Sorry for the lack of details with this post, but I don´t have much time for this post as we have a busy morning ahead of us today. I tried to put up a full post on Wednesday, but wacky internet and computers that delete all saved documents when they are restarted left me high and dry. And, there just wasn´t any internet yesterday. So, here´s a quick skim of things that have happened:

We found Yulber(Juber) and his friend Wilber who is the young man who we got to see savedour first week here.

Exploding attendance at Bible Study.

Jon from Barnabas team met with us and got to attend a bible lesson at a local private catholic high school as well as a parade.

Got invited at the parade for a chance to teach English at two different schools which both led to an invite back to teach the gospel.

Teaching English to a local lady in the afternoons. Hopefully will lead to teaching her the gospel.

Got to play basketball and video games with local kids. Also got invited to play volleyball with some of the local young adults. Didn´t pan out, but had good time of fellowship at youth volleyball and soccer games.

Had an impromptu rooftop worship session in which we got to share the gospel with several children and young adults.

Also, prayer request: We have had our first doctrinal run-in with the Pastor who we have been having our Bible study with. He mentioned that he believes it´s not appropriate to play instruments when praising God and that Baptists try to mingle the Old Covenant with the New. I pray that we will be able to resolve this, that it was simply a misunderstanding, or that we will be able to find a new house to have bible studies in.
Also pray that we will have a safe trip to Nasca, and also that next week we will have a safe trip to Cilcatta and Pausa. We will be sharing the gospel in Cilcatta which is apparently devoid of gospel presence and also visiting Yulber´s work in Pausa. Thanks for all of the prayers.

After a hard half-day of teaching and reviewing English lessons with Romi´s classes on Monday,we decided to grab some lunch and do the thing any teacher wants to do after a day of teaching. We took a nap.So, after an hour or so of being lazy we decided it was time for some internet action to catch up with what had been going on with our friends abroad in Peru. However, as we were walking down the street we realized that the power was out, and as all of you computer buffs out there know, computers don´t work well without electricity. So, we decided we would walk around the city and see what we could find that was worthy of us wastin our time. Then, as we got to a part of the city we had already been to and knew there wasn´t much up there, we turned around and noticed some local kids playing soccer in the street on their way home from school. As one of the stray kicks came our way, Jodi politely returned the ball and thus ensued a game of keep the ball away from the gringos. This was pretty fun for a while, until traffic started to be to frequent for the game to be much fun and the kids decided instead that talking to the gringos would be more fun. They asked us how to say a plethura of words and made fun of our inability to speak or understand Quetchua. Then, as a couple of adults lingered into the crowd, one of the children noticed Allen´s evangelism bracelette and asked him what it was. Hallelujah. In that instant, God had turned a wasted afternoon into a witnessing oppurtunity to about ten or twelve kids and a few adults. As we explained the colors not all of the kids were paying attention, but that was to be expected. However, there was one lady with a baby in haul that seemed to be thoroughly hanging on every word we said as we explained the importance of the different colors. No decisions were publicly made, but a seed was definitely planted. Mountain-top indeed.

As you may have seen mentioned in the previous message, we were scheduled to have lunch with Methuselah. Well, it turns out, I don´t have my Spanish days down pat because I told you that it was supposed to be on Monday, but it turns out that it was yesterday. Anyways, the menu was outstanding and as always filled us to the brim. For starters, he served some fresh corn with chunks of a cheese wheel that was made by one of the people who live across the street. This was the freshest cheese that I had ever eaten in my life and it was delicious. For the second course, he served a vegetable stew with some sticky rice that was rich and hearty beyond belief. This stuff was so good that even the food skeptic Jodi was heralding its flavor. Then, as a finish, we had some souplike rice in milk cooked with cinamon, clove, and grapes. It was a mildly sweet and arromatic dish that really hit the spot after such a hearty meal. Then, as always with Methuselah, we finished with some food for the soul as he further drove home the Christ-centricity of the Bible and the uniqueness of Christ as our savior. Both topics which will surely be part of our next Bible study at his house this Thursday night.

