What a difference a year makes

We started last year with about 10 people in the church (yes that is including us) 

By the grace of God we started 2013 with about 150 people and we have new visitors everyday.

We've been able to show the love of Christ to many different parts of Peru through our servolution campaigns. 

We hosted our first ever "Save the Family" conference in September

All of this because you sent us here to serve Piura Peru. 

Thank you for being a part of our ministry and vision. 

This is a short year in review video we made 

Enjoy!

Servolution.

A couple years ago Jose and I had the opportunity to hear Dino Rizzo speak at "The Remnant" conference in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He is the author of "Servolution" a book which sprang from something his church actually does. They go out and serve their community. Serving is very important to us and actually a part of how we met. So when Mr Rizzo was finished speaking Jose went up and told him "You wrote my book." Mr Rizzo responded "That's awesome, you should write one that's better than mine." Now our church here has become a part of Servolution. Every month (and sometimes twice a month) we go out into the community and do something nobody else here really does. These are the things we've been doing this month.

Refrescate! - Refresh yourself

Peru is south of the equator so Summer just ended for us and we have now entered into Autumn. The beginning of the year is the hottest time here. So we collected 1000 bottles of water, went to one of the busiest intersections in town and handed them out to everybody that wanted one. We gave ourselves 2 hours to run out. It only took us 30 minutes. Obviously this was a hit with the people of Piura. We saved 100 to give to the car washers and attendants at a local shopping center parking lot. The car washers pay 40 soles a day to work. Then they get to keep whatever they make. They make about 5 soles per car they wash and there are about 40 car washers all fighting to wash every car that comes into the lot. Even so not every person coming into the lot wants a car wash. You can imagine these people having to work so hard to make money don't really get to take breaks to go buy water. So they were really excited to get this water.

Operacion Utiles Escolar - Operation School Supplies

             Y                                      &

Operacion Mochila    -    Operation Backpack

This school is run by some local pastors. They felt the need for this school because these kids would have to cross a very busy street to get to the school the city provides. The year before the school began 21 kids died just trying to cross the street to go to school. It's a free private school so they work entirely off of outside donations. We were able to get a good portion of the school supplies donated from people in our church and local businesses. We also had 75 backpacks donated by 1 friend in Lima. In total we were able to bless 97 kids with their very own backpacks & bottle of water plus the school supplies I mentioned.

 

We have more things planned in the months to come. 

Please pray for us that God would continue to provide for these outreaches. 

Also the need for a van and possibly a truck has become increasingly apparent. (we rented the truck in the first photo set) Most of our church members don't have cars so we are just stuffing people wherever they fit and taking a few taxis. But some of the areas we are going to are really difficult to find taxis to come back. It would just be a huge burden lifted if we had a van big enough to fit about 18-20 people. So as you pray for us please put that on the top of your list. We need a van! 

Thank you so much for continuing to support us and lift us up in prayer!

You are a part of what we are doing here. We couldn't do it without you

Christmas Outreach

We had a great time with our Christmas outreach Sunday Morning. 

We had initially set a goal of giving gifts to 100 kids but because of the generosity of so many people (in the states and here in Piura) in the end we had enough gifts for 160! 

Here are some pictures of the highlights 

Loading up the truck with presents

Driving to Expolvorines it started to rain on the way there

Jose overseeing set up with some help from Logan and Timothy

Jose preaching on the true meaning of Christmas

 60 people raised their hands for salvation!

 Logan and Timothy liked helping...Tim did not want to give up that bullhorn 

These are some of the pictures from handing out the presents. If you look closely you will see Timothy down in the mix with the other kids.

Jose and Patrick did most of the work to make this happen

The whole team plus 3 kids from the outreach

(the shacks in the background are houses. They have no running water or electricity)

People thought we were crazy for doing this on December 25th. 

Most people here celebrate Christmas on the 24th and sleep all day the 25th. 

But God knew what he was doing. We had a ton of help and an overwhelming response from the kids and families of Expolvorines (the area outside Piura that we chose for the outreach)

On our way to the outreach it started raining and it continued until Jose finished preaching.

So our volunteers not only set up but they did it in the rain. Once it stopped raining it got really hot.

We all have sunburns to show for it. 

Most of the volunteers are just getting introduced to us because of this outreach. 

(only 5 in the picture were members beforehand) 

It was awesome for us to work with them and they are all excited about the things Powerhouse Church Peru has planned. 

We were so blessed to be able to be a part of this and just want to say thank you to all of you who donated to this and prayed for it. 

We can't wait until next year!

Christmas Outreach

We are really excited to be doing our very first community outreach for Christmas. 

There is a little area outside of Piura where there are tons of impoverished families. 

Our plan is to bring Christmas gifts and dinner to 100 children. All it takes is $11 per kid. 

If you would like to participate please click the Children's Christmas Outreach donate button on the right of this page  and your donation will go to our goal of $1100.

You can include a message to the kids if you want and we will make sure the kids get them.

I will take lots of pictures and post them here and on Facebook.

Thank you for your help to make this happen! We can't wait to see what God does.

