UPDATES

The smell of pumpkin bread finds me upstairs. I think this is the third time this week my wife has made some variation of pumpkin something. I’m not sure yet if she loves pumpkin that much or if she's simply trying to bring fall into our little house, even though it’s most definitely spring here in Arequipa.

“Five and a half inches! And this one is seven inches!” Measurements for everything, from a brother’s shoe to Sadie’s head, were excitedly shouted down the stairs. As you may have guessed, one of our children recently started learning how to measure in his math class, leaving nothing and no one safe from his little blue plastic ruler.

The August completion date for our church construction project turned into a large smudge on the calendar as I finished erasing. Yes, one of the kids had definitely been chewing on the tip of this eraser. “Oh well,” I thought to myself, “at least the date had been penciled in.

“You need to leave the country.” The words barreled into me. This was not how things
were supposed to go. My mind was reeling. After months of paperwork, immigration
appointments, and background checks, our only remaining option was to leave the country and then, upon re-entry, try to file the paperwork over again.

Squeals of excitement danced through the air as dozens of little ones, standing on tiptoes, vied for a better glimpse of the storybook setting hidden inside. The gates were opened, the drawbridge was lowered, and with the help of a missions trip team from the States, our first-ever Vacation Bible School at El Salvador Baptist Church began.

Blue and yellow balloons crisscrossed the entryway, and dozens of volunteers swarmed around,
each busy with their individual tasks. The whole building seemed to hum with excitement. It was
the Inaugural Service of Redeemer Baptist Church.