Today Was NOT "Ratchet"

I am traveling with teenagers. Sigh... there was a LOT of use of the words "sketch", "totes", "adorbs", and "ratchet". The blog post title was a challenge from the team. They didn't believe I would do it. Wrong. On with the real post -

Today was AWESOME! God blessed us so immensely. Our first stop was in Carhua, and to be honest, we didn't expect much. This is typically a holiday from school and there aren't many children there. We drove in and school was open!! OPEN! The teachers welcomed us in, allowed us to teach our entire lesson on the Prodigal Son, do the craft, and play some games. There were 15 kids. Members of the team had the chance to talk with the PE teacher and discover that she attends a Baptist church in Lima. I also had the chance to chat with one of the secondary teachers about the differences between our church and the Catholic church. The kiddos are very excited that we're coming back the next few days!

After a picnic lunch by the river, we headed to Lachaqui. We headed straight to our friend Dulia's class. I got a bit "misty" when I walked in and a bunch of kids yelled "CANDI!!!" and ran for hugs. Life is good. She invited us to come teach our lesson a bit later in the afternoon so we could have more kids than just her class. Since we had some time on our hands, we went into the plaza to find some of the families Parkway has worked with before. First, we visited with a family that our mid-term team invested heavily in - Zoraida, Jaimito, and Carlos. Today we were able to deliver some devotional and study materials they had wanted, as well as some pictures that Ben took. They were so tickled with the photos of their birthday celebrations! In a gesture of thanks, they gave us a 3 liter bottle of Inka Cola. :) The best news of all is that they have been continuing their Bible study three nights a week!!! We have been invited to join them tomorrow night as they continue through the book of John. We also visited with Elsa, who runs a restaurant two doors down. She is cooking chicken soup for our lunch tomorrow, so we will get to spend some more time with her. Our time with the Lachaqui kids was good as well, and our trip down the mountain was smooth and full of laughter.

Speaking of laughter, our team is a RIOT! I have laughed more today than I have in a long time. God is also blessing us with a fellowship that is out of this world. We have flowed seamlessly from conversations about the grace of the Lord to playing a game about death row - what would our crime be and what would our last meal be. Seriously, crazy stuff happening south of the equator.

Please keep praying for us! It makes such a difference. Specific prayer points include our health (we have had small amounts of headaches, etc.), the openness of the children to our stories tomorrow, and for God to move mightily in the Bible study tomorrow night.

Until the next update...I hope your day was not at all sketch and that your tomorrow is totes fab. (pray for me - I threatened that my death row crime was beating a slang-using teen to death with a proper English dictionary!)

On the Mountain Again!

**I promise to come back and add pictures later. I'm having connectivity issues and pictures take too much broadband.

We had a fantastic day of travel, even though one plane was delayed due to a thunderstorm. We were kind of bummed at first that our seats were all spread out on both flights, but God had plans. As always. We had many opportunities to talk with people around us - about life, ourselves, our church, our beliefs, our Jesus. A very tired crew rolled into the hotel in Lima and got some sleep. :)

Today was the day to travel up the mountain to our base village, Canta. I love this day so much! The first thing that happens is a reunion. I get to see my Peruvian sister, Eva (our translator), and usually at least one of our missionaries. Today it was Brett AND David. Doubly blessed. I also get the fun of introducing these precious people to my teammates. We get to go to the Peruvian grocery store. This is a double edged sword - I love to be surrounded by Peruvian food but herding a large group of people through a store is a little crazy!! We had lunch at a place called Norky's, which specializes in rotisserie chicken and fries. I skipped that and had a sampler plate, which led to some of our team trying some new things. For instance, they tried fried yucca with cheese, anticuchos (skewered beef heart), and mollejita (chicken stomach). Don't judge. Yummy comes in many forms!

The team had a smooth trip up the mountain. The road work we've complained about for a couple of years is almost complete!! HALLELUJAH!! We've checked into our hotel, walked to our friend Mercedes' store, and had a warm dinner. Nothing wild - soup and stir fry! We're all planned out and ready for ministry tomorrow. Pray for us HARD tonight and tomorrow. This is when people start to feel the effects of the altitude and we need everyone to be healthy. We also ask for prayers for the villages. Pray that there will actually be children to teach for our VBS and that our friends in Lachaqui will be excited to have Bible study together. Thank you to all of our prayer warriors out there! We need you so much!

If you need to communicate with any of us, I have my laptop at night, so you can always leave a comment here, send an email, or comment/message on Facebook. I'll update as often as possible!!

A Year Passes

I haven't blogged at all since last August. I believe I stopped mid-trip, actually. I ask forgiveness. Lots has happened since then and I will attempt to fill you in on some of it. Our trip last August had some real issues near the end, and while dealing with it, I wasn't sure how to (or even IF to) address it to the blogging world. Long story short - one of our dearest Peruvian team members began to deal with some health issues that necessitated immediate attention and some changing of plans. This was hard and scary, and through the joint effort of my awesome adult team members, we managed to shelter our young ladies from the situation. Then our plane was delayed from leaving Lima for 32 hours. Yep - THIRTY-TWO hours. There were blessings throughout the situation though. We were able to share the love of Jesus with lots of people that we met during our extended stay!

In March of 2014, Parkway sent three of our young men to live in Lachaqui for three months. We even had a short term mens team join them in April. There are many stories to tell from this experience, but that's for another time.

So here we are today. Six of us will be leaving in the morning for Peru again. Please pray for us! Pray that we will find fruit from the seeds of prior trips. Pray that we will have sustained health and strength - physical, mental, and spiritual. Pray that the hearts of the people we encounter will be open. Pray for safe travels both to and in Peru.

Thank you, friends, for being our prayer warriors for YEARS and YEARS and YEARS! We love you. I LOVE YOU!!