down the Marañon

Well, it´s hard to believe, but we are already back. I want to start by saying thank you for your prayers. This last trip was one of awesome blessing and everyone stayed pretty healthy. We saw how God answered many prayers!

We left January 16 for our second river trip to the Marañon River. This time we took a large cargo boat called Eduardo II. We jumped onto the 3 story boat and smashed our hammocks in a row next to about 80 other people on the 3rd floor. This time our leaders from our base in Minnesota came along, Jeff and David, to teach a pastors conferance for local pastors in the jungle. David brought his son Junior along as well. It was fun to swing with them in the hammocks, tearing down the Amazon river, headed for jungle pastors and leaders hungry to recieve from God.

We arrived in a village called Leoncio Prado, and carried our backpacks to our "hotel" (basically a really dirty, 2 story building with a lot of spiders and not the prettiest facilities...hee hee). That night we started by putting on a service for the people who came to the pastors conference. We were surprised to find that the 60 people- leaders and pastors with family- they thought would come, turned out to be 150. Worship was awesome. The people were so hungry for God, not holding back as they sang with all their hearts. You could really sense the enthusiasm in the place and the eagerness to recieve so much from God.

The two days of the conference were awesome. David and Jeff, our leaders, gave full day teaching on basics of leaderships and characteristics of leaders. The people were so blessed. Our team, as they taught in the conference, did a prayer walk for that community, and helped out with dramas in the services.

David, Jeff, and Jr. headed on home and we took off to the next community. Fortuna. One we had all been anticipating for a long time- this was where we would be digging wells. Fortuna is a community that YWAM Iquitos has been working with starting last year, and has seen some really good things happening in the community. As we approached their village on our canoe with a motor (or peke peke as they call it here) we looked onto the bank and there was about 100 people holding a sign that said "Welcome to Community New Fortune". They were all awaiting our arrival. As soon as we stepped foot into the community you could sense the peace and joy in the place. It was amazing. This was the first community that I had ever been too that was all Christian, maybe minus a few people.

As soon as we got there we started on the wells. This community suffered a lot from lack of water. Right now they call this season Winter, because it is a season with a lot of rain. But during the summer, it doesn´t rain much at all, and the river that we arrived on actually dries us and the people have to walk 2 hours to get water. I had no idea what to expect. The digging well process was amazingly easy. We used a generator and a large pipe drill bit, that connected to other large pipes. As whey pumped water through the pipes and drill to soften the dirt, manually two people would turn the drill pipes into the ground. This went on for around 5 hours until they were about 30 meters deep, where there was clear water. Then then put pvc pipes down the holes they dug and attatched a manual pump to it. As you can see in the pictures in was a muddy mess, but it was fun. What blew me away is that in one day these people could have clean water. That night one of the students, Lisa, spoke in their church service on Jesus being the Living Water, and how the deeper we go with Him, like the digging of the well, the more Living Water will flow through our lives. It was awsome!

We spend two days in Fortuna, a well each day, and put on a kid service for the kids there, giving out toys that a Christian business from Minneapolis dontated. The kids in the community was so fun. Also, as you can see, we all got to hold baby crocodiles. :) It was hillarious!

From there we went to San Miguel, which we only stayed 1 night in. The community was much different from Fortuna. Many didn´t know Jesus, and alcoholism was a real issue. We held a church service there, which was one of the most physically testing experiences I have had. We had florecent lights hung in the church to see, and the ceiling was low, so the lights naturally hung low as well. As I am sure you can imagine, bugs are a major issue in the Amazon. And as I am sure you also know, mosquitos, no-see-ums, and others freak winged biting things, all love LIGHTS! We stood under a light and had bugs swarmed around us, as we preached and did dramas (imagine standing in the frozen position having a mosquito feast on your neck). Looking back we laugh but it was deffinatly one of those moments where I wanted to flail my arms about like a psychodic mad person, tearing out of the service screaming "GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!!". But all for the cause of Christ, right :) Although the trying bug experience, I really saw God speak through the team and believe good things happened that night in some hearts.

The next day we spent some time going door to door praying for people and inviting them to our kids service. One of the groups that went out prayed with a women who was abused by her husband and was fighting to support her family. Before we left, another women asked for prayer for the same thing. Many of our team were really broken over these women and we were challenged to pray for these people even after we left.

