Urgent Prayer Request

As many of you know, the main community where our team has been working for the past year and a half is a small village called Qhochumi. A few months back, the guys told the first story that included baptism in it and our “man of peace,” Celedonio, soon after told them that he wanted to get baptized, without even being asked. When the guys tried to make his request a reality, he began to make excuses as to why he couldn’t do it that day, putting it off further and further.

We prayed that this trip Celedonio would put aside all of his hesitations and be baptized along with some other members of the community who have been listening to the stories. However, the guys called this morning and things are not going well. Celedonio told them he is not interested in the stories anymore and doesn’t want to change. The other families that have been learning the stories are working our guys like slaves and don’t seem to be interested anymore either.

Trent and our Quechua friend, Simon, have gone to meet the guys, encourage them, and assess the situation. As you can imagine, we are all confused, discouraged, and sad. What is God’s plan in all of the this? Why would we see God working through His word this whole time only for it to end in nothing?

Please pray for Trent and Simon as they travel and for our guys, Javier, Roberto, and Efrain, who are very, very discouraged.

Getting Ready for Training

November 22-January 31 we will host our team’s first Bolivian training. We’ve been through training and helped teach at a few, but this will be our first time to be primarily responsible for the training. We have begun thinking about, planning, and preparing. We now have a piece of land to hold the training and are gathering materials we will need. We already have some North American team members who will participate in the training and some Argentine believers who are likely to come. Yesterday, Trent spoke at two Quechua churches informing them of the opportunity to be trained as a missionary.

We are so excited about this next step in this ministry and can’t wait to see how God will use it. This training will be a little different than the ones in the jungle. The goal behind it will still be the same: to prepare missionaries to take the Gospel, using oral Bible stories, to hard to reach places. In this training, the trainees will live in an adobe house with no running water or electricity, cook over a fire, and bathe using very little water.

They will not only learn how to live like the people they will minister to, they will learn 36-40 Bible stories that they will practice sharing in a local community once a week. We will teach about church history, approaches to missions, first aid, and much more.

One of the major goals of this training is to get our South American team members, including all three of the guys on our team, to run most of this training. Please pray for those that God would lead to participate in our training and also for our team members who will be leading out in this training.

Headed Back Out

Please pray for our guys who headed back out to Qhochumi today. Please pray that they would see some baptized in Qhochumi this month.

Three Friends

There is a young man, Aquiles, who is a member of one of the families who meets with us as a church. Aquiles occasionally joins us, but hasn’t been very sure about his personal spiritual state. The last time we met, Aquiles brought a friend, Nicol, who is interested in knowing more about God. Trent talked with them both and invited them to meet with him to talk more about God. Later that night, Aquiles asked Trent if he was available the next night.

The next night was Saturday and all of their friends were going to a party. Despite their friends’ attempts, and sometimes jokes, to get them to go with them, Aquiles and Nicol decided to come to our house instead. And they brought another friend, Franco.

Since then these three friends have come back once with plans to come a third time early next week. Each time Trent reads through a story with them in an effort to show them who God is, what obedience really means, and what they would be committing to if they decide to follow Christ. Trent is really trying to convey to them that this decision doesn’t just reflect a part of their lives or help them to become better people, but it means giving all of your life away.

Please pray for Aquiles (Achilles), Nicol (Nicolas), and Franco (Frank) as they contemplate this life changing decision.

I’m So Glad I’m a Part

I’m so glad, I’m a part, of the family of God.
I’ve been washed in the fountain, cleansed by His blood.
Joint heirs with Jesus, as we travel this sod.
For I’m a part, of the family, the family of God.

We used to sing this song every Sunday in my church growing up. For the last couple of times that our church has met here, I’ve found myself humming this same song for days afterward. God is really bringing our little family of God closer together here. And I have never been so glad. Before we moved so far away from our family, we started praying for God to provide us with people who would be like family to us here. And he has.

There is nothing like having a relationship that God so obviously ordained. I had prayed and prayed for Bolivian friends and when I started to spend time with my friend Rosita, I knew that God had brought us together. Our conversations always seemed to center around God and we naturally were able to open up and encourage one another. We first met our friend Simon through another missionary who knew he was from the province where we would work. Trent wanted to get to know Simon better, but that’s difficult to do when you don’t naturally see someone often, or even ever. Soon after we first met him, though, Trent and Simon ran into each other every day for about five days in a row. They finally both acknowledged that God was bringing them together.