How Much is Enough

This morning I have been meditating in the word and saw something that really spoke to me. 1timothy 6:9-10 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. Wow, how much is enough and where does it end? Do we give God Glory with everything that we own or do we say this is for God and this is for me and my selfishness. Please understand that God does give us possessions for our enjoyment and to spread his kingdom. Do you desire to be rich? Well then this is what you should expect. 1)temptations--not that we don't already have temptations, but the ones that get you in debt, distracted, and are selfish. 2) a snare--simply a trap. We fill our houses with things to make us feel great or buy things to impress others or think we need, but it's all a trap because in the end none of these things work. 3)foolish and harmful lusts--what we see and think we need, the latest this, that or the other. Foolish, the word in proverbs refers many times acting like a child and in all the cases they do not enter the presence of God. 4) to drown in destruction and perdition-- think about it, if you desire to be rich you will be drowned in destruction and perdition. Your destiny is not heaven it is torment and everlasting hell. Jesus told his men, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” (Mark 10:25 NKJV) 5) the love of money has strayed them from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows. Do you desire to be rich then expect the piercings of being filled with grief. It comes down to greediness. The question again is, how much is enough? How many cars are enough, how many houses are enough, how many shoes are enough, how many dogs are enough, how many tv's are enough, how much jewelry is enough, how many guns are enough, how many games are enough, how much ______ (fill in the blank) is enough? Please let me help you to understand that it's not that God will not provide for you. It is not that wealth means you are evil or even having money makes you evil. Listen to this verse. Mark 10:29-30 NKJV So Jesus answered and said, “Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My sake and the gospel’s, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time—houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions—and in the age to come, eternal life. But the key is this. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. (Matthew 6:33 NKJV) Please listen to what I'm about to say and examine yourself. I have to daily because I have been blessed to have lived in a great country where we have a buffet of liberty and choices and selection of commerce and opportunity to live the American dream. If you make more than $2 a day you are richer than 1/3 of the world. That sounds crazy. You may step outside of your house and maybe not believe it, but you are. I am not saying giving your money to the poor is your ticket into heaven, works can't do it for you; only Christ, his blood and him crucified. If you think about it and look around your house you are probably like most of us and see you got more junk and stuff you don't use and probably pay storage fees for things you will not go through again. God has blessed us to be a blessing to others. Show that today. What can you do with what you already have to change this world and to bring the gospel to the at least 4.5 billion of people who don't know Christ. That is 4,500,000,000 people! It is our responsibility to do it.

JOSE

Happiness and Cheer! Christmas for orphans

I hope every one of you had a Merry Christmas!

Every year La Casa Del Padre does several Christmas outreaches this year we helped with the one to bring Christmas to orphans and very underprivileged children. It took tons of people and together we were able to bless over 1000 children


my hilarious children being all "vanna white" here. and check out Tim's ever present jacket. It's really hot here but he still thinks he needs a jacket every.single.day. ah, children.

It was a long and exhausting day but it was awesome to see the children blessed


I loved that we took our kids too. Logan handed out snacks to the kids, a mini panaton (fruit cake thing-very popular and traditional Christmas treat)  and chocolate milk to each kid. We were in the room where the kids got their toys and they had to get the snack on the way to the toys. Many children were so focused on the toy that they walked right past Logan. All he knew how to say was "Feliz Navidad" so he would chase them down and shove the snack in their face all the while saying "Feliz Navidad" in a somewhat irritated voice. heartwarming, right? lol. O.k. I admit I thought it was ridiculously cute and understood his frustration. I go through it all the time.

This week we are going to Carmella's house to bring her some presents. God put it on some friends hearts to donate money for this project and we are all so excited! Jose and his dad went to her house yesterday to kind of get an idea what needs to be done. First of all *she* did all the wiring for her house and it needs to be fixed. thankfully Jose's dad is great at that kind of stuff and is going to take care of it! Next she doesn't have any fans in her house. Trust me it gets hot here. I am sitting with all the windows open and the fan on in hopes of getting some air circulating. I cannot imagine what it would be like if there were 8 children running around making it hotter in here! So we are going to get her a couple fans to cool off the rooms (Again Jose's dad is handling this because he's awesome) She also needs a rug, and would like a slide for the kids to play on and a shelf in the kids room. Aside from that we plan to put together a basket of food for her and her kids. This is all really phase one of a project that we think we could work on until we leave Lima. If you would like to make a donation into this project send me a message @ jkmission2peru@gmail.com that is also our paypal address. or you can give through the link on the right of the blog.

I will leave you with our Christmas card because I am super proud of it since I made it! (using pic's taken by my friend Jami)

Happy New Year!

Our first day in Lima in pictures + update!!!

The first day here was exciting

We were all up early and ready to see what we could accomplish...but we didn't realize Peru doesn't really wake up until around 10 or 11

so we hung out around the hotel for awhile

 

When we did get out to the stores they weren't all open anyway but we enjoyed a nice walk.

In fact we walked and walked and walked.

But the boys still had energy so we let them play at the playground.

They were not the least bit excited about it

  

We ate at my current favorite restaurant

They have a cute little flower cart outside.

