Saturday 20 October 2007

Team update.

Hello everybody,

I would just like to take this oppurtunity to apologise for the spelling mistakes in the last post. But I'm sure you all understood it anyway.

Anyway....back to team business. As of now, we have finished the work that has been going on in Ite, regarding the distribution of letters and tracts etc. We are still involved in the church and the meetings that are going on there.

As well as continuing with our Spanish classes, we have been doing some work on the site, most recently, lifting big rocks and digging holes for water pipes. It's hard work but it's been good. We are getting to know the rest of the team better and the integration (not maths) is going well.

The weather has been, as the peruvians might say, "so so". The nicest sunshine we've had was today, but apart from that, it's been cloudy and chilly at times beacuse of the wind. Although the sun isn't always out, it still manages to be VERY bright.

We're also adjusting to the large quantities of rice being eaten. None of us seem to have any real trouble with the food, apart from a few funny Peruvian drinks and a chicken foot or two in the soup. Karen and Tom are due to be on "cooking" with Freddy this coming week and there has been talk of an attempt at a sheperd's pie. Mmmmm.

Just a few prayer points, please pray:

-again for the team as a whole (Irish and Peruvian) as we meet cultural differences. That these won't become problems.
-For the language, as we study and practice with the Peruvians. Conversations are slowly becoming more gramatically correct.
-For the other Irish guys who will be speaking in the church in Ite.
-For the town of Ite, that the people there would be affected by the work going on.
-For the centre, that the building work will keep going, and for the opening on November 3rd.
-Please continue to pray for Graham as he's not with us. We miss him, but he's coming out soon.


That's about it for now, thanks for all your support,

Chau chau (apparently that's how the Peruvians spell it),

El Perú Cinco.

Friday 12 October 2007

The first mission

Hey all!

This week has been the start of our first mission. Malagros, the first Pruvian missionary has been taking us around the village of Ite. she has been here for a long time, and is away from her family in Ilo. (about 1/2 and hours drive away).

After showing us around, the team was given the task of crating a letter to give to people in the village in a 'door-to-door' fasion. the Peruvians handled this, as they know more of what to say to people then we did!

so on came Wednesday when we started. the team split into about 4groups (each with their very own 'gringo') and went out into the outermost parts of the village to share with the people there. on Thursday we went to the main village and did the same thing.

the most encouraging thing is to see that people are willing to at least hear us out. We havent heard of any people having doors slammed in faces!

the benifits of this have already been seen at the ladies meeting. Some ladies who had not been going for a while returned, and said it was the leaflets that reminded them to come! Praise God for this in your prayers.

Aside from this, we have started our Spanish lessons. These are going well, and we are picking up a lot of useful words!

Also, the work on the site has consisted on Karen picing up more stones, while the 'men' have been battering the life out of a bench that was concreted into the wrong place! It still needs to be moved to the right place, but that will come sooner rather than later.

Sunday sees the begining of the guys in the team preachng! Sam will commence, with Trevor translating, and the followong sundays Tom and Aaron will preah also.

Please pray for;
-Malagros at the Ite church. she is on her own and can sometime face discouragement from the other people in the town, and for her work in the current mission
-The Mission itself, that the tracts and letters handed out will sow seeds in peoples hearts that will grow and bear fruit for the Lord
-The spanish lessons, that they continue to be a usefull asset
-the team, that we continue to bond and unify for God


Thnaks again for all your Prayers and support.

Misión Rescate!
(el Perú cnco!)

Sunday 7 October 2007

We're still here!!

¡Hola!

We've got the bags! Woohoo! God is great. We had no trouble getting them back from the company in Ilo, it all went well. We can now have some clean clothes to wear. Yay!!

We are now settling in and adjusting to Peruvian lifestyle of getting up at "cinco hora" (5a.m.), having cold showers and eating Peruvian food. We are really enjoying our time of getting to know the team and have so far gotten on very well with them. It is a bit hard at times to understand everything, but with a little bit of patience we can usually get the jist of what's going on. In fact, we are even managing to string some sentences together. The Peruvians are also keen to learn some English.
We have done some manual work (moving some stones) and the team has also been preparing for the opening in November, but for now it's a sort of "settling in" time for us.
We got our much awaited tracksuits yesterday and it turns out that they are pretty awesome. We even got matching hats!!

We were at the local church in Ite today, where Freddy (from the team) spoke from Romans 5.

We are due to start into our Spanish classes tomorrow at the site. So could you please pray that they will go well and that we would all benefit from them.

Please continue to pray:
-for language
-for team integration and bonding
-that this team will really be effective in working for the local churches and ultimately for God.
-for Graham as it looks as if he won't be with us again until November and that we will all be able to see God working through this.

Thanks for all your support,
Ciao ciao,

El Perú Cinco.

Thursday 4 October 2007

We're here!

We have arrived in Peru!!
After leaving Ireland over 30 hours ago, we are now in Ilo, at Trevor and Christine's house, and we most likely will be going over to the site in Ite later on today.

The journey went well, apart from a hiccup at the end when our bags didn't turn up! So now we are going to have to wait for our bags to be delivered down to us.
Could you really pray for this, that we will get our stuff back as soon as possible and that we will get by for the time that we don't have our things!
Pray aswell for a speedy recovery, after the long travel we are all quite drained, that we would be back to full health as soon as possible.
Finally pray that we will quickly integrate with our Peruvian counterparts to the team.

We are thankful to God for bringing us all here safely, without many problems, and we will continue to rely on him in the times ahead.

Thanks for your support.

El Perú Cinco.

Tuesday 2 October 2007

News on Graham and Team Travel

Hello again,

This is a post to let you all know that Graham has recently been quite ill and has been told he is unfit to travel. So he won't be coming with us tomorrow. We're not sure what's going to happen but God does so we need to have faith through all of this.

Could you please pray for this situation that it will be worked out, that Graham will make a quick recovery, that he will make it out to Peru as soon as he can, and that through this God will get all the glory through all of this.

Also could you please pray for the team as we do travel out tomorrow morning, that we will have a safe journey, that all will go smoothly and that we will keep trusting in God even through situations when we don't really know God's big picture.

Keep praying,

El Perú Cinco.

After Zero9

This is just a post to give an update after the weekend we spent at Zero9 (Baptist Youth Weekend) in Ballintoy.

We spent the weekend up there getting to know the youth at the weekend and we also got a chance to share with them about who we are and what we're going to be doing. Jason Post was the speaker for the weekend and the emphasis on the weekend was all about mission and that mission isn't about where we are but about how we live.
It was a very encouraging time to be able to get to know the youth and share with them.

Please continue to pray for the team and aswell for the Youth that were at that weekend.

Thanks for your support,

El Perú Cinco.