Lauren in Peru: Attn: We have a new neighborhood Bible study!!

This is one of the most exciting things that has been happening for the past 6 weeks. We have finally started a Bible study in the neighborhood where I live. Kids in my neighborhood have been asking for this for a long time, and we could just never get it started for some reason, but God’s timing is perfect timing. The best part about this Bible study it is all Peruvian led. I do not even teach it! My Peruvian leaders who are in my discipleship class are fully responsible for it! The first week we had 28 people attend, 7 of those being adults. After that we have been running an average of about 10 people (ranging from 3 years old to 80 years old), but we are not getting discouraged because ministry is like this in Peru. We have also had a lot of competition with other things since Sundays are the people’s only day off here in Peru, a lot of times in the summer everyone goes to the beach on Sundays. We are hoping now with school just starting that people will get more into Routine and more will come. It is so cool because the Peruvian leaders come to my house at 11 am – plan a skit together, get the songs ready, the Bible study ready, and even cook together. Then we have the Bible study at 4 pm. It really does feel like I am living the book of Acts out. We are having really good adult attendance at this Bible study which we have had trouble with in other Bible studies so that is a huge blessing.

My next door neighbors have been coming who I am really close with. It is so neat to see them coming to learn about God. They have not had anything to do with God for a long long time. They are really interested. The mom and the teenage son have expressed interest in wanting to lead this Bible study one day. She told me the other day, she is ready to get involved in everything, and she even wants to go to other Bible studies with me. She is not a Christian, but God is definitely working on her heart. Please pray for this family specifically. I think they are the ones that God will use one day to take over this house church and lead the entire neighborhood to Christ. Other great news is at last week’s Bible study, a teenage girl named Lucero gave her life to Christ. She is a very big leader among the kids in the neighborhood, so we are thrilled about her being the first person in our neighborhood to become a Christian! Please pray for our neighbors that they will come, please pray for our leadership that they will consistently come every week and lead. It is very easy to start something and then not consistently do it, and I really want Peruvians to be the ones leading this every week!