peru number 3.

have you ever experienced one of those moments where your eyes began to hurt because of the pressure you have put on them in attempts to soak in every aspect of your surroundings into your cornias? where you even get pissed because you have to blink? but then you are quickly reminded of your humanity and submit to the pain you are experiencing, only for a very brief moment though. your eyes open and refreshment fills your soul once again becasue of the beauty you continue to find yourself immersed in. the best part about these sort of moments, is that the enjoyment almost never ceases while experiencing them. somehow, God decided to bless me with one of these moments this past weekend. the church took a mission trip to a tribe 6 hours into the jungle (yes, i did say jungle) from thursday to saturday. we all packed onto 3 boats like sardines and made way for our desitnation. you would think that i would have wanted to sleep, simply because i had only gotten about 4 hours of sleep the night before due to last minute preparation for teaching. however, God decided to bless me with some of the most beautiful sites i have ever seen. you would think the same site would get boring after 6 hours, yet i do not think i could have looked at the beautiful trees and scenery any less. thankful for a God who is creator of heaven and earth.

the 3 days in the jungle were exausting, amazing, challenging, sweaty, and above all God glorifying. we ended up having a conference at the village we spent the weekend with where about 200 people gathered (some people from the tribe and the rest from the church in iquitos). the weekend was filled with a ton of futbol (which, yes, i am still terrible at. and the peruvians love pointing that out), food, a wedding (yup, my 2nd wedding to attend in the middle of the jungle), baptism of new believers (freaking awesome), worship, and a lot of teaching. one of the coolest aspects of the weekend was the fact that a couple of the stand out leaders in the young adult group came on the trip (alber, gret, caesar, jose, carla, and a few others). it was a great opportunity for our relationship to grow as the trip provided much time for laughter and conversation. i thought i was going to be preaching 4 times, but it it only ended up being twice. i was super stoked about the opportunity to steward Gods word and proclaim it to such a large group of people in such a memorable environment. of course, i was nervous because of the translator barrier, but i was looking forward to experiencing a demonstration of the Spirits power. the pastor asked me to share what it means to be a disciple and what biblical discipleship is. like i said, i was stoked. round one comes up and i stand up in the front of this makeshift pavillion with palm tree leaves as the roof, (may i remind you that i am in the middle of the jungle and i have beautiful scenery ALL around me), and not even 2 minutes into the sermon a woman about 3 rows back, dead center, plops out her uhhuh (sorry for tmi) and starts breastfeeding her infant. i laugh. almost stop mid sentence to make light of the situation, like (you really think he is that hungry, RIGHT NOW?). then i silently told myself, (not i, but christ). i again, silently laughed, at my sarcasm of course, and continued on. on a serious note, i am so thankful for the opportunity to share what God had laid on my heart about discipleship. i reminded the people that being a disciple requires radical abandoment and great cost, yet we are radically dependent upon Gods grace throughout the process, which yields a great reward in our lives. we get God. a real, living, and intimate relationship with God. thankfully, no children were hungry during the 2nd sermon. i shared with the peruvians that through making disciples we must share the word, show the word, and teach the word. i insisted that discipleship is the greatest need in the world and that we are building people, not an institution. let me tell you, i did not feel confident in myself at all after sharing both of these messages. it truly was of those times i had to completely depend upon the spirits work in and through me to proclaim the word. after the 2nd sermon, my friend gret wanted me to pray for him, simply because he desired more fellowship and intimacy with the Lord. i am thankful for a God that desires intimacy with us and is strong when we are weak. i am also thankful for the word, an amazing faith family that is fervently praying for me and supplying me with resources to teach on, and also for other sermons in which helped provide useful tools for the teaching. overall, the weekend truly was a blessing. i am thankful for what the Lord taught me and the relationships he built with the community i find myself immerssed in at this moment.

other moments this past week that will forever be engrained on my heart…conversation with alicia over lunch as she confessed that everyone in her family has decided to pursue the world rather than Christ, conversation with piedro (a 17 year old boy in the youth group) about his parents divorce and the hope we have in Christ as our foundation of life. playing tag with about 30 kids in the jungle (somehow, they always thought i was it). having dinner with daniel and his family last night and they continued to tell me how grateful they were that i was apart of their community. praying over a woman who was having a lot of trouble breathing out of her nose on saturday and then asking her how she felt on sunday and she smiled contagiously and pointed to her nose and then gave me a thumbs up. sharing ephesians 2 8 with a catholic girl today at joses school and seeing her ponder for a bit about what that meant. we serve a great god who graciously meets us right where we are.