Now our team, Rosita’s family, and Simon’s family have been meeting together as a church for about a year and a half. Recently the girls’ team has joined us and has really made our group feel complete. At first our church meetings were awkward. We had a Quechua family and a Latin family (two completely different cultures), an American couple, a Peruvian, a Colombian, and a few single American guys. We had three languages represented and we were meeting in a very non-traditional way.

I thought our expectation that we would open up and share our deepest thoughts was quite unrealistic. But God has joined us together in a way that is difficult to describe. One person will say something not knowing until later how much it encouraged someone else in the group. Often we will find that God is teaching us all the same thing. We eat together, laugh together, cry together, sing together, and live life together. It is not by our own efforts that we have gotten so close, but it is God who has nurtured and strengthened these relationships. There is nothing like that.

This past Sunday Rosita called us up and asked if we wanted to eat lunch with her and her kids. “We’re a family,” she said, “and families eat together on Sundays.” 

Javier’s Dreams

The guys had a very discouraging trip this last month. Celedonio, being the first member of his community to ever have decided to be baptized, is putting off his first act of obedience. You can imagine all that is coming into play here. Generations and generations of people in this community have been enslaved to Satan’s tricks, to animism, to fear. Spiritually, the battle is intense right now. Celedonio is thinking about what everyone will think of him, of how this will change his life, of what he will have to give up. Trent encouraged the guys by telling them this is a good sign that they have presented the truth very clearly; that Celedonio understands what true obedience is and that is not an easy sacrifice to make. Still, at times, the guys felt like all of the work they have put into Qhochumi, Celedonio, his family, and other families there, has been in vain.

During debriefing, Javier shared with us that God often uses dreams to encourage him. One day in Qhochumi he was so discouraged that he was ready to come home. The couple of the house where he was staying went out of town and left him with their four small kids to take care of, something men in this culture never do. He obviously wasn’t telling stories and didn’t know why he was even there. That night he had a dream that he talked to Trent on the phone. Trent kept telling him that he was a good soldier and to keep up the good work. Javier woke up refreshed and ready to keep going.

This past trip Javier had been sharing stories with Alberto and his family. At the end of the trip, he started having doubts about whether or not Alberto was serious about learning the stories. One of the first nights he was back in Sucre, he had a dream. In the dream, an older man was standing beside a house. They were in Qhochumi and Alberto was in the house. Javier asked the older man who built the house and he replied that Javier had built the house. “But I didn’t build the foundation,” Javier said. “Look at that mountain,” the man said, pointing to a mountain that really does exist in Qhochumi, “The foundation in that house is stronger than that mountain.”

At that moment, Javier woke up and quickly realized what the Lord was showing him through the dream. Javier’s job in Qhochumi is not to build the foundation. That job is the Lord’s. Javier was encouraged is ready to head back out and continue sharing stories with Alberto and his family.

Please pray for Javier, Roberto, and Efrain as they soon head back out to Qhochumi. Also pray for Celedonio, that he would take this first step of obedience to be baptized.

Such a Different Life

I was thinking the other day about similarities between our “former” life and our life here. I could hardly think of one thing they have in common. I’ll tell you this: it is a big change going from an 8-to-5 job to this. It’s hard not to think of work as tapping away on a computer or checking things off your list. I always thought of work as more task oriented than relationship oriented.

Here we quickly realized that our job was to invest in people, whether that means out in the community spending day after day with them or back home spending time with our team. Most of our time is not spent on the computer but with people. In fact, we have found that the computer can take away from those much needed relationships. This takes time. At first it was hard not to feel like we were wasting our time or not working when we spent an afternoon hanging out with our guys. But we soon learned that they need this to do their job and we need it to connect with them.

Another difference is that Trent and I do almost everything together. Gone are the days when we went our separate ways in the mornings and saw each other at night. We still have our own roles, but we are pretty much always together. Not only do we do ministry together, but just day-to-day things. I can’t think of a time when we haven’t gone to the grocery store together here. It means a lot to me that I know, and that Trent makes a point of telling me, that he needs me to do this job. And, of course, I can’t imagine doing it without him. I know things might change as our family grows, but right now we do everything we can to do this as a family. For example, when we were in the jungle and Trent was teaching, I knew that if the only thing I had time to do was manage Jack in that difficult situation, I would still be helping Trent just by being there with Jack.

I have to admit that on a Monday morning, it is nice to not have to clock in and be at a desk at 8 a.m., but I miss that Friday afternoon feeling, knowing that I have the whole weekend to relax. Although our schedule is very flexible, sometimes we work 24/7 and I find myself wondering when was the last time we had even an evening off. Other times we are stuck somewhere or waiting for something and it is boring and frustrating.