After lunch, since most of us were halfway into a pleasure coma already, we decided once again to sleep off the effects of a heavy meal for about 20 or 30 minutes and then resume our afternoon. After a good time of laying around lazy and listening to music, it was time to prepare for the bible study we had planned with Danté that night. So, after a couple of hours planning a lesson on the warrior of God and searching through english to spanish dictionaries for all of the crazy epic words I had used in my notes, we headed out into the hallway to wait for Danté to show. And, who did we meet there other than the traveling English teacher, Andrés. Perfect timing. We promptly invited him to join us just as we heard Dantés motorcycle pull up outside. He agreed and quickly ran back to his hostal to grab the Bible we had given him when we had first met him. Then, as we were preparing the lobby on the third floor, Marivel showed up and helped us round up more chairs and we also invited her to join us. After explaining the different commandments and pieces of armor that Paul mentions in the last Chapter of Ephesians starting in the 10th verse, both Andrés and Danté had excellent questions that allowed the perfect oppurtunity to explain the need of discipleship in all believer´s lives. So, after a few goodbyes and informing everyone of Thursday night´s study, we decided that it was time to get dinner and Pizza was sounding like the choice of the night.

As we turned the corner to start walking toward the Pizza place, we noticed that the doors were all locked shut and the lights outside were not on. But, this didn´t stop a hungry group of 4 college kids and their guest teacher. No, instead, we decided to go into Pollo a la Brasa which was conveniently right next to where we were standing trying to figure out where we were going to eat. Though reluctant after the last meal there had been a common link between the incapacitation of both Allen and I, we decided that we would try it again and either we would be fine, or would know for sure that Pollo a la Brasa was the cause of our last ailment. After we had ordered, Andrés went to talk to one of the men running the restaraunt, who was apparently the head hauncho. After a few minutes, he returned and we were served our chicken. The meal was delicious and the fellowship was sweet. Then, as we were leaving, the owner stopped Andrés and talked to him for a little whie longer as we waited outside the front gate. Within a few minutes, the owner and Andrés came over together and began to talk with us. Apparently the man was also either a teacher or administrator of one of the larger private Catholic High-schools in Coracora. He had approached Andrés to ask him if we would possibly want to lead a bible class this saturday at the school. Pouncing on the oppurtunity we were all confident in saying "Si." We then told him that after some prayer and studying, we would return tonight to inform him of our topic. Which, unless the Spirit changes, will be the story of David´s great sin. So, in finishing, pray that the will of God will be done and that He will give us the words to speak to these 8-14 year-old children. This is an oppurtunity that came about just like all of the others as a way of sheer Godly intervention. Thank you for your prayers and your support. I assure you that they are being heard and that God is working.

Pan de Vida

Sad news. We haven´t heard from our good friend Juber in several days. He broke two appointments to have dinner together and I´m not sure why. However, the last time we saw him, he said something about his son being sick. Of course, this was the first mention any of us had ever heard of a son, or even of a family for that matter. I´m not sure what´s going on with him, but please pray for him that whatever he´s going through that he might be strong enough to do what God would have him do.

Happy news. None of us are laid up in bed anymore. We´ve actually had two days in a row now that we were all able to walk around the city and be present at planned functions. Yesterday we started the day by seperating up and going on a prayer walk around the entire city. We got the chance to walk by the bull ring, see parts of the city we didn´t know existed, found a new plaza, and also talked with several construction workers as we were walking back to our hostal. The two groups then met back up after lunch and chilled out for a little while until we went to the orphanage to hang out with some of the kids. We had planned on telling a bible story to them, but never really could calm them down or get them together enough to tell them a story, so we decided to stick with just singing some songs with them and spend some good bonding time with our good friends, Christian and Reuben. FOr some reason, God has drawn these two young men to us and we´re really excited about that. Hopefully, we will be able to use them as an in-road to start a Bible study with some of the older kids at the Orphanage. So, please pray about this.

