The trip there was eye-opening. Always interesting in Latin countries the influence of Coca Cola and Pepsi....as shown in the following video (taken through our bus window):
Like I have said before, it is often the people of a country that you fall in love with. We had a chance to participate in several prayer meetings in different churches, join a young people's evening, have dinner with many, and share around the table with a few more.
Our time in Piura included visiting a number of the churches there and in surrounding communities. Some are quite remote, reachable by driving down sandy "streets" outlined by power poles and a mix of brick buildings and grass/wood fences. For most, the edge of town is where desert begins, as far as you can see.
The city of Piura, though, is quite modern. A new mall includes a food court with KFC and Burger King, and soon a Starbucks and Pizza Hut("and Payless Shoe Source!" adds Melissa) will join the list. The central town plaza (Plaza de Armas), next to the Cathedral, is a beautiful place to hang out as well!
From Piura, we flew back to Lima, to spend some time with Jose Prada and his team. Jose has been pastoring a church plant in Lima for many years and is a wonderful visionary in that city. While his wife has been ill and out of the country for a month, Jose was very kind to take us around and show us the many sights! A top memory will be the water park at night:
We ended the trip with a tour of Lima, exploring the center of the city. It is a beautiful place, with quite a bit of wild and crazy traffic, but with a lot of places to visit and see:
So where do we go from here? We are still absorbing the many sights, sounds, and experiences Melissa and I had on this trip. There are any number of places we feel we could find ourselves serving in the country, but for now, we are waiting for further direction from our sovereign God who has His own plans for this future of ours.
As always, there are a lot more pictures to show, and not enough time in the day to upload/share them all! If you would like a personal report, let us know! We would love to share our stories of the people we met with you.
And for those of you who are still trying to figure out what exactly we are going to be doing in Peru, at this point the plan is for us to support the current pastoral and MB conference leaders with discipleship, leadership training, mentoring, seminars, strategic planning... stuff like that. We're going to be supporting the work already being done - not starting a new church plant or some other new ministry at this point. But as the Peruvians we'll be working with start new ministries, we'll be there to join them.
Psalm 24:1 says "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it." This was something running through my head on this trip. I was reminded of this on the road through the desert to Piura, in the back seat of a wild taxi ride through the streets of Lima, and during the turbulent flights between Lima and LA.
Take care.
Lowell
