Totally mind blowing Tuesday

Dear friends,

Thank you so much for praying for us in Peru. God is doing an incredible work here and in my heart. I know it is only because the prayers of His people and the work of the Holy Spirit. I know I just wrote on Sunday, but I really am trying to keep things more updated this year. Anyway, on Monday Nancy and I finished doing some shopping to move into our house hopefully in the next few days. I was honestly kind of depressed on Monday. Our friends in Surco were busy with other things and could not hang out and we have not gone back to the Community yet to hang out because we have to get some things settled first. I was thinking to myself after a year of being here, it is like I do not know anyone all over again. I have not gotten to hang out with my old friends from Ventanilla because we are staying with a friend in another city, I have not gotten to hang out with the kids from the community whom I love like part of my own family, and I did not have an opportunity to see my friends in Surco. I was getting down about how I didn`t know what God had for me to do and how to do it, even though I knew I just needed to trust in Him. I know it sounds so stupid because God continues to prove himself faithful. Anyway, Monday, I was in a blah mood. Nichola came and picked us up from Surco and we had a great time on the way home from Surco with him. Then Nancy had a great idea to go hang out with the family that we are living with right now. We watched a movie together, ate together, and helped the younger kids with their homework. It was really good to finally get to know the family that I had been living with for the past week.

Tuesday morning rolled around, and I slept in late. I am sure that is not a surpise for those of you who know me well. :) Anyway, I had received a message from one of my dear friends that needed help with some documents. I met up with Alvaro around 12 noon, and together we went on a mission to work on somethings for one of my dear friends. God, literally opened up many doors to get the things that we needed for this situation. While we were going from city to city, Alvaro began to point out all of the cities that we could have house churches in. We started talking about ideas and strategies. We decided that we would take a combi one day and just go explore all the nearby cities. Here in the Ventanilla area there is like a different city or zone literally every five minutes. He showed me where the poorest of the poor go and eat trash in the middle of the night, we talked with a lady who knows in the city where girls get sold for prostitution, and my heart was just burdened for the injustice that happens right where we live.

I was talking to Alvaro about how it has been totally new and different for me to only live in the power of the Lord and not in my own power. He talked to me how he noticed I had changed. I say that not to be proud, but that God has to be doing something for him to notice that. All glory to God. Alvaro said, ¨Lauren give me time, I made a mistake for deciding to teach history classes as well. ¨That was a decision of my human nature. He explained that he would not be able to teach about Jesus in his history classes. This kind of mission (church planting) needs to be 100 % of our focus. ¨I reminded him that it has taken me almost 20 years to figure out, and which I am still figuring out how to rely on God. I told him that I had noticed a lot of changes in him and how I was excited that he was ready to tell people about Jesus. He shared with me that he wanted to announce the good news everywhere. I noticed only months ago he was ashamed or at least worried of what people would think of his beliefs, and now He is ready to tell the world. He also told me that he had gotten a video at the Christian bookstore in the market. I didn`t realize until later on that he had gotten it this past Sunday. He went to the store asking the owner if he had any videos on Peter and Paul. This new mission of starting house churches had intrigued Alvaro´s heart and he wanted to learn more about it. He had already told me previously that this is how the Christian movement was started, but I did not know how serious he was about it. He asked me if I wanted to watch it before Nancy came over. He said it was only 40 minutes. What I did not understand was that it was in sections and the first part was only 40 minutes. It ended up being a 4 hour long video. It was one of the best things I have ever watched. The movie in depth went into the journey of Paul and Peter. It basically outlined what our ministry should look like. It was incredible. To top it off, Alvaro made popcorn for us, and we had a movie ministry night!

After that, Alvaro, started to share his heart and his strategy for reaching the people of Peru. A lot of things were Catholic things he had done before when he was young training to be a priest. He talked about a year long experience he had had working with people that no one else wanted to work with. He explained that for that year he only taught about Jesus and not about the Catholic church. He said after that year, it was like impossible for him to go back to doing the things of the Catholic church and that is why he had to split ways. God, was already working on his heart years ago. He said, ¨I would venture to say that everyone that was in that one year project does not work with the church anymore.¨That really hit me because it was more as if God was speaking to me, not just about the Catholic church but the Christian church as well. It was as if God was speaking to my heart showing me that an experience of church planting movements and true miracles from the Lord will probably not be in the confines of a regular traditional church and that God is calling us out of that. I am not saying that God does not work in regular traditional churches, but I know that He is calling this team to something different than that. Also, Alvaro, talked about how he could relate with Paul so well because just like Paul was so entrenched in Jewish tradition and religion, Alvaro was the same with the Catholic religion. God saved Paul and God saved Alvaro. I know that God is going to use Alvaro to reach the people of Peru because Alvaro has been there with the people and knows what it is like to be entrenched in religion and not have a relationship with Jesus Christ.

