There and Back Again... A Tale or Two from Peru :)

                                                             Pisac Valley 
Hola Friends!
I wanted to take a minute to update you on my trip to Peru.
Last week I had the privilege of traveling down with the WGM member care team. We were able to lead a retreat for the missionaries that are serving in Cusco, Peru. I am thankful for your prayers for our time there. Thankfully I never got sick from the high altitude even though we were up 11,000ft! That was a big answer to prayer as sometimes that seems to really effect me.
                      Member Health Team bookends (Left: Ned and Marlene McGrady, Right: me, Mike Banks) And then the Strongs are the couple in the middle left with Jesus and Kristen Vega and their kiddos; Josh, Lucas, John, Alexis, Diego, filling in on the right with another WGM MK Josh Zimmerman) 
There are 2 WGM family units serving in Cusco. They do a lot of what some would call "side-by-side" ministry with the local Peruvian church. To name a few; they do a lot of mentoring, hospitality, church leadership, and soccer ministry. This was the first time their field has been able to have a retreat and they were so excited to have this refreshing time in God’s word and for some much-needed physical rest. They were also really excited to worship the Lord through song in English. They are not used to being able to worship in their heart language each Sunday.  The adults focused on Sabbath while the kids focused on God as our Anchor. The one family who has 5 kiddos are facing transition up ahead and so as I was praying about what to teach them,  a verse in Hebrews kept coming to my mind. So we studied Hebrews 6:19  

“We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner
place behind the curtain”

I wanted to remind the kids about how our hope in Jesus is secure; that He is faithful to His promises and His word. He swore by his oath because there is no higher authority than Himself. These will always be constant. Even amidst the changes and unsteady circumstances that they may face, they can always trust Jesus. We talked about how do you trust someone? It comes from when we KNOW them and how we do that is being in God’s word and learning more about Him and His promises which will never fail. It is so important for them to know Jesus and have a relationship with Him of their own, not something they can BORROW from their parents' faith. The other focus we had was that Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow! Again, I wanted the kids to have their eyes turned back to Jesus as they face yet more changes in their lives. We talked a lot about doing transition well and how they can start processing about it. Thanks for your continual prayers for the Vega family. They have an 18 year old girl named, Alexis, who will start at Bethel University in the fall. She is really struggling with the move ahead and is just now learning she needs to start preparing for this transition herself instead of fighting it. Please keep her in your prayers! The Strongs are the other couple there and are nearing retirement. Doughty is a fellow “Kenyan” and we enjoyed talking about his time at RVA as a boy and him growing up there.

This trip was so exciting to be apart of as it really gives roots to what we do in Member Care. It’s good to take care of people from afar, but it isn’t the same as getting to be on their own turf and seeing their lives and ministries in action. I am so thankful again for how the Lord has provided this job for me and I appreciate your continual support in walking through these different ministry trips and times on the field with me.

One of the funny parts of this trip was trying to remember to speak Spanish! Between my twin living in Japan and me living in Kenya, I am always trying to learn new words in Japanese and Swahili. Well you can imagine which languages came to my brain first when responding to the Peruvians.. haha, I am sure they thought I was a crazy American.

I loved being in the Andes Mountains. WOW are they beautiful. Such an amazing display of God’s creation. The retreat was held at a hotel in what is called “The Sacred Valley”. The Pisac village is full of Inca ruins and is home to a lot of mystic practices. Everywhere you looked, there were terraced ruins from the Incas’ farming practices. We could see that lots of foreigners come to Pisac to visit the shrines that are there. There are witch doctors and shamans there in the valley and it is a very spiritually dark, yet beautiful place. They definitely need Jesus in the Pisac Valley! 
We got to stop at a Llama and Alpaca rescue center as well as another animal rescue center where we learned more about Peru’s Quechua history and their beautiful wool textiles. It was so neat to watch the ladies weaving their beautiful designs that are kept only in their heads and passed down generation to generation.

These little girls walk up to you in the village square and say "Picture?" while holding up these baby animals..I was puddy in their hands. :) 

One of the days we also HAD to take a chocolate tour where we learned all about their cacao harvest and the production of CHOCOLATE. 😊 Cacao beans are one of their main exports. They don’t do a lot of the production there as it takes costly machines to make the chocolate. They leave that to the Swiss and Belgians as we all know. 😊 Thankfully, since they do produce some there, we got to test lots of fine, Peruvian chocolate. 

Just for fun.. a Hairless Peruvian Dog.. No one seems to agree with me that they are so ugly they are cute.
 

Again, I just want to thank you for sharing in this journey with me and I pray that you are well and are encouraged to hear how you can keep praying for the Strongs and the Vegas in Peru. Please keep praying for more workers for the harvest.    
² And he said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. -Luke 10:2
Serving with you from COLD Indiana, (seriously, can it be spring yet??? Not used to this non-equatorial living) 😉
 
Amy