The People Came In Two-By-Two
Sorry you haven’t heard from me for a while, I’ve been meaning to post this for a long time now.
I just wanted to fill you in on the holiday club as it came to an end recently.
After Christmas, the girls and I were charged with organising and running a holiday club for children and young people that last the for the entire month of February. I’d done week long holiday clubs solely for kids before, but this was something entirely different, made even more difficult by the fact that we were doing this in Peru, where we’re still getting to grips with the culture and the people don’t speak English!
I’ve already mentioned that the month of preparation was a hard one for me, so I won’t elaborate too much more, other than to say that we got so caught up in everything that we didn’t give much thought to God and His plans for this holiday club.
Leading up to the ‘Big Launch’, we were placed in charge of the church youth group that met on Saturday nights, as the usual leader was away. We did this for three weeks, and for three weeks, no-one showed up. This could have been incredibly discouraging, especially as we had to plan the sessions as wells as preparing things for the holiday club. However, it didn’t stop us!
That first morning was the start of a month long journey in which we all learned a huge amount about how futile our own plans are. Kids actually turned up! More than we expected and as February progressed, children brought their friends and some turned up simply because they saw the sign outside the church or because they received a flyer in the street! Even now, after the holiday club has finished, some of these kids are coming to the church services on Sundays and the Friday club that the church puts on for children!
(The antics with the children at the holiday club!)
With the youth, similar things happened. We saw numbers increase as the weeks wore on and one of the greatest privileges was being able to see how a few of the young people progressed from only coming for the English lessons to going deeper in their understanding of God. Some of these teenagers are now attending church on a regular basis and the weekly youth meetings.
One of the highlights was when we took the group out onto the streets of Cusco for a spot of evangelism! The youth that were shy when they first started attending boldly stepped out and began talking with members of the public about Jesus! Another moment that sticks out is the last day of the club, when we took everyone out to an open space above the city, and there we played football and talked about what we had learnt from our times together. We were touched by the journeys that some of the young people had been on. It reminded me that God does things without us realising. It was that night that it occurred to us that we had actually developed relationships with these ‘Jovenes’, the first people with which we had properly done so since arriving in Peru.
(Playing football to an Andean back-drop)
The finale came the following Sunday, when the children put on a spectacular performance of Noah and his Ark (the theme of the entire month) for the church. Organising the children and anxiously waiting for the key characters to arrive made me feel like a Sunday School teacher on the day of the Christmas Nativity!
(The animals about to enter the Ark)
The youth also stood up at the front and talked more about their ‘cardboard testimonies’ that had been put up on walls.
(A youth with her ‘cardboard testimony’)
And throughout it all, God provided us with various interpreters.
So that’s it. Thanks for your prayers!
“With God, all things are possible”.
The Game We Play 