Peru Trip Aug 2009 V

One of the first things that we saw when we got to the Yanamarca Valley was a festival day on Sunday afternoon in Marco. There was a mountain of beer purchased by the municipality for the town celebration. And people were literally falling down drunk. They were excited to see Americans, and wanted lots of pictures with Kayla (we were going to start charging for them). But our hearts were broken at their need, and slavery to alcohol. And so we became even more determined to bring the gospel to them in a lasting way.

Even though God led us to different villages, the image stuck in our minds, for it is a very similar situation in many of the villages. And so when we were given opportunity to share Christ in Julcan, Molinos, and Masma, we were really excited. For as far as we know, there may only be three or four born-again believers in any of these villages. So the deception is big, and the fields were white. And God so showed up on our behalf there.


We did a lot of witnessing in the town plazas with the evangicube. A couple of our team actually learned their presentation in Spanish. And everyone loved the pictoral presentation of the gospel on the cube. People would well up with tears when you shared with them the freedom and joy found in Christ. But many knew the implications of believing the evangelical gospel, and have been warned by the Catholic church to steer clear. And so we had few professions of faith. But our goal was not to count heads or raised hands, but to clearly give the gospel and its demands upon the lives of all those that would follow our Savior.

During the evenings we did a values talk for these three villages that ended with the story of Nicodemus and the value of being religious vs. having a genuinely transforming relationship with Christ. A couple of our men played the parts of Nicodemus and Jesus as I narrated the story.


Then we would give out a snack and show the movie La Esperanza. This video is the Spanish version of the Hope film. We were turned on to this by a missionary from Asia who spoke at our church recently. The people were enthralled by the story of the bible in modern media. And they would stand for the entire 80 min presentation, linig up at the doors to see! It was truly amazing!

We then shared the gospel again, thanked them for letting us come, gave out school supplies, new testaments, and stuffed bears. This was a little crazy because of the crowds, but we survived. We put out sign up sheets if people wanted further information about Jesus and following Him.

In Masma, we had about 120 people come to our presentation. In Molinos we had about 100. And in Julcan, a village of about 700-800 people, we had over 200 come! The gospel definitely advanced in the Yacus Valley of Peru that week. We are looking forward to the fruit that will come forth from these endeavors.

Here is a picture right before we showed the movie in Julcan on Thurs night. You can't really see the people lined up out the door, but they are there.

More to come...