Hands On students having fun, praying for and encouraging one another.

Pray for Greg (Far left): serving with his wife Shawn in Chile; Ellis, Caleb and Kristin (left): serving in Brazil; Becca, Lindsay, Kaleigh, and I (Girls in middle): serving in Peru; and Aaron and Barrett (Boys in back right): serving in Chile.

I will spend the next few days doing more orientation in Lima, Peru and on Monday we will all take a trip to the mountains to get Becca and I settled into our new home and ministry for the next several months. We are finding out more and more each day about what exactly our ministry will look like and it is very exciting. (I will post more soon, when things are really set.) I am looking forward to the things the Lord is going to do in and through me this semester in the high mountains of Peru.

From the ends of the earth I call to you,

I call as my heart grows faint;

lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

Psalm 61:2

ready or not.

Today is the big day. The day I have been thinking about and planning for, for almost four months. Today I will get on a plane and leave the country and I will not be back in the states until December. At times I thought this day would never come, but it is crazy how fast it seems to have appeared. I have asked all the questions I can think of, I have packed my bags, and I have my passport is all laid out ready to go. The preparation on my end is done and now I get to sit back and walk confidently in the fact that the Lord has gone before me and He is going to go with me.

Going into mission trips I try not to create to many expectations in my head and since this experience is coming so soon after camp I really have not even had time to think about that. People have asked me how they can pray and my response is “just pray.”

Two nights ago as I sat at Kairos at Brentwood Baptist I read the words of a song as hundreds of people around me sang them so freely. I have heard the words before, but last night they became so real to me. As I thought about leaving and questioned what life in Peru is going to look like I began to pray they words over my trip.

Let love explode and bring the dead to life
A love so bold
To see a revolution somehow.

Let hope arise and make the darkness hide
My faith is dead
I need a resurrection somehow

Let Heaven roar and fire fall
Come shake the ground
With the sound of revival

As I leave today this is my prayer. Let love explode. Let hope rise. Let Heaven roar and fire fall. Let me see a revolution somehow. Thank you all for showing such amazing love and support as I have prepared to leave. I leave knowing that I will be thought of often and covered in prayer daily. And for that I am truly thankful.

Past, present, and future tense.

An update on what I have been doing, what I am doing now, and what is coming next.

Since the end of May I have been in New Orleans joyfully serving and loving on the people and the city of New Orleans through the avenue of M-Fuge. I had a great summer. It was the first summer that Fuge was in New Orleans so we definitely had some obstacles to overcome and some major groundwork to lay. The team I worked with was amazing. Together we worked hard doing everything from changing our schedule, setting us apart from many other Fuge camps, to tearing down and setting up the auditorium each week.

My ministry site all summer was close to Tulane’s campus at a place called Evan’s park. There was no prep work done at Evan’s park, no site contact, and at the beginning there was not even any kids. Week two of camp I was sent to this park, not having the slightest idea what was going to happen and honestly not having the best attitude about it. So, we started from scratch. Me and my week two campers and adults started by praying and then we just began to walk around the neighborhood and knock on doors. Slowly, but surely we started to find kids and amazingly enough their parents trusted us enough to send them out the door and down the street to the park with us.

I truly saw the Lord answer prayers this summer through the work I was a part of at Evan’s park. We started out the first two week with only two or three kids coming each day, but then by week three as we prayed “Lord, multiply the kids that come to Evan’s park”, we saw twenty-two even twenty-eight kids come to the park one day. The Lord is so faithful. The ministry at Evan’s park might not have been organized or even ideal, but our ministry this summer was full of love. As the kids and families of Evan’s park waved goodbye to M-Fuge I walked away confidently knowing that we, as M-Fuge, had poured out genuine love on this neighborhood all summer. Love that could only come from Christ and the love He first poured out on us. 

So, what does all of this have to do with what comes next? The Lord taught me so much this summer, but one thing He taught me was exactly where my ministry is. He showed me that this summer my ministry was in New Orleans. And now you are thinking, “Duh! You have been doing ministry in New Orleans all summer, of course your ministry was in New Orleans.” But it is so much bigger than that. Going into my summer in New Orleans I knew that I would be going to Peru shortly after camp was over. I began to worry that I would be distracted all summer with figuring out what life and ministry in Peru would be like.

The Lord is so faithful. He showed me again and again how He was using my ministry in New Orleans to completely prepare me for my coming ministry in Peru. He used Evan's park and the people of the community to specifically prepare me for what is next. He used the bible study material, the life and ministry of Peter, each week in a new way to teach me something new about His plan. His plan, that is so much bigger than mine and I become more and more thankful for that everyday.

In less than a week I will be getting on a plane and heading to Peru until December. I will spend my first week in Santiago, Chile participating in orientation with many other students who will be working in various part of South America all semester. My partner Rebecca and I will be serving in the town of Recuay, which is in the Ancash province of Peru. Much of our ministry will be based on relationships. We will get to know the people of Recuay and become part of their lives. We are told this could include helping wash clothes in the river, teaching in the local schools, playing soccer with the boys and volleyball with the girls, studying and sharing from the Bible, leading Bible studies, etc. We will know better what we will spend our time doing once we get there. 

The Lord is so faithful. Even though I may not feel prepared I am resting confidently in the fact that the Lord is faithful and He has completely prepared me for my ministry in Peru. I cannot wait to see His plan unfold.

It is good to praise the LORD,

To sing praise to Your name, Most High,

To declare Your faithful love in the morning

And Your faithfulness at night

Psalm 92:1-2