It was amazing because for the first time yesterday the tables reversed. Alvaro encouraged me in my faith and the vision the Lord has put before us. He talked to us about what our strategy would be, would we go work with the extreme cases or would we work with the families. He said I believe the Lord is leading me to work with the families. He said we would have to pray about it. I totally agreed, right now the Lord is definitely calling us to the families, and He will show us in his time how to minister to the extreme cases of the drug addcits, prostitution houses, etc. I thought it was exremely wise that he would bring up the extreme cases because Alvaro and I normally always like to run straight to the extreme things and not necessarily the things the Lord has called us to. We like to tackle the big projects, but this time we know that God will take us there in his timing. For right now, God is calling us to work with families, Casa to Casa. Also, we talked a lot about the team from FBC Mansfield that is coming in June. We talked about strategy and the way the Lord was going to open up so many doors for us in that one short week that would help us with our church planting ministry. We are excited to see how God is going to use a small team of young people from the states to make a huge eternal diffence here.

The Lord has grown Alvaro in unexplainable ways in the past few months while we have been gone. He talked about how he felt so good yesterday, it was 9:30 at night but he felt relaxation and peace. Normally, Alvaro and I are the type that run ourselves ragged, but God has been showing him at the same time the power of his Spirit. I can`t count how many times Alvaro said this has to be something that the Spirit does, and we do not do. He said we are only the instruments, the mediators, but God is doing the work. Then we had our first team of three prayer time. We were for the first time in one year all united under the same thought and vision. It was a beautiful night. A chord of three cannot be easily be broken.

Trying to Recount the Miracles God has already done!

