Email Update from April 5, 2016

Greetings from Peru! Here are some highlights and prayer requests. Don't miss the last 3! We want to take a moment to let you know how thankful we are for having you on our support team. Here are a few updates from the last few months as we serve in Trujillo, Peru. The year 2016 has started off very full!  January 1, we returned to Peru after a Christmas visit and helped with the Summer Camp, Noah's Ark. My niece, Anna Louise, stayed with us for a week after coming down with the group from Twin Lakes in Jackson, MS.  Bethesda Clinic re-opening. The first week in February the medical clinic in Arevalo started attending patients again. Geneva School found a new director and also hired a few new teachers and started the new school year on March 7th. We had a great VBS week in our church in Arevalo with around 60 children every day. Cristo Restaurador celebrated it's 11 year anniversary on February 14th with a potluck dinner and special music from a visiting volunteer from Nashville. We had a decent turn out and seemed to encourage attendance a little bit. Please pray for our church attendance. We have several new visitors coming regularly but we are losing several older members. We are seeking them out and visiting them. Please pray for grace and encouragement for them.  Last week, we celebrated the Resurrection of our Lord with a Maundy Thursday service, a church-wide picnic fellowship, a Saturday prayer vigil and a sunrise Resurrection service.  The Young Adult ministry increased attendance during summer vacation, one evening we had 24 people. We planned several activities, a day of sandboarding, a trip to the beach, a fund raiser for a retreat later in the year. Please pray for these young christians battling many temptations and struggles. We started an officer training class where several candidates are regularly attending along with a few others who are interested in learning more. We also started a new apprenticeship program with four young men (see more below). The carpenters at Las Ponas are plugging away but struggling to grow. Please pray for encouragement and wisdom to improve their business and discipleship efforts with their employees. In the bible study with Felix the mechanic we have had several very good conversations where he expresses recognition of his need for Christ and change in his life, yet he thinks he is not worthy to give himself to Christ. Please keep praying for the Spirit to work in his heart and help him understand free (yet costly) grace.  Praise God and many thanks to our supporters that our personal financial support has been fully supplied and we lack in nothing!   Because of too many mechanical problems we are going to sell our old VW classic van and plan to replace it with a more reliable car. Please pray for a buyer for the old and guidance to select the right vehicle to suit our needs for family and ministry.  We have 3 special prayer and fund requests:   Geneva school is working towards becoming self-sufficient but will need a few years to reach that goal. Would you consider supporting the education work to cultivate a new culture in the next generation? You can do so here and select Arevalo Geneva School The session at Cristo Restaurador has started an apprenticeship program where we are training 4 young men in ministry. Their names are Alexis, Bryand, Jefferson and Luis. These young men have proven themselves in their commitment to the church and are zealous to serve Christ. Some are considering full-time pastoral ministry and others are pursuing careers but commited to serving the church in ministry. We would like to enable them to dedicate concentrated time in ministry in the church and study by providing a stipend for them. Please pray for our program that we would succesfully prepare these men and also please consider contributing to support this. We aim to raise $330/month per apprentice for 2 years. Please consider helping us provide this by donating here and writing in the additional comments: Arevalo Apprentices We saved the best prayer request for last! This one is not a fund request but an announcement and request for prayer. We are excited to announce the expectation of another baby!  Megumi is due to give birth to our fourth child early October. Please especially pray for the delivery as we are planning to stay here in Trujillo for the birth. Make a gift! Did someone share this email with you? Sign up to receive more of our emails.  P.O. Box 25912 | Greenville, SC 29616 | 864.735.8267

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Email Update from July 28, 2016