So, Methuselah was kind enough to invite us to his house Friday morning for a traditional peruvian breakfast that consisted of some cheese tamales that were rediculously tasty yet, crazy dry. But, that was ok, because he also fixed us a drink that was like a thick, cinamon hot chocolate with oatmeal in it. Crazy good, though I don´t think anyone else liked the entire meal as much as I did. I ate five of the tamales (Allen was runner up with two) and I drank my whole cup of drink. Albee beat me at the drink as she drank two whole mugs, but I think she regretted it within the hour as she became a little bit sickly. So, I don´t think she´s as excited about our lunch date with him tomorrow as I am. In all actuality though, pray for us that we will be able to stomach what he has so graciously offered us.

Speaking of sickness and the girls, Romi has offered to let them live with her free of charge, however, since we´ve already payed for our hostal through the end of June, they won´t be able to move in until after midsummer. However, this will be perfect because Romi is one of the like two people in Coracora with a heated house. This means the cold that has been plaguing Jodi may actually have a chance to heal. Also this will provide a good solid relationship with Romi as well as her daughter that could have a good chance of starting a new or strengthened relationship with Christ for all parties involved.

I would also like to report a praise as we had a new attender at the house church we´ve been going to this morning. We got to teach about The Lord´s supper and baptism, the prophecies leading up to these, and the imagery and position of Christ in all of these throughout all of the scriptures. It was an amazing service and touched on many of the key topics of the Christian faith. And yes, it was a three hour meeting. Hopefully the truths sank into those that were there and provided a solid spiritual meal for all present. I know I got a good filling. with that said, pray for us as we continue to try and get this and possibly more home-churches and bible studies started with a firm basis in God´s word.

As for an update with personal contacts, we are making good friends with one of the locals named Dante. He has started hanging out with us more often and has attended several bible studies so far. Also, he and Allen are meeting tonight they are going to practice speaking German. God has a ton planned for this inteligent young Engineer and I know that he will be a valuable contact in this small town. Pray for him that he might continue firmly in his walk.

Side message- I now have MSN messenger. My screenname is Benjavajammin@live.com if you ever catch me while I´m online, feel free to drop a message.

God bless.

Those Who Wait

Not much has happened in the last couple of days. First off, we met for another awesome prayer session/bible study with Methuselah on Sunday. Then, on Tuesday, all of us except for our sick translator, Allen, met with Romi, one of the local school teachers who teaches English, and helped her with her classes. We first met her as she was teaching two 6th grade classes and helped explain the use of plurals and various other vocabulary such as the seasons and weather words. Then followed her to another school and helped out with a second grade class, expaling colors, shapes, and various things such as windows, doors, walls, etc. In all three classes, we were asked to end off with a song. We obliged the request by singing our unofficial themesong, "Sing to the King." The kids loved it, and got to experience praise in another language, whether they realized it or not.

Other than that, we've been kind of hanging out in internet cafes and resting as plans have been either canceled or forgotten. However, I don't look at these closed doors as bad omens or even as time wasted, but rather as waiting for God's timing. One instance of a forgotten/cancelled/plan gone awry turning into a positive twist was when a failed bible study ended in us meeting a Peruvian Geologist who spoke a good bit of English. Also, for me at least, a decent amount of the downtime has been spent in reading, prayer, and even some meditation. It has tremendously helped to take my mind off of simply being in a new city and helped me focus on sincerely wanting and craving to do the work of God. Which, as we read in John, is to "Believe in the one whom He sent."
Through all of this as well as some reading about the early church, I've found that God requires a period of waiting that builds in us patience and also transforms our hearts to want what is in His will for us. After all, I have no clue what God is doing or what He wants done here, except for that His name and His promise might be presented to these people. In the meantime, we wait for the opened door and also for our "Wings like Eagles." We appreciate your prayers and your thoughts as we await the wonders God has prepared for Coracora, and also for us.

