6th day in Matucana

It´s been so good to see God at work on this trip. It´s humorous to think that one of the concerns of the group was that there would not be enough to do here. It´s been such the opposite that Dan wasn´t able to update the blog last night, so don´t worry...we´re all still alive and doing well.

Yesterday one of the mountain teams returned from Marachanca. They could only bring good news about what happened there. From what they have told me, there was at least one conversion there, and many chances to share God´s Word with people. No one knew how many Christians were actually in that village, and after the team went around talking to everyone that they met, there ended up being quite a few believers. A house church could very well be underway soon, and maybe even within the next few weeks (God willing). One of the (many) great stories that they brought back was that there was a man who had apparently been praying for God to send him someone to tell him the truth about Christ. He did not know very much of the Bible, but he explained that he felt that something was wrong about the Catholic belief system, although he didn´t know what or why. The team stumbled across him on a hike up to some of the Inca ruins and shared some Bible stories with him. They began to ask him questions, and eventually he became so fed up with the questions that he finally interupted them and asked, ¨What must I do to follow Christ?¨ Folks, we now have a new brother in Christ. He was so excited that he apparently ran over to one of his Christian friends rejoicing about what had just happened.

Amazing!

Today, my (John) team arrived back from Collana. We also brought good news with us as we saw incredible things happen in that village. Once we arrived in Collana on Wednesday, we immediately went over to the school and got to meet the kids and team them some English. We used that opportunity to also share a Bible story with them, but what I think is even more important is that we got to meet the teacher, Beatrice, who we were able to share the gospel with (pray for her and her father--they did not make a decision, but are VERY close). We met some of the people and set up appointments to talk about some Bible stories with them, and everyone that we encountered were extremely nice and gracious. We stayed with Irma, a woman who owned a conenience-type of store as she let us share half of her and her family´s living quarters. The girls got the bed and the boys got the floor, and let me tell you--IT WAS COLD! Anyways, when we arrived both David and I were wondering what we were going to do in 3 days, and it turned out that 3 days was not nearly enough time for what we needed. Some of the cool things that happened in Collana was that we were able to disciple a man named Arnaldo, the local cheese maker (awesome cheese!!). There was already a small evangelical church in Collana that a pastor from Lima travelled up once a week to preach at. Our group saw incredible potential in Arnaldo, and the discipling process was incredible. This man was a cup that was ready to be poured into, and a servant of God with joy that exploded out of every pore. We shared with him the story about Jesus choosing the disciples and explained that just as Christ had to leave, the pastor had to leave every week and we had to leave in just a few days. We explained to Arnaldo the importance of carrying on the work of Christ during the week and meeting with other believers, that through the power of prayer, evangelism and discipleship, Christ would turn Collana upside down.

We still believe that is possible.

I´m still collecting all of the great news that has been happening amidst our group here in Matucana (and surrounding), and I promise you that these are only teasers of the plethora of news that you will be able to hear once we get back. Pray that God will find men and women to follow up with Marachanca and Collana, and that greater things will be accomplished in those villages. Pray for us now as we are united once more in Matucana that we will not grow weary of doing good and that more opportunities will present themselves. Pray also for Dan as he just left to go back to Lima (he is flying back early so that he can then hop on a plane with his Grandmother on a missions trip to Togo, Africa). Pray that God will give him strength and stamina and that everything will go fine in his travel.

Can´t wait to share more once we get home! To quote Chris Tomlin, ¨Greater things have yet to come, and greater things are still to be done in this city!¨

Until tomorrow, and always in Christ alone,

John