Even after all this time, I’m still adjusting to this relatively new lifestyle. Sometimes I long for my old one, and other times I wonder how I ever lived that way. One thing is for sure is that it’s completely different.

Not That Cool

Some people join our team expecting the adventure of a lifetime. They normally don’t last very long.

Our team is called the Xtreme Team, which brings to mind crazy stunts and edgy sports; adrenaline rushes and dangerous situations; tromping through the jungles or scaling mountain walls to reach people who have never seen anyone outside of their tribe before. The truth is, no one on our team has ever skydived into a village before. Can you imagine how freaked out those people would be? We don’t rock climb or white water raft. We don’t go to uncontacted people who have never seen anyone outside of their group before. That does sound pretty cool but would probably take a whole missionary career to reach one tribe, if even that.

We are called the Xtreme Team because we go to extreme places: the most isolated, hardest to reach places. Trent always says a better name for our team would be the Uncomfortable Team. It doesn’t take you long to realize that this is what it takes to go to extreme places: a lot of discomfort. When one former team member was recruiting for our team, he told someone this: “If you want to know if you could make it on the Xtreme Team, leave your underwear slightly damp and wear them like that for a week.” This better describes our team: a constant, nagging discomfort. I hate to break the image, but it’s just not that cool.

I remember the first time I was given a machete. I felt so cool tromping through the jungle cutting through vines like Indiana Jones. But it didn’t take me thirty minutes to figure out 1) I look entirely stupid with the a machete and I don’t know how to use it, 2) the 90 pound indigenous girl beside me can chop through a piece of wood in a minute and it takes me, well, I can’t chop through a piece of wood, 3) I hate that stupid machete. I remember giving myself a pep talk about the things I am good at, all of which were completely useless to me at the time. I looked and felt anything but cool.

Our team members aren’t the strongest, bravest, most athletic people. They are normal people who are obedient to withstand some of the most challenging, difficult circumstances they will ever be in. The battle is much more mental and spiritual than physical. They live for months at a time speaking a language that is not their own, eating food that isn’t familiar to them, working at tasks they’ve never done before and aren’t that great at, sleeping in mosquito nets or on rock hard mattresses. The work is slow, tedious, oftentimes frustrating, and overwhelming. It’s just not that cool.

The irony of it is, is that at the end of their term, it is an adventure of a lifetime. It’s just not what most people expect it to be. There is something completely satisfying in the day-to-day sacrifice of self; in realizing that it’s not even about you at all; in admitting to yourself that you just aren’t that cool.

Vacation Photos

Here are some pictures from our vacation to the States. I just realized that almost all of these are of babies or kids. If there is an adult in the picture, they are pretty much looking at the baby in the picture. Oh how life changes.

The Ones We Were Too Late For

Trent wrote:

A friend of mine once rushed a burning house to save a young girl inside. When asked why, he responded, “What else could I have done? She would have died.” It does not take a PhD in ethics for even a lost person to understand why that was the only right thing to do. Yet many who name the name of Christ and call themselves Christians will not lift a finger to save the thousands of souls around the world who have never heard the gospel. Why?

The picture above is of the cemetery in Qhochumi, the village we have been working in. The graves you see are filled with people who never had the chance to hear the saving message of Jesus. They died before we arrived. They died before you arrived. We praise God that the light has shone in that dark place, and Quechua men and women can be buried in hope of eternal life instead of the fear, dread, and reality of hell. But there are hundreds of more cemeteries in this area that are daily being filled with the bodies of people who have not yet heard the Gospel. And as they become dust, Satan dances. As Christians devote their energy, time, and resources to their own well-being, Satan dances. As you use your money on that nicer house, TV, church building, and not on the carrying of the Gospel message to the unreached, Satan dances.  As you dedicate yourself to yourself in your job, Satan dances. As you use your God-given abilities to enrich your own circumstance while neglecting to consider how you could be useful in taking the Gospel to the unreached, Satan dances.

You see, the Gospel does not just spread by itself; it’s a task that requires effort and time. It’s not just carried by those “missionary types” who can easily pack up and move; it’s carried by normal people who painfully say goodbye to family and home. The resources needed for the task don’t just fall out of the sky; they are given sacrificially by believers who get it.

Would you, o Christian, honestly ask your Savior what you can do to help the Gospel spread across the world? Would you honestly be willing to do something? Anything? Would you hold loosely to the things of this world and pursue Him, His righteousness, and His glory? How else can we live with ourselves? How many more will we be too late for?

How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

-Romans 10