so i am 13 days into this journey and i have to be honest…this has been truly 13 of the most blessed, challenging, worshipfilled, and humbling days of my life. i am blessed as i continually am being stretched by the Lord in new ways as i depend more and more with each new day that comes. i am challenged simply because of the lack of verbal communication i am able to have in most of my interactions with those around me. i am learning that God has the ability to move despite language barriers. i am challenged in learning that this is a different culture, in that their value of time and sense of urgency is quite different. praying for patience and grace to lead my every thought and action. i am challenged because of the lack of comfort and not having any of my friends from back home here with me. but i am thankful that God has not called us to comfort but to a cross and that he does not leave us as orphans but provides his spirit to depend upon. i find myself distracted sometimes as i miss aspects of home, but then quickly remind myself to be where i am. in fact, every morning, i write on my hand (be where you are) as a constant reminder to give everything i have to the people in this community. i am humbled simply because i do not know how to even respond in most situations except pull out my dictionary and say gracias para tu paciencia (even you can tell what that means). i am moved to worship because of the way i have experienced Gods strength during my weakeness and desperation. i am moved to worship because of the relationships i see Him at work in in building on a daily basis. i am in awe of Gods work so far and so thankful He has brought me to this place to be stretched and build a stronger relationship with our partner church here in iquitos.

please continue to be in prayer as i am consistently learning how to interact with this community, what my role is, and how to make most of every opportunity to share the Gospel in word and deed. pray for joses wife (i just found out through text message that she broke her leg earlier today), pray that i would continually be in a place of desperation for Gods presence, and also pray that i would get better at futbol just to avoid the mockery next sunday. thank you again for journeying through this trip with me. and also, next tuesday i will be online from about 2 to 6 and if you want to skype or get on facebook chat, that would be pretty awesome. also, i would love to hear about how life is going back in the states so please send me updates! thankful for all of you.

(so we do not lose heart. though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. for this light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of lgory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal) 2 corinthians 4 16 to18.

for his glory,

bubba

also, i tried to attach a picture of some friends from this past weekend…hope it worked!

first full peru update!

giving you an adequate update in which you did not get too bored in reading and so that you were able to feel the weight of my experience thus far is quite possibly one of the hardest things i could do at this moment. my mind continues to race as i attempt to try to pick even a few things to share with you. i will do my absolute best and i hope you have the patience of a peruvian in reading this. (hopefully you will understand that one later in the email).

when i arrived in iquitos last thursday i was immediately greeted, well honestly tackled, by my good friend maykol. maykol is 27 and works as a translator for the international mission board. he spends weeks at a time with missionaries in the amazon jungle developing relationships with unreached people groups. maykol also served the group i came to iquitos with last year and translated for us and somehow was able to put up with our extreme sarcasm and lack of seriousness. it was truly amazing to see him again. he has an incredible heart for the gospel and for people of all nations to experience and proclaim the gospel.

initially i planned on sleeping at maykols house, however since he left for the jungle on saturday, they put me at robertos house. roberto was our driver last year and cannot speak a lick of english. however, he has a huge heart, is an incredible leader, and loves attempting to get me to say innapropriate things in spanish to women. as you can imagine, he and i have had a great time together. i have gotten to spend an abundant amount of time with the leadership of the church here in iquitos, which only gets me more and more excited about the partnership Fellowship has with them. it honestly just moves me to worship as i am currently apart of something God has totally pieced together without blemish. it is a comforting promise knowing that nothing will or can thwart Gods plan…in anything. it is evident that the church has such a heart for the lost in the community through the way they have such solid relationships with one another and continue to reach out to others in the community in attempts to form strong and lasting relationships with them. i have had a number of opportunities to get to know numerous amounts of people in the church as i have been invited to multiple homes to share meals with them.

