Johnstown Trip - Day 4 (Tuesday)

Yesterday was our first day of basketball camp and adventure camp. It was epic to say the least. In the morning we got up and ate breakfast and it was delicious. After breakfast both teams went to basketball camp. At basketball camp we met a bunch of new kids. I met Aamir and i played him in some sweet games of one on one. We did not get many kids, but we are looking forward to getting more kids tomorrow.  After basketball camp we came home and ate some lunch which was filled with nutrition. Next we went to start our Adventure Camp where we met a bunch of awesome kids like Derek and Jordan. We sang songs. played games, and taught the kids memory verses. At these camps we are teaching the kids many new things while growing closer to God and each other. At the end of the day we went to a skate park.  We saw a church service and we watched Adam and Leah dominate skateboarding. During the church service, Josh the Pastor at Crucified Ministries, talked about how many people spend their time worrying about the future and what will happen in 5 to 10 years, when we really should be focusing on the present moment and what God is doing NOW! When we got back to the church we had a worship session. After the worship session we had a talk from Steve (our AIM leader) and it was really good. By around 11 o clock we were all really tired and we went to sleep.

Robby

Johnstown Trip - Day 3 (Monday)

Hey everyone! today was our first full day here in Johnstown and it has already been absolutely amazing! Sunday night they cranked the air conditioning and all of us woke up freezing this morning. After we ate breakfast we did our "war cry" to get pumped up for the day and we headed out to New Day family center for a brief training and guidelines then one team (30 feet deep) stayed near the New Day Center to go inviting and the other team (Roc Salvation) went to the west end to go inviting. Both teams walked around their areas for about an hour and a half inviting everyone we saw to our basketball camps. After we went back to the church we're staying at, and had lunch and had some time to relax which we were ALL looking forward to. Then we split into our teams again and went to our Adventure camp locations to invite people to the camp. The adventure camp is like a VBS for kids in the surrounding communities. We invited for about another hour and a half and met so many more amazing people. Then we came back to the church and had a delicious dinner and then we headed off to A GOAT FARM!!! We met the most amazing woman named Dorthy who is an amazing woman of God and had some cool stories. All of us did different jobs, some of us painted boards or the garage, some built a fence, some even cleaned manure out of the barn, and many other jobs. It was an amazing experience to hear Dorthy's stories and she was so happy at the end of the night for all the work that we did. Of course we got to see goats which was pretty awesome. There was even a horse which made me feel right at home, which i loved. Then we all came back for our debrief session, a dance party! and some much needed sleep. I'm so happy to be here in Johnstown and I cant wait to see all the even more amazing things God is going to do through us in this community. Please be praying for our continued safety and that God would bring us lots of kids in the next coming days. Thanks for the prayers and support!

Stephanie DeHond

El primer dia de nuestra mision

Today was our first full day of ministry and it started well.  We spent the morning at the Montessori School teaching English classes.  It was a bit frustrating at first because the teachers didn't even seem to be prepared for our time there.  After a few minutes of figuring things out, though, the group was off and running.  The most notable thing about our time at the school this morning was how the Peruvian students viewed American culture, particularly teen culture.  They imagine that all American teens do is party and eat at McDonalds; apparently they learned everything they needed to from a movie called Project X.  Hopefully in the next several days we can break free from these stereotypes and show these students the love of Christ.   

In the afternoon we went to La Plaza de Armas were we spent two hours sharing the gospel and making balloon animals for children.  We were like rock stars by the end of our time in the plaza.  Everyone was coming out to see the crazy Americanos and their balloon animals (especially Jackson).  We hope that when we return tomorrow we will have more opportunity to share.    

Things to pray for in the coming days:  

1.  To break the American stereotypes with the students at the Montessori School. 

2.  For energy to push forward.  

3.  For the group to be able to step out of their comfort zone and muster up the courage to share the gospel message.  

4.  Specifically pray for Gabe Agostini who is very sick and has not been able to be with the group.  

5.  That we don't get beaten to bad when we play the Peruvians in futbol or at least that we don't take ourselves to seriously.  

Thanks all for the continued prayer and I hope to have some video up soon.  

   

Johnstown Trip - Ropes Course Pictures

Johnstown Trip - Our first Blog!

Hey everyone!

I apologize that it has taken so long to get this up and running.  Hopefully we will have a good connection from here on out.  

DAY 1
We arrived at Geneva College on Saturday at 3:30 and had just enough time to get our rooms, drop off our stuff and jump back into the car to go to the Ropes Course!  What an awesome night for our group.  We did a few different types of warmup games to get us warmed up (and sweaty).  Our first initiative was to get our group in birthday order on a series of 9 slightly unstable logs.  the only catch was that if anyone fell off of the log while we were doing this, we had to start all over.  
It was a fantastic time of seeing our students work together, listen to and encourage each other.  After a few falls, we were successful!  We did a few more similar initiatives and ended our night back at our rooms with pizza and a time of worship.  What a great way to begin our week!  I have heard a lot of positive feedback from our team who feel a lot closer to one another as we start our week of ministry!

josh

DAY 2  

Today, Sunday, We woke up at Geneva College, and we had a wonderful breakfast of bagels and left over pizza. We packed and headed twords church. The church is called, North Way. It is like a giant version of Browncroft, blue roof and everything. After a great worship service and a sermon on Nehemiah 9, we headed to Johnstown. On our way we stopped at Chipoltle. After a filling lunch, we drove the last 2 hours to Johnstown. In Donna's car we recorded a lip dubed version of  "Jesus Music" and at the same time we went through a toll booth.

At last we pulled into the Crucified Ministries parking lot. The guys are staying in the corner of the basement where we eat and worship. The girls are staying up stairs in the sanctuary (some on pews). The facilities are nice. There are two showers for each gender. and plenty of bathroom space (for the seven guys anyway). The bulding we are in has a service for youth in the community every Sunday at 7. We heard a wonderful testimony of a couple that split up after 19 years of marriage and thanks to Jesus, they are both saved and have had a wonderful last 10 years. After the service, we went down stairs for some more worship and to do devos. The day finished peacefuly after the long car ride and quite a few games of ping-pong ( Robby ruled ).

Alex

Johnstown Trip - We are here!!! update coming soon...when we can get our WiFi working!

Our Journey to Piura

So, at this point we are on our long journey up the coast to Piura.  Everyone is very excited and I know that because the majority of the students keep saying "guess where we're at."  I guess I can get annoyed, but there is no reason to because "guess where we're at!"  Driving down the road looking at the surroundings, I am thankful that God has given these students the opportunity to be apart of such a great missions experience.  Culturally Peru is worlds apart from the United States.  Life is quite a bit different and I hope to convey some of that over the week as I keep everyone updated.  Continue to pray for all of us on this journey.  This is only day two and we haven't even arrived at our destination.  I will continue to post pictures and I will try to put some videos up, as well.