Pastors Convention

May 30, 2010

Hi All,

Hope you are doing well. This past week we had our first session for capacitating the pastors of our churches. It was very exciting as this has been another dream come true for me. The National Superintendent and the District Superintendent of the Wesleyan Church of Peru flew to Iquitos to teach our pastors in the Amazon area for 3 days. It was absolutely awesome with 22 pastors and their leaders attending.

(Pastor Felipe Jordan--National Superintendent)

At first I was a little disappointed as 3 of our churches didn’t show up but I then got caught up in the activities. The pastors were so excited as they also have been longing for direction. They kept telling me they were beginning to

understand things in a different way and had such a hunger to learn more. I had to ask the Pastors from Lima to go a little bit slower as many of the people from the jungle have around a 6^th grade education due to the professors coming, teaching for a while then leaving when they receive their check. Don’t get me wrong, these pastors are very intelligent people but just were not given the educational opportunity that is offered in more highly populated areas and they have such a desire to learn more.

Yesterday the session ended with 2 people getting baptized in a swimming pool here inIquitos. Yesterday was also my birthday and I awoke at midnight to balloons breaking and all of this noise outside my door. My dentist had just given me this bite guard to wear at night so I quickly had to take that out so I wouldn’t scare anyone and answered the door to all the people singing me happy birthday. It was so sweet. I thought that was the end of it but when we came back from the baptism, they surprised me with cake and soda. As I was blowing the candle out, the District Superintendent pushed my face in the cake and broke eggs on my head (a Peruvian tradition).

It was hilarious. We then had to say our goodbyes and the church feels empty again but with many plans ahead.

This next week, Lucy and I are headed to Tamshiyacu, Santa Ana and Nuevo Triunfo to visit our churches there. After we return, we will be headed to Amazonas to our church there where I am going to teach some computer classes. The government gave the kids laptops which is awesome but a bit funny since they do not have electricity there. Apparently they are a type of laptop that you charge the battery separately and the school has a generator so they charge them there. The church is trying to save to buy a generator so they can have lights and a keyboard for their services. I am looking forward to teaching as they said no one knows how to use them and it will be fun to be able to place this tool into their hands.

(Me with Pastor Daniel Bocanegra--District Superintendent--also cake and egg culprit)

After we return from Amazonas, we will have to get ready for the team coming in July. Lucy, Gladis, Pastor Leiter and I are also planning on doing a lock-in for the kids in Iquitos and a children’s program where Lucy is going to dress up as a clown in Tamshiyacu. I am still kind of feeling like “so much to do and so little time” but I know God has it all in His hands. I asked Pastor Felipe (National Superintendent) and Pastor Daniel (District Superintendent) if they could start sending some outlines for the pastors as guides for preaching so that even as they are preaching, they are learning. It is an exciting time even though it always feels like 2 steps forward 1 step back. I just have to remember that it is all in God’s timing and not my own.

Thanks to all of you who wished me Happy Birthday on facebook. It really meant a lot to me when I opened up my email and saw more than 50 messages for my birthday. May the Lord richly bless you as you have me. Hasta mas tarde.

Dios les bendiga ricamente,

En Cristo

Kayleen

San Juan de Sinchi Cuy

May18, 2010

Hi All,

I know I just wrote but wanted to send another quick update. Yesterday we—Lucy, Gladis, Gian Franco, Pastor Leiter and I went out to San Juan de Sinchi Cuy where we are trying to start a church. It is kind of a difficult community as they are very wary of strangers. This village is 2 hours away from Iquitos by boat then a 3 mile hike into the jungle. Below: Esther, the birthday girl with her baby.

I have been trying to lay kind of low when I go there as last year some of the people were saying that I was coming there trying to change everything. I just want to be a blessing to them so I am just trying to get to know some of the people there. We went to celebrate Esther, Lucy’s niece’s 15^th birthday. She had a baby about 3 months ago so this was the first time I would see her also.

Right: Baby Amy Veronica

We were greeted in the town where the boat stops by a herd of water buffalo.

We then walked the 3 miles toSan Juanwhere we played soccer, then bathed in a stream before holding a service. The family killed a duck so we had a delicious duck soup.