3 things i have learned so far about the church. 1. they will not be satisfied with my stay in iquitos unless i leave iquitos with an esposa (wife). 2. they are positive that i will gain at least 20 pounds. 3. they are one of the tightest knit communities i have ever seen or been apart of before. they have such a desperation to see the gospel lived out in the way they experience community with one another. i am excited and humbled to be apart of that while i am here. i can already say that i will let them down with not being able or wanting to comply with number 1 and i am keeping my fingers crossed i do the same with number 2.

before arriving in iquiots one of the things i continued to pray for is that i would walk humbly with God (micah 6 8) and gah, God did not waste any time in humbling me. i have experienced my fair share of humbling and almost even unsettling moments as ive sat there with a blank face while the people around me converse crazily, quickly (they talk so fast here!), and LOUDLY and then they look at me almost expecting that i understood everything they said with complete clarity. praise God that after only 6 days, i am beginning to learn a little bit about the language and am able to have a very surface level conversation with any peruvian. i am so thankful for the patience of the people here. they are eager to teach me spanish and also very gracious when i butcher it. it{s amazing to witness a people that are so filled with Christ it pours out in almost every aspect of their lives.

one other aspect about the trip that caused a little bit of inseciurity for a while was my relationship with my translator, jose. i say that because during the first couple of days, he did not seem too stoked to run around with me all the time and translate for me. however, on sunday, i was able to spend all day with him and his family at the swimming hole here in iquitos. it was then that our friendship really sparked as i began to realize how much of a joker he is and then i realized how perfectly our sarcasm meshed with one another. game on. one of the many reasons i am excited about spending countless hours with jose is simply because he is one of the leaders of young adult group at the church. one of the reasons i am positive God has sent me to iquitos is to walk along side the young adult group and form a strong relationship with them as whole. i know God will use my friendship with jose to create a very special relationship between the church here in iquitos and with my church back in nashville as i learn more about how they are wired, what God is doing in their midst, and how we has a community can more faithfully serve them over time.

i had an awesome opportunity yesterday to go to work with jose and help him teach english to his students. he teaches at a tech school about 21 kilometers outside of the city. some of the students have been studying english for 2 or 3 years, yet there has not been a lot of progress it seems in their speaking abilities. as the class started i sat next to a boy named adrian. adrian is from the jungle, and to my surprise, he is from the tribe my group worked with last year during our time in Peru (the yaguas). only God does things like that. simply amazing. we began to converse quite a bit as i continued to speak in my broken spanish and he tried desperately to make some sense in english. it was an incredible opportunity to get to serve him for the 4 hours or so as we sat and worked on his english. however, before i knew it, the entire class, about 15 students, were sitting around me as i attempted to teach adrian. all of these students are studying english for the main purpose of becoming a tour guide in the jungle. i was humbled to be apart of this process to get to assit them as they progress in their english speaking abilities, knowing that if they do not learn the language adequately, they will have to resort to a lesser paying job. the highlight of my day was when i got to spend time with tony, a 23 year old man who spoke english well,  as they were taking me on a tour of the jungle. he attached himself to me and began asking me tons of questions about why i was there and if i could help him more with his english. tony had really impressed me earlier in the day as i noticed his leadership abilities and descent english speaking abilities. i later found out that tony was in school to learn english in hopes of being a translator for missionary groups one day. he spoke with such humility and geniuneness. we began to have great conversations about the Gospel and the transformation process that had occured in our lives because of Christ. amazing. one thing though, he does not know a lot about the bible, so i told him he and i were going to study together every monday after class. his eyes lit up and a contagious smile struck his face. i am so excited about this chance to be used by God to help train another believer in the study of the word of God.

finally, yesterday, i turned 23. this, by far, was the most interesting birthday i have had yet. about 15 of my friends in the young adult group came over to the house i am staying at to celebrate with me by eating A LOT, playing games, and again, helping me with my spanish. i have alreardy been so blessed by the relationships God has sparked up with the young adults. they made it a very special celebration for me. they even slammed my face in the cake after singing happy birthday. they really do know how to have fun. i am confident that God has already began working through me in a way that is hard to describe with words as he strengthens my relationships with the young adults daily.

through this experience thus far, my dependence upon the Lord for strength, wisdom, and guidance increases every day. i am beyond grateful that he somehow has chosen to use me in the place for his specific purposes. i have had so many incredible and rich times in the word and in prayer as well. i am thankful and humbled the Lord has called me to play here. it has only reinforced his promise that he takes the initiative to choose us, he empowers us to use us, and he gets all the glory through us. thank you for your prayers and support thus far. i look forward to updating you next week!

oh and also, please pray for me this thursday as i lead a group from the church out into the jungle for 3 days. i am preaching on discipleship and leadership to a few tribes. as of right now i am preaching 2 times on discipleship and 2 times on leadership. pray that i would depend completely upon the Spirit, that i would steward the word of God well, and that the people in the jungle would receive the word with clarity and understanding.

dios te bendiga (god bless you),
bubba