We headed for our last village that afternoon. We loaded our 25 backpacks, food, and sound equipment onto our 2 peke pekes and hoped on finding any open spot to squeeze into. Clouds started rolling in and the wind started to pick up. As we headed out of the small cove that San Miguel hid, we came to the opening of where it hit the Marañon River. The 2 mile wide river that the day before moved gracefully with the current, was being pushed with force by the strong wind, creating small rapids. Our roofless canoe pushed against the current up the river, and sprinkles brought promise of a storm. Yet, God was with us and we got to San Jose, our destination, without a down pour and no problems at all. We were all in awe of God´s power even in a storm.

San Jose, I will have to admit, and so will most of the team, was our favorite place. Although not even half of the community was Christian, there was a sweetness to the people that made us want to stay for long time. I remember greeting the pastor, and he looked so serious. I was intimidated thinking, "I wonder if he is not pleased with our team", but felt, "just SMILE Rachael"...so I did. I gave him a huge smile, and he responded with the greatest smile. From that moment on, every time I greeted him with a Good Afternoon, Morning, or whatever, he just smiled and laughed (maybe I had something in my teeth the whole time or something...) and I loved it. We spent 2 days and 2 nights there. We held 2 church services and a kids service, which was our best one ever. Even the adults were laughing at our teams ridiculous clown acts. The kids were a blast, we played chicken in the river, soccer in the fields, and some of the team danced in the church during some down time. Myself, Katie and Jenny talked with the pastor and leaders in the church about how we could pray for them in Minnesota. It was hard to hear that they suffer also from water. When the river is so high, their whole community floods. The houses are all sitting on stilts above water. Their facilities go into that same water, and then the also drink that water which makes them very sick, especially the children. The crops flood and they can´t sell as much produce so suffer financially. It was really awesome to let them know we would be praying for them. It was a really good place where we were able to encourage the Christians there, and we really sensed that God used us to challenge non-believers there as well. It was so hard to leave.

I wish I could go on and on. We loved those people and many on the team feel God is showing them even more of how He has wired them to serve Him. One thing we all saw is the blessing of being able to serve people on a practical level. Not only with the 2 wells we dug, but also a girl on our team, Rebecca, who went to EMT school, was able to clean and dress wounds of children who suffered from very infected open wounds. I am also sensing God might be leading me to get some medical study and practical community develop,ment training to be able to use in missions, wherever He would lead me to.

Well, if you have actually made it through this very LONG blog, I congratulate you. It is so hard to summarize all the amazing things God did. We saw God keep our health strong enough for everyone to be involved. A poisonous spider bit our team member Kevin and after women prayed for him, God healed him. Days that we had to build the wells, there was a wondeful overcast and sprinkeled just enough to keep us cool. Most of all, we believe that God did amazing things that we can´t even see, in the hearts of the people there.

Thank you all again for your prayers. Please continue to pray for our health. Energy. Pray for a protection in every sense, especially against the enemies stupid plans. We will be heading for our last trip down the Tigre River on January 30 and will be returning February 11. I will try and update you as soon as we get back .

God bless, and thanks for taking the time to read this long blog! ;)

Rachael

Our first trip into the jungle

We just finished our first trip!

I have so much to tell you guys. It was an incredible to time. I was able to visit the same places that I did last year.

The river we went down on is called Rio Momon. We took a 9 hour trip in the boat you see in the photo to get to our first community. The team enjoyed sitting on the roof of the boat, watching the amazing Amazon jungle go by.

We arrived in a village called Punto Alegre. The name is so fitting. The people were waiting on the river bank for us to arrive and greeted us with the friendly smiles. I was so blessed and surprised when I got off the boat and heard my name, Raquel in Spanish, called. The community had remembered my team from last year and remembered everyone´s names.

It was an amazing 2 days. We were able to go door to door and pray with people. We held church services for the people in which we danced our hearts out during worship, as you can see in one of the pictures. We prayed with people after the service and believe that God healed some of illnesses. During the day we put on a youth workshop in which we challenged the teens in the community to step out and be 1 Timothy 4:17 kids, examples for those around them of youth who love Jesus. We taught them this fun coreagraphy which they then performed for the church. Then in the afternoons we played soccer and volleyball in the mud, as you can see the guys picture after one of their games. Let´s just say, they wooped us! :)

It was sad to leave Punto Alegre. It was like a dream. As we were loading on our boat to head to the next village, most of the community stood on the bank to say goodbye, two gentlemen from the church singing us goodbye seranades with their guitars. We were so blessed by this community.

