Amazing Amazonas

October 13, 2009

Hi All,

Hope this finds you safe and well. I returned Sunday from the convention in Amazonas and have to tell you, it was absolutely amazing. This was the first time we have had our churches from the rivers all get together. Previously we had a Women’s convention but unfortunately due to economic difficulties, there was not a high amount of participation.

There were over 100 participants in this convention with representatives from Amazonas, Santa Ana, San Juan de Sinchicuy, Iquitos and another church from Nuevo Triunfo that has now joined the Wesleyan denomination. They are a village a little further up the river Tahuayo where Santa Ana resides. Pastor Hildebrando had been visiting with them for years and they decided they wanted to join the Wesleyan denomination as they have been abandoned by their church covering for 3 years. It was a blessing that the Superintendent of the district—Pastor Daniel Bocanegra (corazon blanco) was here to welcome them into the denomination. There were also representatives from Puerto Prado and San Carlos. Unfortunately there was not a representative from Yanashi or from Tamshiyacu.

For some of these people, this was a 16 hour boat ride so it took sacrifice for all of us to be together but it was well worth it.

Another awesome point of this trip was that it was put on by the churches in the coastal region of Peru. It is my dream and desire that the more mature churches in Peru itself come alongside these baby churches in the Amazon region to provide spiritual support and teaching. Hna. Marleni de Casteñeda, her husband, Hno. Ricardo and Pastor Daniel Bocanegra all came from Lima to provide teaching and preaching for the convention. My part of the teaching actually went pretty well. I thought I had about 10 minutes of material but it turned out to be more than an hour.

We had such a good time all together in fellowship, playing volleyball—my team won despite having me on their team and bathing together in the river. All the people of the church in Amazonas had gone fishing, so we had plenty of fish plus the people coming from Santa Ana met up with some people on their way to Amazonas that gave them tons of watermelon plus we brought rice and 12 chickens so everyone was well fed.

Perhaps the best part of the trip for me was that 4 people accepted Christ and 21 people were baptized. We also had a communion service which was the first time many of the people had ever taken communion. Many people kept asking me “hermana how do we take communion” so the whole process was explained and we had communion together. It was such an awesome trip, I can’t begin to express my gratitude to the Lord for allowing me to be a part of this. It is such an honor for me to be able to see how much the church is maturing in the Amazon area. I want to thank all of you for your support and prayers for making this possible for me to be a part of all of this and I especially want to thank the Lord for without Him, I am nothing.

I am sending a few photos of the event although the photos cannot begin to describe the incredible experience. 1. The kids receiving t-shirts which Marleni sent and Gian Franco and Pastor Leiter painted. 2. One of the church services. 3. Eating together. 4. Baptism Candidates. 5. Baptism—this is Dayer—Lucy’s nephew who many of you prayed for his cancerous tumor last year.

By the way, there was an announcement at the end of the convention by the people who traveled from Lima that they are going to make this a yearly event so next October we will be in Santa Ana!

May you be richly blessed and please email me and pray for the work here in the Amazon.

In Christ’s Precious blood,

Kayleen