Calling all prayers!

"Incline your ear, O LORD, and answer me;

     for I am afflicted and needy." Psalm 86:1

We have tickets to return to Peru August 28 by faith.

However, if our long-term support is not high enough by August we will have to postpone our return to Peru until we reach our goal.

My needs are nowhere near those of David when he wrote the Psalm quoted above. I am not in the midst of a direct life threat for trying to receive what God has given me.  I am also not as afflicted and needy as many of my friends and family who are going through very difficult trials right now. But I do relate to this prayer as we are at a time of need. I trust that the Lord is the one to pray to and I am praying to him for our need. I will be honest, I don't like hate fund-raising. I do love traveling around and telling about what God is doing through His church. That is for the most part what I have been doing this year. I am conflicted about this. I have some dear brothers who tell me that many say they have heard many powerful testimonies of how God is using people in ministry but they didn't ask for money so they didn't give. Then I have heard others tell me that God has promised to give and so we are being unfaithful if we go and ask other people. We should just pray in our closet and trust the Lord to be the Lord. I definitely believe that the Lord is able and does often provide through private prayers. But I also recognize that He has chosen to use His people to pray and has chosen to answer the prayers of His church. He often uses people through communication to do His will. Therefore I appeal to you to pray with us.

Our long-term support is only at 51%. The Lord has blessed us tremendously in one-time support and we are already at 86% of 2013. Thank you for so much generous support and partnership with us in this work.

If you have given one-time support and are willing to commit to give that every year or if the Lord has laid it on your heart to support us, please let us know by sending in a note to CMS of your commitment by the end of July.  This will help us greatly in our planning.

If it proves to be the Lord's will to postpone our return to Peru, we will re-schedule our tickets for later in the year and keep raising support until we are ready. Even if we do have to change our tickets we will still save money on not having to buy new tickets. However we are still pleading with the Lord that we will be able to get back to Peru sooner than later.

Please pray with us that the Lord who provides will provide in His timing. Our team is pleading with us to come soon and has expressed their deep anticipation of our return. They tell me that I am greatly needed for a pivotal role in the ministry of the church in Arevalo but, we cannot return to Peru without increasing our long-term support. 

The work of discipleship with the carpenters with Parish will continue but on a wider scale of directly working in discipleship with the church community. The church, Christ the Restorer in the neighborhood of Arevalo, is at a pivotal point. The Peru Mission team is telling me that the gifts God has provided me with and demonstrated in the growth of the carpenters are crucially needed to help produce local leadership and growth in the church.

Our focus with Parish is narrowing more and more to disciple the men that we are working with and help them grow in the local market in Peru. We are still praying toward future growth in export to the U.S., but have decided to focus more on local growth in Peru until God shows us his timing. This means that we are focusing on the three areas of ministry; spiritual discipleship, technical training and administrative training. Parish has been helping one new business get started, Las Ponas, and we are seeking to help several other carpenters become more sustainable in their work. I am convinced that the best way to serve Christ's church is to seek to apply the means of grace to our whole life throughout the week. This not only means studying the Bible during the week but also means applying scriptural principles to our work to be able to support our church, our family and our community.  Please pray with us that the Lord will bless this ministry to cause growth in the lives of the men and their families both in their spiritual and vocational lives. 

in the joy of resting in Christ,

Stuart Mills

(for Megumi, Satomi, Samuel and Ezra.)

below are some pictures of a display created by Las Ponas to showcase their work. Many new customers have come in and purchased their products as a result!