The Only Car Mentioned in the Bible

::CAUTION:: This Post is in no way in chronological order, it´s just a random grab-bag of a few of the awesome things that I can remember since the last post.

Ok, so first, for the like two of you that don´t know the joke, "What´s the only car mentioned in the bible?" Which refers to the verse in acts which reads "And they all left in one ACCORD." And second, to explain what on earth that all means. So, have you ever been in a situation where everything just fell into place like a game of Tetris on super easy? Well, if you haven´t, let me fill you in on what its like. Wednesday night, we were supposed to meet our friend Juber at the MMM(acronym for Worldwide Mission Movement in Spanish) church down the road from our new Hostal. (I´ll get to Juber and the new hostal business later). So, heeding the words of Paul, I prayed and prepared a short sermon over the bread of life based on the tempation of Christ in the desert. Then, when I arrived at the Church, I received an unmistakeable urge to also throw in some of Christ´s teaching on the proper way to pray in public. And, as the Spirit would have it, what did the pastor preach on that night? Exactly the verses and the topics which I had planned to discuss. Ok, cool coincidence, God. I appreciate the support. Then, like three days later, when I had built up the sermon about the bread of life for our next Bible study, the amazing man of Peace whome we have lovingly named Methuselah. . . because he´s old . . . and wise. . . decided it appropriate to open the study with the words, "Now let´s receive the bread of life." And, by this time I was rediculous excited and rediculous encouraged. Happy day. Excitement. Jesus rocks.

Now, for Juber. . . This is the guy I was talking about last time that wants to start a church here in CoraCora. He´s amazing. He´s picking up English, and he´s an artist. What kind of artist you ask? Well, put simply, he´s an alpacca artist. That is, he´s trained in the art of textile and makes rediculous cool tapestries and anything else out of alpacca fur. Some of his works include M.C. Escher replicas and other rediculously meticulous patterns. I´m going to try and get some pictures of a couple of his works up at some point because they are really cool. Plus, he´s supposed to be making me a bag out of the colors that are on the witnessing bracelets as well as a cool beannie thing and probably eventually a hoodie. Anyways, he´s really cool and is becoming a good friend.

As for Methuselah, he´s a pastor from a church of God who has the babptist doctrine emblazoned on his heart. Why church of God? I don´t know and frankly don´t care. He´s wise, and he´s preaching the truth regardless if it´s Baptist or not. We´re not here to promote the Baptist agenda, but the Christian one, after all. And speaking of Frank and the Truth, we´ve also started to make good friends with Padre Franco from the local Catholic Church. I love this man. He´s a rebel. He refuses to preach not only pergatory but also the deity and praying to Mary. Is he perfect? No, but he´s probably closer to the Truth than many protestant pastors in the states. I like him.

And(It´s a blog. . . I can use rediculous grammar), I have no clue how to seguay in to this. . . We took a taxi to some of the Hot Springs the other day which was pretty rediculous because, you see, I had woken up that morning feeling kind of loopy and extremely tired. Thinking that I had simply slept too long and needed some coffee, I decided to go on up to the hot springs, only to discover after frying the lower half of my upper right arm and having half of my legs in boiling hot water for about two hours, that the drunkeness was actually the result of a fever which had now only become worse. But, with the help of advil and a good 13 hours of sleep, I felt like a million bucks and left the next morning to go to the ¨"closer" hot springs with some of the older chicos from the local orphanage. Well, it was closer. The only problem was that after we started to go there, we realized that it was over a mountain and through a gorge. Long story short, I got not only the workout, but also some of the most amazing views of my life. I don´t think I can explain the extent of the hike, except for we climbed a mountain that started about 10000 feet in the Andes and then climbed down the other side and then walked through a gorge in another mountain to get to a mountain stream that ran alongside some volcanic vents. Amazing. Then, we went back. . . all in the same day. Exhausting. . . and amazing.

