I wanted to give you guys a recap of what happened in Peru!
Our team was a little bit split up, we lived in a café and Caleb and Cristen worked in there, waiting tables and making drinks. Calvin and Darlin were at an after school program from about 3:30 to 5:30, and Luis and I were at a different after school program from about 3:30 to 6. The great part about it was that we all came together and got to eat with one another and share what God did (as I talked about in my last blog).
This was the first time our ministry was kids being on the race, I didn’t really know what to expect coming into it and from seeing the way the kids acted in Ecuador, when we did work with them, we had no idea what to expect.
IT WAS AWESOME. Luis and I fell in love with these kids from the start. I played games with them while Luis took turns throwing them around and spinning in circles with them, making me nauseas just looking at them! I loved hearing their laugh and seeing them smile.
This program we were working with owned a mountain… a legit mountain! But that meant we had to walk up it every day, which was great for exercise but when you are at 11,000+ altitude it’s a little challenging. On the second day as we were walking up, we see about 10 kids off in the distance, all of a suddenly they see us and start running! Hands in the air and smiles that consumed their faces, Luis and I look at each other and all we can do is smile and laugh, we open our arms up to welcome them in. It was beautiful.
The last day we got to spend with them, Luis and I were in charge of the Bible story. We decided to talk about the feeding of the five thousand. We made them all tuna fish sandwiches and talk about how God provided the people with enough food to eat, then we taught them how to pray. We shared with them that they have authority and that they can talk to Jesus like a friend. We asked if any of them needed prayer over any pain in their body, about 3/4th of them lifted up their hands with a desired to get healed, then Luis prayed over them with the faith that they would be. Luis then asked them how they felt, majority of them said they were pain free!! Praise God! For those that weren’t, we ask them to come up to the stage and we prayed over them again, but instead of just us praying we surrounded them with the little kids. THEY WERE ALL HEALED!! God is so good!!!
Our nightly routine was to caring them/ walk with them to their houses and drop them off, we did that one last time and hugged them as many times as we could. It was hard to say good bye but knew God had planted many seeds that we pray will be watered and grow into a huge harvest.
We had a lot of down time in the morning with just having the after school program but during that time I was able to spend a lot of time with Jesus. My prayer coming into this month was to have a desire to read the Bible and God really provided! God is so good! He just kept filling me up and I was just able to sit in His love and rest in that. It was awesome!
At the end of the month we got to go to Machu Picchu!! One of the 7 wonders of the world. I was out for a crazy adventure and I got one! The boys and I decided to walk to Machu Picchu… yes you read that right we WALKED! If you want a detailed story of it message me or read my brother, Caleb’s blog, I will just give you the gist of it. We bused to a town that I can’t spell or pronounce so I just call it O-town. It was about 9pm and pouring down rain and our plan is to walk 18 miles on the rail road tracks. We decided to start the walk that night and try to get a couple hours in and then find a camp spot. Luis and I had hammocks and Calvin and Caleb had a tent to share. We started at 10pm and didn’t stop until 3am. We were soaked and tired and had no luck at finding a place to sleep. We finally came up to the market area that had cover and poles to hang up our hammocks. We “slept” till about 5:30, I got sick in the night shivering and having some stomach issues. We woke up to snowcapped mountains all around us, I seriously considered turning around and catching a cab back, but my brothers prayed for me and we kept walking. I felt a lot better as we started walking and got warmer.
The views were amazing!! It was mountains everywhere you turned, absolutely majestic! We had the speaker going with wordship songs and just praised God in all His creation. We ended up taking trails up the mountains where the locals lived to stay off the tracks, it added to our mileage but was safer (you’re welcome mom). To eat all we had was canned tuna, beans, and bread. It was hard and tiring but the views made it worth it.
Over 30 miles later we made it to the town before Machu Picchu… our 18 mile walk turned into a 30 mile hike. I’m so thankful to have such encouraging brother walking by myside because it was hard, to say the least! My I felt like all the blisters on my feet gave birth to triplets and that I was just walking on raw skin, so you could say that I was going to be sore the next day. We finally get to the town about 6pm, we made it!!
I spent the next morning up at Machu Picchu by myself, the boys wanted to sleep in. I would have but my feet itched from the pain so I got up to beat the crowd. It was incredible!! I could barely walk the steps but I was able to take my time, listen to music and just enjoy the view. It was definitely worth it!
Calvin and I ended up taking a short train, 2 taxis and a bus ride to get home, we were not walking anymore! Luis and Caleb had a little more difficulty getting to Machu Picchu… all in all they got lost, and ended up walking and extra 20 miles total. But they made it!
It was an adventure I will never forget!!
Peru was awesome, we made relationships outside of our ministry as well in the markets where we got food. We got to share the love of Jesus with prayer and sometime just with a simple smile. I love how big God’s love can be and how small it can be, it covers all!