Hi friends, I have been back in Peru a week and a half now, and it is crazy to look back on the things God has been doing. I can not believe the amount of miracles God has done in my life in the past week and a half. I know people all over have been praying for me, and I so appreciate it. To start out, I get on the plane from my layover in Houston to Peru, and I for free got first class. My mom had given me enough miles so that I could get a free plane ticket to Peru, with her ticket I got this is awesome first class seat. I was so shocked when the stewardess would come by like every moment offering something to drink or eat. I got to eat filet minon for free! Also, I had the blessing of sitting by a man that normally never sat in first class either. We literally got to talk about the Lord for a couple of hours and the work in Peru. His wife is from Peru. He was a blessing to my life. When I got to Peru, my good friend and taxi driver, Nichola picked me up and took me to some of my dearest friends house, Shaun and Amanda Wissman. They are fellow missionaries in Peru who have been such a huge support, encouragement, and blessing to my life. If you want to check out their ministry: http://www.calledtoperu.org/. It was so fun because I was able to bring back some surprises for them from the states, so at 1 am we were all enjoying opening up chocolate etc from the states. The next morning, I woke up bright and early meaning 9 am to go get my residency for Peru. Another fellow missionary and friend, Mark Clancy, met up with me to meet a fellow Peruvian to go get my residency card. This is so exciting to me because no longer will I be a tourist here, but I will finally be a resident by the end of April. It turned out that we did not have time to finish the whole process, so I would have to stay in the Surco area until Monday. In the mean time, I got to hang out some more with my good friends Shaun and Amanda. Amanda and I went to the movies in Peru, which is definitely something neither one of us hardly ever do. We had a great time together, played phase 10 together with their whole family. One really neat thing is Shaun´s dad was there also to visit Shaun and Amanda. I got to know him and really how God has been working in his life. I had planned on going to church with Shaun and Amanda at their church that they serve at. It just so happens that this particular Sunday Shaun´s dad was preaching, and I got the privalege of seeing Shaun´s dad get baptized as well. It was a beautiful Sunday. After that, I had the opportunity to visit a house church that Mark Clancy and his team lead. Then I got to go to a church planted by an American family years ago called Camino de Vida. In between all of these church services, I was able to fellowship with several Christian Peruvians. The whole Sunday was a major blessing to my life. On Monday, I finished up my residency. It should be coming in only about one more month. Yay, I am about be officially Peruvian. Amanda and I decided to go eat some American food in Peru, so of course we went to Chilis! Then we decided to take a small trip to the post office to see if they had any mail. I never knew what this post office trip would hold for me. We went to the post office, and it turns out that they did have a package but that we would have to go to another place to pick it up. We went to the next post office and did all the paper work and then started to wait for the package. We had waited 1 1-2 hours when finally I was just pure fed up! I finally went to the window and asked what was going on. I had run out of patience. They sent me to another window that we had already been to. When I went up there the guy in front of me was complaining as well. He said he was number 93 and they were already on number 98 and had passed him. I was number 84. He then told the guy and the girl behind me has been here a long time too. He then proceeded to ask me if I spoke English. This guy had grown up in Conneticut. We were able to start talking in the lobby. The Holy Spirit was really doing a work. He was very interested to learn about the gospel. It did not seem like he had ever heard it before. I had my Bible with me and was able to give it to him. There was a reason God had us a the post office for over and hour and a half. He had a divine appointment for me. It was one of the best conversations I have ever had with anyone about the gospel. I will be calling this family in the next week or so to check on them. Although, I was so frustrated to wait at the post office with horrible service, God had divine plans in mind instead. It is so cool to see that God´s plans are always better than ours. After that, Amanda and I rushed around to get a few errands done, so that I could attend another house Bible study at Mark´s house. I figured while I had the time before I got into the routine of the ministry God had for me this year, it would be good for me to check out some other missionary´s ministries, since we never had time for that before. It was a disaster getting to Mark´s house because my cell phone died etc.....it is actually a very long story. By the time, I finally got there, I was so stressed because I had been trying to get there for 2 hours. I made it just in time though. It was cool to see how someone else leads Bible study in their home and the families and friends that are coming to it. As, I left there, the culture shock started to hit me. It was time for me to go back to Ventanilla and face real life. I still had to go to Amanda´s house and pack my suitcases. When I got to her apt, I just broke down and started crying. I did not know where I was going to live, what I was going to do this year etc. The reality of now knowing anything all hit me. Nancy had recently just called me and said she was not going to stay at the hostal that I had been planning on staying at and that she had moved in with a girl for a while. I did not even know where this girl lived, but I would soon be finding out. I was so discouraged. I had been having so much faith before this moment, then fear hit me straight in the face. My dear friends, Shaun and Amanda and their dad all prayed for me. Amanda even offered to go with me for the first night. I love having Christian friends in Peru! I told them I needed to just go on my own and I would be fine. Approixmately 2 hours later around 1 in the morning, I arrived at the house where Nancy was staying. Let´s just say that I was in a very mad and depressed mood once I arrived at 1 am. I was upset that Nancy had moved somewhere without my input. It seemed kind of permanent and a lot of things were bothering me in general. I had let myself over the past few months get very bitter about somethings. Nancy asked me what was wrong. I had been praying for an opportunity to talk to Nancy and to get some things worked out in our team. I had also been praying that God would take away my bitterness and also help me to forgive. I had been praying for that for at least a month a more and still I had not allowed God to truly take that away because I was too stubborn. When Nancy asked what was wrong there was no denying the Holy Spirit. It was time to talk though some things that had been between us for a long time. I want to give God all the glory because he used that conversation to get everything out in the open and to truly remove the bitterness from my heart. I know God heard the prayers of many that were praying for me and the cries of my heart. Our team honestly has never been so solid as it has been in the past few days. Tuesday, it was finally time for me to go back to the community to say hi to everyone and talk to Miguel about teaching religion. I got to the community around 1 and director Miguel was not there. I decided to go to the school and say hi to the kids. It was such an unexpected blessing. The kids were