After lunch we drove around for a few hours looking for houses with for rent signs outside...we didn't find many but that didn't really matter.

We finished out the day at a grocery store named Wong. Jose got our cell phones set up and me and the boys sat in the little coin operated car area.

They liked this one

We have really seen God's hand and just favor over us the whole time here.

Even when we were flying over here. We checked with the airline the day before we left to find out how much it would cost if we checked extra baggage they said $140 per bag. We decided to buy an extra suitcase and check it because we were just running out of options. Tuesday morning at 4 am we showed up at the airport with our 11 suitcases, 5 carry-ons and 5 personal items. We weighed everything to make sure we weren't over weight and had to move a few things to carry ons. Jose went to check the bags and they said it was only an extra $40 instead of $140. Jose decided to go ahead and check 2 of our carry-ons as well because it was so much cheaper (plus we really didn't want that many carry ons.) The lady called her supervisor over at the end to sign off on everything and the supervisor said "no, you were supposed to charge them $140 for each additional bag" then she told Jose "sir because of our mistake we are going to let you check these 3 bags for free" We didn't have to pay any extra fees for our bags at all!

Secondly when we went out with the realtor she had 2 apartments to show us in our price range, and 2 that were slightly higher than we wanted to pay. We looked at all of them and Jose and I both liked the first one we looked at (which was in our price range hallelujah). All the places in the area we need to be in were unfurnished though. So while we waited to get the contract from the owner we decided to go price furniture and appliances (houses don't even come with ovens here) I'm not going to lie. Looking at how much everything was going to cost and even just trying to furnish a complete house from nothing was a little intimidating. But I serve a big God. That night we went to meet with the owner (a former actress/tv host) We were there for about 2 hours talking about the house/living arrangement/her health/the realtors family/ etc.... this is Peru you don't have short meetings about one specific thing and then move on here. In the process of our conversation she asked if we have furniture. We told her we don't and she said "My daughter lived here for 3 months. She bought everything new and left it with me when she moved. I'll tell you what, if you want I can furnish the house for an extra $200 a month then when you go to Piura you can have it all if you want it. I even have trucks that go up there all the time you can take it in one of my trucks when you go."  All we need to get is linens and some kitchen items to have everything we need for our house.

Third. One minor hickup is that the house is brand new. When we were looking at it it didn't have light fixtures and was still being painted. Because of that the house won't be ready until Friday. But our hotel is only available until Tuesday then we were going to have to move to a different room. Not a big deal for us but it would cost us 4 extra night's in the hotel. Yesterday when we were at church we talking with the pastors and the couple that is in charge of the retreat center. They asked where we are staying and we explained the whole situation. When we finished they said "don't spend your money on a hotel we have a guest house behind our house you can stay there until your house is finished." Then Jose asked if we can start moving our luggage over today and the pastor said "just use the church van. I will send it over to pick all your sutff up on Tuesday so you can move everything in one trip"

We have an amazing God. It is so awesome to see his hand on every step of our journey. It is clear he is Jehovah Jireh our provider. We can't wait to see what He is going to do next! 

Please be in prayer with us for a vehicle. There are six of us so we need something that carries at least six comfortably. We are really praying for an H1 mini van (they carry 12 passengers but look like a mini van) We have called on a few used vehicles but they sell for almost the same as new...cars do not depreciate here. 

Thank you so much for all your prayers and support it is deeply appreciated! And we can seriously see/feel the prayers in our daily life!   

Giving Details

I've had several people ask what they can do to help and what our specific needs are.

Overall
PRAYER! We need all we can get and then some. This will only work as long as it has God's hand on it and we desire more than anything to be in his will. Because of that we covet your prayers above all else that He would guide us, our hearts will stay right and that he would go before us and behind us every step.

Financially
One time donation's
We need to raise about $10,000 more before we leave for start up costs. That covers everything we need to get initially established. As you probably know everything we own is currently residing in 12 suitcase (4 are carry-on's) So we will need everything from travel/transportation to a place to live, plus the paperwork fees etc... really boring stuff but important!

Monthly recurring donations
We will need about $3000 a month. The first year we will participate in the ministry school that reaches out to the families of Peru. Most of our budget will go to our daily living expenses. Including traveling to Piura monthly to work on establishing the mission there so when our time in Lima is done the transition will be easier. Anything we are given above that will go into a savings account we will use for the Mission in Piura.

If you would like to give into our ministry one time or monthly you have 2 options.

Option 1 Paypal. I have installed a tab to the right that will take you directly to our paypal account and you can give that way. Our paypal account name is jkmission2peru@GMail.com

Option 2 Tax deductible donation. There is another tab on the right that will take you to our church website. They have set up an account for us where you can give (designated as Mission to Peru.) They will track it and get it to us and mail you a giving statement at the beginning of the year (just in time for tax season) They also email you a receipt and you can track your giving through the website. If you choose to give this way please send me an email at the above address with the amount you are giving and if it's a one time gift or if you plan to give monthly.

Any amount you can give is helping us to fulfill our mission to Peru. Thank you for your support of this ministry!