Left: Water Buffalo

That night, the service was awesome. We sang, did a drama, had a meditation then played games. There were about 30 adults and 50 children attending and they were all very open to hear the word of God. When we finished, they didn’t want to go home. They begged us to please return soon and 2 people accepted Christ. One was a young 20 year old man that had attempted to hang himself the week before. There is such a need for the gospel in that village. The alcoholism rate is very high and there is a lot of witchcraft practiced in their town. I would like to go there for one day with the team that is coming in July. I asked them to speak with the town officials to see if that is a possibility. We would like to try to regularly get out to that village. It is so difficult with all that we have to do this year and after each trip, I need 1 to 2 days of rest before going out again. It feels like there is so much to do and so little time but I know that God has it all in His control and I just need to keep doing things one day at a time. Please keep this village in your prayers. Hasta Luego

In Christ

Kayleen

Right: Lucita, my own personal stylist

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I am here

May 12, 2010

Hi All,

Hope this finds you all well. Sorry it has taken me so long to write but as soon as I arrived, we hit the ground running. I arrived in Peru on May 3^rd and was to meet a medical team from Indiana Wesleyan in the airport in Lima. I arrived at 10:15 and their flight was supposed to come in at 10:30. I didn’t know it had been delayed so at first I thought I had been left at the airport and got a little scared. Then when their flight did get in, no one from their team came out. Almost everyone was gone from the airport and it was 2 a.m. when a couple of their team members came out and said some of the girls had lost their luggage. We finally got to the church in Surco about 3:30 a.m. slept a bit then headed back to the airport in Lima to catch the plane to Iquitos.

When we got to Iquitos, the medical team began to sort their meds and get ready to go out into the jungle. I had lost 4 fillings while in the states and so went to the dentist to get that done. The 4 fillings cost me $35 which I didn’t think was so bad. I also went to try to get my internet hooked up thinking that I was going to be able to get high speed from the telephone company. To my dismay, all they have here still is dial up. I am going to check with this other company but I think all they have is for businesses. I was very very disappointed as my internet connection is so frustratingly slow and disconnects often. Oh well, I am happy to have an internet connection at all.

We left for the jungle the next day…to Yanashi first which we made our home base. We took a slow boat there—we left at about 9 a.m. and arrived about 7 p.m. It was getting dark so we had to quickly get the boat unloaded and get the generator hooked up. We had a lot of team bonding time which was great. This team was led by two students studying in the medical field at Indiana Wesleyan but also on the team were Sue Ferguson and Joel her son. As many of you know, Sue and Jarvis Ferguson were missionaries in the coastal area of Peru for over 20 years. They came on the first mission trip I was on in 2001. That was also Joel’s first mission trip to the jungle at 16 years of age. That trip changed both of our lives forever as we both received the call into missions on that trip. Sue is a very dear friend of mine and has helped me so much through the years so it was a huge blessing for me to have both of them on this trip and get to spend some time with them.

We went to 4 villages nearby Yanashi to give medical and dental care. We were also able to do some children’s ministry in several of the villages. The villages we visited were: Nuevo Israel, Santa Ursula, Nuevo Esperanza and San Antonio plus we were able to offer some medical services in Yanashi and Iquitos. All in all over 500 patients were seen. We wanted to hold services at night in the villages but it just was not possible as the water is very high right now and it would be too dangerous with snakes and trying to navigate the river at night. Besides, the team worked so hard, they would have become even more exhausted. As it was, two of the girls got pretty sick and had to go to the emergency room when we returned to Iquitos.

When we got back to Iquitos, we were going to go to the zoo ect. but were not able to due to a strike. It ended up o.k. though as the team walked to a nearby park and played and we went out to dinner later.

Yesterday the team left and I am now alone here. It is always hard when a team leaves as you become so close so it feels very empty when they are gone. Today we are cleaning ect. I am going to paint my bathroom later today. Pastor Leiter, Gian Franco and Lucy painted my room as a surprise for me. It looks so awesome that now I have to paint the bathroom.

We are going to have a busy year. May 26^th the National Superintendent and District Superintendent are coming fromLima to teach a few classes to the pastors from the river. So we will have them and all of the pastors until the beginning of June. I am very excited about this as I have said in prior emails, my dream is that the churches in Lima adopt the churches in the Amazon region. After they leave, we will have to start getting ready for the TX/LA team coming to work on the building inIquitos the first part of July. A team from New York came in April and redid the roof but while the roof was off, it rained really hard and destroyed the ceiling boards, the walls are also cracking which may mean taking down a few walls and putting rebar in. There will be one team from TX/LA coming in July, then we have another TX/LA team coming in August to the beginning of September. Finally in October we have a big convention of all of the churches. I am really excited that the work is finally starting to take off here. Please pray that all continues to go well. I said to some people that the work here was always one step forward, two steps back and they said they think I better start saying it the other way around—two steps forward, one step back or we will be losing ground.

Well, I know this was kind of long but since I hadn’t had a chance to write and tell you all that we got here, I thought I better do it now. Hope you are all doing well and very blessed. Please write.

In Christ

Kayleen