so excited to see me and I was so excited to see them. It was like I was HOME again. I saw my peruvian son, Angel Antonio, and it was as if God was saying, I am taking care of everything Lauren. I had some big worries before I went to visit, but God made it clear that things were going to be okay. Anyway, I decided I would wait for Miguel, but he still was not back. I went to the internet to find a phone number with a Peruvian friend I was supossed to meet with. We decided we would meet up at 3. Right when I left to go meet with him, Miguel showed up. I thought about cancelling my other appointment because I really needed to talk to Miguel about teaching religion classes because school ahd already started. I decided though to go ahead and go through with my appointment. Then, I finally after that appointment got to meet up with my good friend Alvaro and talk about the work that God for us this year! It was such an encouragement to see him again! I tell you all of these details to show you in just a minute the whole reason why I could not meet with Miguel because God was definitely working in the details. Anyway, Tuesday night, Nancy had things to do at the internet, and I didn´t. I had gotten all of the majority of things that I needed to do done while I was in the States. I guess you could say I was bored. That is the first time in probably all 22 years of my life that I could say that. I was out in the boonies in the desert literally away from all of my normal ministry opportunities, caught up on all my work etc, so I decided to read. I had left this awesome christian historical fiction book at home, so there was only one other book that I could read I mean besides the Bible. It was this book given to me by Bruce Troy, the pastor at Southmont, it is called Church Planting Movements: How God is redeeming a lost world by David Garrison. I started reading this book and from the preface it started to capture my heart. I read about the first 70 pages, and then decided I had to wake up on Wednesday morning and finish reading this book. I worked on reading the book all morning on Wednesday. That afternoon, I had to go do some work with Alvaro, then that night I continued to read the book till 4 in the morning. This book has forever changed my life and perspective on ministry. First of all, let me tell you the miracles of me even reading this book: 1. God closing the door for me to talk to Miguel on Tuesday and start teaching religion 2. Having an appointment with a peruvian at the exact time Miguel arrived. 3. Leaving my other book on the table in the US 4. Being stranded out in a desert 5. Being bored. 6. Having all of my work done. These are just some of the miracles that God did for me to get to this book. Basically the theme of this book is reaching the nations house by house or casa by casa. The book talks about the biggest missionary movements that are going on right now and it is by church plants in houses. God, just begin to speak to my heart that I was not supossed to be involved in the schools any longer not even one day a week, but was supossed to focus all my time on house churches. He made it clear that I did not need to be distracted by anything else. I kept reading quotes outloud out of this book to Nancy. Nancy decided she would read this book as well. Which was another miracle, I thought for sure she would not be interested in this book, but God had other plans. She started reading on Thursday. In the meantime, I went with our taxi driver Nichola to look for a house to rent because I was not okay with not having running water and having to bathe out of a tupperware container. Anyway, Nichola ended up picking me up at least 1 1-2 hours late. Once again I was impatient and frustrated, yet God had other plans. We stopped at only 2 places asking about houses to rent. The third place said yeah we are renting come in and look. It was exactly the thing I wanted a whole apartment by itself. 2 bedrooms, a great living room, kitchen, bathroom, and running water and electricity! Literally it is almost the exact house plan I had designed 2 months ago but already built. Some of the most trust worthy peruvians I have ever met own it, and said we could set up a meeting for Sunday to confirm the details about renting it. Wow, God was surely blessing us in ways we could never imagine. Friday, Nancy and I had the opportunity for one of the first times this year to do some normal things. We went to the grocery store, did laundry, went to the internet, and she worked on finishing the book. She finished late that night, and decided that she was not going to teach English but work with me in house church planting. I could not be more excited. We were going to go completely seperate ways this year with ministry, but God in his sovereign grace brought us back together for the exact specific work He has for us. On Saturday, we had another pretty chill day. I slept in because Nancy and I had talked till´4:30 in the morning on what God had for us ministry wise. We did some things at the internet and then went to the place where we had been having house church. We shared our vision with the family and prayed with them. Finally, Sunday, today! We finalized the deal on the house we are going to rent. Not only, were their workers this morning finishing the electricity, they decided to put flooring in for us as well. We are beyond excited! We should be moving in next week. After that, we went and had a prayer time again with the house church lady and Nichola our taxi driver. It was kind of weird because we did not invite anyone today. We are going to spend all week praying, re-strategizing, and reading the book of Acts in expectation for what God is going to do next Sunday. Nancy and I went to the hostal and took showers! Yay, then we went and hung out in Surco until we had the privalege of going to an amazing church tonight called Camino de Vida. The message was straight to my heart about following God´s call. After churh, we were able to share the gospel with 3 different Peruvian ladies. 2 of those being a believers. We were able to encourage the 2 believers. It was so crazy because one was literally a begger in the street, yet she had no complaints. She just sat quietly under her blanket. We were able to give her some food and have a praise and worship time with her and prayer time. It was a beautiful moment from the Lord. The other lady that was not a believer was so interested in learning. Nancy made a huge personal sacrifice and gave the lady her own personal Bible. We ended up finding out she was only about 20 minutes from where we live even though we were 3 hours away today. It was such a God moment. Who knows...she might be another start of a house church. Then again, it was kind of a rough night because I was reminded once again that I have no clue how to do this new ministry God has called me to and I have to completely depend on Him. That sounds great I know, and it is is. The problem is that for so long I have put my dependance in my own work, what I can do for the Lord, how much I can do etc. I thrive on stress, not sleeping because of doing ministry, and always being busy working for the Lord. The Lord is calling me to take a step back and work only in His power. He is calling me to something I could never manufaturce on my own so in the end HE WILL GET ALL THE GLORY! Tonight, was hard for me because I have put so much faith in myself instead of in my all powerful Savior. Please pray that I would fall hard after God´s heart and only do the things He has for me. For tonight, we are going to stay in Surco and pick up a few things for our new house tomorrow. Please pray that God will guide our steps as we seek him on how to minister this week. God is so good and has done more than I could ever imagine in this past week and a half. All GLORY to His NAME!

