Please Pray for Pisco, Peru

Lord-willing on Monday I’ll be heading to Pisco, a city four hours to the south of Lima. Here I will meet up with a group of twenty five adolescents from Ayacucho for a four day conference/missions trip. Half the group is not Christian. They are starting a new church in an area where there is no other protestant church. The city’s catholic church is not nearby. I will be teaching on evangelism for four hours for three days. I am dreadfully scared and unprepared. Lord, please forgive me. I don’t know how I will be able teach for such long periods of time. The first day I plan on basically given Ray Comfort’s message called “Hell’s Best Kept Secret”. Please pray for me, the adolescents, and the people we will be sharing the gospel to that God would open up an effective door and reveal the mystery of Christ.

Blogger with Michael, one of the leaders that will oversee the work in Pisco after the group leaves

Blogger with some of the adolescents from Ayacucho

Are you allowed to...?

Every now and then someone asks me, "Being a christian are you allowed to do "x" immoral thing?" What if I asked, "since you are married are you allowed to steal?" Notice that the questions assume that there is no universal morality. More preoccupying is the questions assume that a relationship is based on rules and regulations. The only acceptable basis for a relationship with God is Jesus. This relationship is described in the bible using many metaphors such as:

1. Abraham's seed: The believer is a friend of God by faith. (Gal 3:29, James 2:23)
2. God's Son: The believer is a son of God by faith in Jesus's name and receiving the Word. Jesus is the Word. (John 1:1, 12)
3. Messiah's Bride the church: The believer is part of the body and bride of Christ by the crucifiction and resurrection. (1 cor 6:14-15)

My father Abraham and I in Carhuaz where we bought some really yummy manjar blanco :)

Repentance is a fruit

Is repentance necessary for a relationship with God? Is it necessary for a watermelon vine to produce watermelons? However, we are not plants. We have the freedom to choose whether or not we will produce fruit. That’s why all the prophets command, “Produce fruit in keeping with repentance." (Matt 3:8 NIV)
Now that I have known God's kindness I don't want to do anything that ofends him. "Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God's kindness leads you toward repentance?" (Romans 2:4 NIV)

It's kind of funny that Jimmy is from Ica, the land where the best watermelons in Peru are produced. Here he is in Ayacucho eating a watermelon probably from Ica.