The next two villages we went to were harder. Punto Alegre had a lot of Christians in the community, they were a united community, all what we could see affects of Jesus in their lives. The last few villages were different. The 2nd village is called Sargenta Lores. They had no pastor in the community and only 3 families meet in the church there. The leader of the church was really discouraged. We stayed a night and held a church service which we really sensed God worked through. In each of our services we do dramas, people share testimonies and preach from our team. It was one of those services where everything went really well, and you could just sense that God was working through each thing. We know that in this village, our main role was planting seeds. The people were not open to wanting to know Jesus, but we believe He is passionate about them, and that whatever they heard, God will use to bring them closer to Him.

The last villages we went to were right next to each other. Again, harder areas. There were hardly any Christians in the area. There was tons of alcoholism which lead to abuse in the family. Past hurts from family fueds and murders between families divided a village and groups of families split off and started their own community. Homosexual male prostitution is becoming a big thing in which two men are also pulling small young boys into it. There is a resort just next to them for tourists where they have a Shaman house and withcraft and very demonic things are practiced. It blew my mind how all of this could be out in the middle of the jungle, 3 hours from civilization.

We held church services and kids programs for the people and visited them door to door, telling them about Jesus. The first day was hard. I don´t know how to explain it to you, but you could FEEL the heavy oppressive evil in the place. It physically felt weight pushing you down sometimes. We did a church service one night and it was like walking through muck. We had this urgency that we had to pray the whole time, especially against anything that the enemy was doing. No one felt peace, it was hard to even speak clearly. It was a fight to get through the service. It was hard to see what was going on and what God was doing. We all got really discouraged.

The last day we went door to door to share with people. It was amazing. I really sensed God was giving us the words to share with these people. Sharing with one family that didn´t know the Lord, I could see in the husbands eyes that he really was hungry for God, but he didn´t want to stop drinking so much.

That day we had an amazing time with the kids. Sharing crazy stories in which Lisa, one of our team members, told a hillarious version of Jesus calming the storm. That night we did a church service, and here´s the amazing part. You could FEEL that things had changed. There was a breakthrough. There was this joy I felt that I had no idea from where it came from. There was this peace during the service, and a freedom to be able to speak what was on our hearts, not stumbling all over our words like last time. There wasn´t a ton of people in the little grass hut service, but something told me that God did something in the heart of that husband we had talked to earlier. At the end of the service many people came forward to pray to be reconiled to Christ, because they had walked away from Him. It was awesome.

Well, that was long, but amazing what God did. I just want to tell you thank you, all of you who prayed for us. We saw God do miracles. His protection was very evident upon us also. We were protected by a poisonous snake that had snuck into one of our church services, that someone caught in killed. We found a poisonous scorpion and killed it that had walked into the girls side of a hut we stayed in. We were protected from a boat that came really close to hitting us. We also saw God´s hand healing us. Many people got sick in the last village we were in, and we think a lot had to do with the demonic stuff going on in the place. Yet, many of us saw God heal us. We are back in Iquitos now and everyone is doing great, only a few still sick a bit, but we are seeing them get better each day.

God was so faithful on this trip. I saw the team really step out and preach with all their hearts. They dressed up as clowns and danced with kids as their face paint sweat off. They loved on the locals, even though they didn´t know the language.

We consider it an honor to have been able to tell people of the love that Christ has for them. Who will go to these forgotten places? There is such a need for missionaries there. We still can´t believe God would use such a bunch of silly young people to share with these BEAUTIFUL people of His love, but He did. He is good.

Well, God bless. I will give you one more quick update on what we will be doing for our next trip before we leave. We will be heading out Tuesday for a 15 day trip down another river.

Thanks again for all of your prayers!

Heading for the jungle

This picture is a kids program we did on a street. The kids loved this drama. It´s called Hero. Kevin in black is a "doll" and characters come in and make the doll what their hero is. This one was a baseball player.

Well, we are all doing really well. We have had a few people sick, but they are taking medicine and are feeling a lot better. We had an awesome opportunity to do this kids program and a church service last Saturday. The church has a ministry do Cancer and AIDS patients. This was a tougher day. We played with some children who´s parents died of AIDS and they too have it. Many of the people suffer from a lot of illnesses. We prayed with a woman who had problems with her liver and pains all in her legs so much that she could hardly walk. She said when we finished praying for her that her leg didn´t hurt as bad. Praise God.

We leave this Wednesday for a week trip out on a river called Momon. We will be traveling to 3 or 4 different communites, sharing with them about Jesus and holding church services for them. I am excited because I visited some of these same communities last year and will see some of the same people.

I hope everyone had a good Christmas and New Years.