Body of Christ

Stateside blog – Body of Christ

I think I saw the body of Christ function at it´s finest when I was home in the states. It was incredible to see what God did through His people. My first day home was great, I was picked up at the airport with a sign, got to see my parents, and got to see good friends that day and night and eat steak. Then shortly following the first few days, the biggest snow storm I have ever seen happened. We had a like a foot of snow in Texas. It was beautiful! Therefore, I was snowed in for 4 days. I wanted to go to places in the states, but I couldn´t....therefore I made a video about Peru. It turned out to be a huge blessing! One of my dear friends helped me make this video as well, and I ended up using it for all of my speaking engagements at church. Then the next week, my parents so kindly took me and my best friend to Disney World. It was a dream vacation. It was so cool because I got to spend great quality time with my two wonderful parents and my best friend. Plus, I got to see all kinds of awesome things, ride all kinds of amazing rides, take pictures with all kinds of disney characters, and wait in line for nothing because we went in the middle of February. It was such a blessing. Thanks mom and Dad! After that week, the craziness began! God, just opened up doors for me to be able to share what he has been doing all over the state of Texas. I had the opportunity to speak at several amazing churches. The people I met at these churches blessed my life in so many ways. I was able to speak at Southmont Baptist Church (my home church), FBC Clifton Women´s missions meeting, Meadowbrook Baptist Church in Waco, FBC Meridian, FBC Purves, Four Corners Church, First Baptist Church Mansfield, and Dallas Baptist University. Each of these opportunities God just opened the door so wide and used so many people to help me get connected with those places. It was so cool to finally get to share with people in the states what had been going on in Peru and for more people to start praying about what is going on here and get excited about Peru too. I met some amazing people at each and everyone of these churches that are passionate about the work of the Lord. It was a huge encouragement. I also had the opportunity to take a family road trip. I spent about 4 days going to get to see each side of my parent´s family. I got to see ALL of my cousins, grandparents, and Aunts and Uncles. It was such a blessing. We got some great quality time, ate great food, and of course played card games! I also got to visit my dear friend in Kentucy and see what her life is like in Kentucky and got to visit my aunt and uncle in Arkansas. They have just moved up there, to work with family life ministry. It was so neat getting to tour where they work everyday! Family Life is such a legit ministry! Check it out! Anyway, between all my layovers with southwest, between seeing Kelly in Kentucy- Indiana, and my relatives in Arkansas. I went to 6 different states in 3 days. Anyways, I was able to get many productive things done in the states. I went to the dermatologist and found out I am allergic to nickel which in like everything. So, as soon as I learned what had been causing my skin problem was my belt buckle my skin quickly got so much better. Thanks to everyone that had been praying for me. I got my tooth implant surgery finally finished, and just got a lot of miscellaneous stuff done that I had needed to get done before coming back! I want to thank all of my dear friends and family members who encouraged me, played nertz with me, supported me, loved me, and just hung out with me during the time in the states. One of my last and greatest memories, was the week of leaving to come back to Peru which was actually just last week, I had to write 6 curriculums, make all of these verse games, etc. It was like 100s of hours worth of work and I barely had any time to do it. I had been so busy with speaking engagements that I had not actually had the time to do what I needed to do for Peru. Anyway, so many people came together at the end and helped me get EVERYTHING done. I had a work day at Southmont and many people came for hours just to do factory type work. I had people all over translating things for me, working on verse games, cutting things, etc. Then the night before I was going to leave, I probably still had 40 hours of work left! At the last minute literally my mom and I decided to call together some of our very mission minded loving friends to the house, and I am telling you it was a miracle to see what happened. Hours upon hours of work was finished in like 4 hours because so many people came to help and worked so hard. I ended up staying up all night but literally finished everything that I needed to do besides leaving the house a mess and my room a mess for my parents to clean up. They are used to me doing that though! Hopefully my Peruvian wreck will just remind them a little bit of me each day! Haha. So anyway, it was a great and productive time in the States. God did an amazing work, so I will give Him all the GLORY!