Finally, what would a post be without some music? So, the first night we moved into our new hsotal, we were really in the mood to jam for the Lord, and the only place we could find that was big enough for all of us to fit was on top of the building. That´s right. We jammed on the roof of a building in the middle of a Peruvian City singing to the King by the light of a flashlight and a lamp that the loving young landlady, Maribel, brought up for us when she decided to join us. I love it when the Lord just randomly inspires. And, by the suggestion of Barry and by the rediculous amount of kids walking through the plaza nearest our hostal around 2:30 when they got out of school, we decided to make our presence known even more in the city by holding a mini praise concert on the steps of the statue at the middle of the plaza. It was pretty cool. We got to explain to several people our purpose and also got to make some good contacts with some of the local youth. God is awesome. Like I said before, I´m having the time of my life and I´m getting to do all the rediculous things I´ve only been able to dream about doing in the states. With that, I´m going to resign for the night and go eat some Peruvian dougnuts(picorones) and canned tuna. Cao homies.

Exodus and Arrival

So, it´s been one week since we´ve been in Peru and two days since we´ve been in the city of Coracora in the province of Ayicucho. Already God has given me more understanding of his plan through Christianity in all of the symblism through the days of the Tabernacle and the Exodus of his chosen people. This causes me to wonder in what chapter we exist and if this is not the final chapter, what God will show through us in Generations to come. But, let´s get to the basic storytelling part.As many of you may know, my flight to Lima, Peru was indeed my first and certainly not my last ( I may have to get home... sometime). Don´t worry, mom, I´m only kidding. Anyways, the flight went about as well as could be hoped for and after about 11 hours of flying and running around in airports trying to use the bathroom and get food before the big old jet airliner that was supposed to carry us away left without us, we arrived in Lima. And in those eleven hours, suddenly I became as effective as a 5 year-old teaching an Astrophysics class. I was there and I knew enough of the language to order a happymeal. Luckily though, Allen came to my rescue and got me through customs. Then we met up with the people that were looking for us, exchanged a few bucks into soles and bought some Big Macs. That´s right, the first thing I ate in Peru was a Big Mac. It´s ok though, because after a midnight taxi ride through the streets of Lima with our new friends Rachel and Sierra, I was not only wide awake, prayed up, and more confident in my own driving skills, but I was also hungry again. So, when more missionaries showed up at our hostal, one of the more extroverted guys, Derek, suggested we go get some early morning llama heart. So, a group of six or seven gringos set out to walk across half of lima to find a 24 hour peruvian waffle house of sorts for some good old Anticuchos. Just in case you were worried that we wouldn´t find them, we did. They were delicious. They had an unmistakenly tasty hint of wild game and were a perfect texture somewhere between steak and fried chicken liver. But, that´s beside the point because while we were sitting in an outside of this restaraunt, some creepy old drunk man in really nice clothes who really resembled a possessed Mr. Bean offered to buy us beer. We refused. Then, somehow he found out we were Baptist missionaries and wanted to know if we were black Baptists or White Baptists. We weren´t quite sure how to respond so we just said "well I don´t think any of us are black. . . " and he didn´t like that answer, got angry and stormed off with a disgusted " Now I know what you are, Cao Babies!" only to return a few minutes later with an appology. After we cleared up the fact that we didn´t care about the color of peoples skin, he proceded to inform is that the real missionaries, catholic missionaries, usually were killed where they served. He followed this bit of insightful information by inquiring where were staying to which we obviously gave an overly general answer of ,"uh... we´re just kind of spread out all over Lima." I guess he did like that answer, because he ordered a beer and payed for our food. And, in light of the obviously dulling conversation and hour of the night, we walked, well half ran, back to our hostal by way of China. It was strictly for exercise, obviously. Then, around 4, we got back to our hostal and got a good 3 hours sleep before we met at the REAPsouth office just down the street.

