I shared these today at Calvary, but I thought I would post them here for posterity sake.  In reflecting on my time in Peru this summer, there are several lessons I learned and several aspects of the Peruvian culture that I fell in love with.  Here are 10 of them…

10. The Schedule. Every day we awoke to a rooster crow, usually around 3:00 am, which a touch earlier than what I am used to getting up, but I loved rolling out of my hammock around 4:00 or 5:00 and heading to work.  Generally we worked from 6:00, or so, in the morning till 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon.  Then we had our afternoons off to go swimming, hang out with the villagers and build community, or just take a nice siesta nap until the evening service.

9. Pastor’s Who are Hungry for God. We worked with two pastors along the Itaya river who were just as passionate about reaching their villages for Christ as the pastors at Calvary are about reaching our community.

8. Kid’s Can Use the Restroom on the Church Floor and No One Cares. It didn’t matter if it was a kid who couldn’t behave quite right, an old man who smelled a little odd, or if it was someone who was just a little “different”, people were just glad that others were able to be at church….even if they make a little mess on the floor.

7. I Learned I Can Live with a Lot Less. I realized that I really don’t need my iPhone, my computer, or even that new Kindle I really want.  The people of Peru live without running water, electricity, and a whole lot less than what I have.

6. No Need to Go to Gym, Because Just Getting Through the Day is a Workout. Just getting from point “A” to point “B” requires expending a ton of energy…and sweat.

5. The “Downtown Square” of Every Village is a Soccer Field. Enough said.

4. The people of Peru are Very Family Focused. It didn’t matter if they were cooking dinner, eating breakfast, going to work, going to church, or just hanging, out the people of Peru do everything as a family.

3. Everyone has a Place of Ministry in the Church…Including Kids. I love being a part of a church that values kids, and it was great to see that same value in Peru as well.  The kids were a part of the church services, especially when it came to the music.

2. Hospitality on a Completely Different Level. When the people of the second village we visited found out we were coming they actually built bridges to make our 2 or 3 day stay easier.  They don’t use bridges.  They just walk down the hill, through the creek, and up the other side.  But they didn’t want us to have to do that, so they actually went through the trouble of building us bridges to use.  Just one example of their amazing hospitality.

1. There are No McDonalds…so I Lost 11 Pounds! We worked so hard that sometimes I didn’t really even feel like eating, but when I did eat it certainly wasn’t McDonald’s.  Fish and rice made up the majority of our afternoon meals.

I normally don’t just reprint quotes, but this one by John Piper from God is the Gospel is so good I couldn’t resist….

John writes, “The critical question for our generation-and for every generation-is this: If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ were not there?”

I’ll admit I paused to think about this question….and I have my answer….no.  But what does it say about someone’s relationship with Christ if they answer “yes” to this question?

Until you run around a soccer field with kids for a few hours, it is easy to forget how out of shape you actually are.  This week during our church’s Mega Sports Camp, I realized that I am very much out of shape.

This year was our best year yet at Mega Sports Camp yet.  We introduced baseball for the first time, and we also had our traditional basketball, soccer, archery and sports swords for the kids to participate in.  I think all the kids had a great time, and I know for sure I did.  A few things I love about sports camp….

1. It gives me the chance to get to know some kids I haven’t met before from Calvary, and the community.

2. It is a great event for kids to invite their friends to, as almost everyone loves sports.

3. It is a great mix of having fun with sports, and having fun during the coaches huddle times (devotional times).

4. It get’s me out of my office and staff meetings for the week 🙂

In fact, I love sports camps so much that we are probably going to be offering some more soon.  So keep an eye out for some upcoming sports clinics.  We will probably be offering archery again in the fall, and then baseball in the spring.

What a week.  Most missions trips expose you to another culture, a language other than English, perhaps some different kinds of food, but my time in Peru exposed me to a a completely different way of life.

I traveled with 15 people from Calvary 6 hours up the Itaya River into the jungle outside of Iquitos, Peru.  There we visited two villages, both having less that 100 people in them.  No electricity (except by generator), and no running water.  We slept in hammocks, ate fish (head attached) that we caught out of the river, traveled by boat, bathed in the river, purified our own water, and used machetes as construction tools to build 2 churches.

I am sure I will write more on my experiences in Peru later, but for now let me just show you the 2 churches we built.  We intentionally left the front of the buildings open so that the people of the village could finish the church themselves.  Hopefully this will give them a sense of ownership having completed the last bit of work without our help.

An amazing week.  Kid’s camp is full of all sorts of fun….canoeing, swimming, field games, rock climbing, team competitions, and so much more.  My favorite part of camp though is the kids.

It is always great to see kids be able to get away from their regular environment for a week and focus on God.  In many cases they leave their less than desirable home situation behind, they leave their regular friends behind, they leave their TV’s and Wii’s behind and just get the chance to spend a week with God.

This year we 15 go with us from Calvary, and I think that every single one of them had an awesome week.  It was great to see so many of our kids around the altars each evening, praying for the various circumstances in their lives, and praying for their own relationships with God.  I know for certain that many of our kids were touched this week, and I pray, had their life courses altered for the better.

For those of you who are interested in seeing some of the footage from our time at camp, just search YouTube for “SNED Kids Camp 2009.”