Life in Phases: To Peru and Back

Well it has been a few weeks since our last blog, we have been all over the place this past month. I've been on a mission trip to Peru, visited my family in Texas, and just this past weekend Anna and I and her whole family went to Chicago to see her brother and sister-in-law and their new little arrival into their family. So it has been a crazy month full of great times all that I am so thankful for. I went to Peru with a good friend of mine from Texas, I went with him and his wife and some college students from their church. It was an awesome experience for me to see what the Lord was doing in Peru. We were in Peru for 9 days and were busy every single one of them. We partnered with an American missionary couple who live in Iquitos, Peru, they work there with a local bible school who trains and equips their students to go out and share the gospel through church planting. We went up the Amazon River and visited one of the church plants from the bible school. It took a 2 hour bus ride and a 6 hour boat ride up the Amazon to get there. We spent 5 days at the village in the jungle building a house for the pastor and his wife, doing VBS with all the children(where I got to dress up as a clown...I was kind of frighting though), as well as having church services at night. I was blown away by the joy of the pastor and his wife, though they had very little they were so happy and joyous... and children of the village... well they just touched your heart by the all joy that they had. On the day we left the village we stopped in Nauta, Peru and got to play football, soccer, ultimate frisbee, and volleyball with some local young men and women there. We had a great time playing sports (esp. football) and at the end I got to share the gospel with all of them. It was awesome to see how the Lord can use something like sports to bring people to know him as Savior. We got a lot accomplished on the trip, we built the house of their dreams for the pastor and his wife, we brought joy to children through loving on them, and we brought the wonderful news of Jesus to many who had never heard it. All in all it was an amazing trip, one that I will never forget as long as I live. I know I am forever changed from it, in many ways that I have not even realized yet. I thank the Lord so much for it. I have also enclosed so photos from the trip, I hope you enjoy them.