Thus began one of the most tiring days of my life as our group of four college students (Allen Kittenger, Albee Zhang, Jodi Webb, and myself) were assigned a translator and given an envelope to begin a scavenger hunt across the entire city of Lima. Then, after exchanging money, eating raw fish bathed in lemon juice and topped with rediculously tasty red onions, eating a pepper that tasted like smoky goodness at first then made me cry both tears of joy and sheer pain, drinking some frog juice (litterally, I watched the man take a live frog, beat it over the head with a butter knife and then proceed to clean it and gut it in one fluid motion), and finally exploring some catacombs, I took a hour and a half bus ride. However, this was no goin to primary school bus ride. This was a how many people can we fit in a 15 passenger van converted to look like a trolly for midgets where personal space became a figment in the imaginations of fairy tale creatures and the driver´s only goal was to hit sixty miles an hour then slam on the brakes and cram even more people into the space he had just created by making everyone that was standing fall over, or to have lst ten pounds vomiting. But we made it to a little park finally where we were instructed to get some dinner, then to buy some bottles of water and some toillette paper. . . which we have to take everywhere by the way, then catch another taxi to get to the Fica Bautista where we would begin our last minute preperations as missionaries in Peru. So, we finallly got to the Baptist compound at what seemed like at least 11 because the sun had been down for a good two hours. Then after we all realized that it was only 8 o´clock and that it is currently winter in the southern hemisphere, we decided to do the thing that all comletely exasperated college students that had just walked more than they ever had in the whole of their lives. . . we played elbo tag for two hours, then followed that up with games that would make us look rediculous to even preschoolers, then crashed onto sheets of plywood covered with some material. Oh, and I would like to take this time to mention that it was one of the best times in my life.

The next two days were filled with making new friends that are the kind of friends that I´m already sorry that I won´t get to see for another month and learning about the culture, the "whole picture of God", and how to keep from spending all of your time either sitting on or kneeling before the porcelein thrown. Back to the friends though, these were all men and women with a heart for God and that genuinely cared for one another as if we had all grown up together, or at least all did a really good job at portraying that feeling. Anyways, after two days of morning to night worship and learning, we headed back to Lima to prepare to send off to all parts of southern Peru to spread the good news of God´s love for all his creation.

After exploring Lima for another day, my team, as mentioned earlier, hopped on a bus for a 16 hour bus ride, and after 19 hours arrived in the frigid coracora. We caught a few hours of sleep then went about with our guide from the states, Barry and a translator named Javiar and went on a tour de CoraCora visiting the orphanage ( where we were both rockstars and jungle gyms), the college (which was smaller than almost every primary school in the states), and finally a Bible study where we got to see a local accept Christ into his life and met a man who is hungry to start a Christian church here in Coracora. . . in the first day. Of course that´s not mentioning all of the random places we stopped along the way. All of this is to say one thing, though. I am so thankful that God has not only let me have the chance to make this journey and to meet all of my new friends, but to also see his work amongst these loving people. Thus ends the short story so far.

In the beginning

So what's this Mission trip all about, you ask?
Well, Allen and I will be going to Kora-Kora, Peru as part of the Reap-South mission through the International Mission Board(IMB). We will be working on behalf of Poplar Grove Baptist Church in Cookeville, Tennessee. Our primary goal will be to help existing Bible studies and local small groups continue to meet and possibly start new groups within the area. Our hope is that these small groups of believers will continue to meet even without our constant presence and will be well-rooted enough to start churches on their own that will be able to withstand the constant pressure from past traditions and the local presence of an idol-prone religious sect. That's not to say we're there to "Catholic bash" but instead, to offer the residents a firm scriptural backing and plant a seed of Truth in the hearts of the people that could possibly be missed within the Catholic setting.
We will be flying out of Atlanta on May 27th and we will be returning on August 1st. We would appreciate all prayers and support. We should be providing more updates while in Peru and also if anything arises before then. Thanks for your time!