Hello from Peru!  How can you be praying for us? We want to take a moment to let you know how thankful we are for having you on our support team. Here are a few updates from the last months as we serve in Trujillo, Peru. Family Meg and the baby girl are due October 9. We are planning to stay here in Trujillo. Please pray for God's grace, health for both, and good medical care. Please also pray for a few couples with whom Meg and I are doing pre-marriage counseling. May the Lord bless and form families that will glorify him. We have had a very busy month with several short-term teams helping with the work. Youth Retreat and Missions Conference Today, as this email arrives in your mailbox, we are on our way to a retreat with the young adult ministry  July 28-30 (Peruvian Independence day), we will be speaking on going deeper in the gospel. The theme of the retreat is "Further up and further in." Some of the other pastors and I will be working through the Evangelism Explosion outline and tying it in with Ephesians. Please pray that God will work in the lives of many visitors that are not yet professing faith.  We are also planning a missions conference, July 30 and 31 with the entire church. Pray that the attendants will be motivated to participate in missions. Apprenticeship Four young men are participating in the apprenticeship program at the church: Luis, Jefferson and Bryand (full time) and Alexis  (part-time; full-time architect student). Please pray that they will continue to grow in grace and wisdom and that the Lord will confirm His call on their lives. Luis recently was ordained as a deacon in our church. Pray for our young deacons that they would humbly carry out their role faithfully as they grow in spiritual maturity.  Morning devotionals, led by the apprentices and pastors, are held every morning with school and medical clinic staff. We have begun working through the book The Peacemaker by Ken Sande. Pray that these devotionals would be instrumental in unifying the employees and deepening their understanding of the gospel. Food Fair celebrating Independence Day at Geneva School Geneva School Continue praying for improvement and growth. Several parents of students are in the new members’ class of our church. We give thanks to God that we received the approval to begin 1st and 2nd grade for the 2017 school year. The classrooms for these grades are yet to be built. Ideally they need to be finished by September or October to accommodate summer session classes. Looking at our financial situation mid-year we have calculated the actual cost per child. Being in a lower income neighborhood, we charge only S./120 ($37) monthly when it actually costs S./ 207 ($63) per child on an extremely tight budget. The school is highly dependent on donations given to Peru Mission to the compassion fund.   Pray for Funds for and rapid construction of classrooms Funds for covering the difference between tuition and actual cost per child.  Increased enrollment for the 2017 school year Please consider donating to Geneva School and/or the apprenticeship program in Arevalo. Did someone share this email with you? Sign up to receive more of our emails.  P.O. Box 25912 | Greenville, SC 29616 | 864.735.8267

Peru MissionP.O. Box 25912Greenville, SC 29616 Unsubscribe {Email Address} Update Profile | About our service provider Sent by stuartmills@perumission.org in collaboration with Try it free today

Greetings from Louisiana!

     Yes we are in Zachary, LA! It has been over two years since we have been back for Christmas so we decided to come back this year to spend the holidays with family and take time to recharge. We plan to return to Peru December 31st to be back in time for our summer camp event the first week in January.  We will have two more years on this term before we come back for home assignment in 2018.

     I regret not sending out a newsletter sooner but with all the busyness in the church and school and preparing to leave we failed to send out our newsletter until now. Please keep praying for the ministries and pleading with God to bear fruit from all the labor of proclaiming Christ crucified and resurrected. 

These last few months have been packed.

     Pastor Ricardo had a hernia operation late October. I filled in for him preaching morning and evening in November so he could recover and also take a little bit of time to sharpen the saw. Please pray for his continued recovery. He is back in full swing with the work. Pastor Percy's mother passed away Nov. 21 and Ricardo stepped back in a week early to help fill in at Cristo Redentor. In Cristo Restaurdor in the Arevalo neighborhood, we had a congregational meeting Nov. 29 and received nominations for 7 potential officers. Please pray for these men and for the officer training that we will start when I get back in January. 

     Several leaders of the young adults ministry are filling in for me while I am gone. We have had several new visitors the last few weeks. One of the young adults is leading the adolescent ministry and growing in leaps and bounds in his faith.

     In the middle of October we had a week long seminar with Rev. Dr. Rodney Wood training us to train expository preachers. It proved to be a great encouragement to all of us. As soon as the seminar ended a group of ladies from Tupelo, MS and the Dominican Republic held a women’s retreat Friday and Saturday which ended with an evangelistic meeting Sunday evening. Both of these events were a good shot in the arm for our churches and pastors. 

     It seems that the previous several months we have had a slump in our church attendance.  Pastor Ricardo, Pastor Percy and I have been meeting with each of the members to encourage them and find out how they are in their relationship with God. Please pray for us and for the church members to grow in grace and understanding of Christ's love in such a way that it will compel us all to more evangelism. Many of the members are begging for us to come visit them to encourage them but don't come to be fed at the regular services nor are they reading their Bibles on their own. Please pray for us to be more clear in our teaching of the gospel. 

    As for the regular ministry in the church: There are several young couples that Meg and I are counseling. We will start pre-marriage counseling with one couple in January and also counselling another couple that are close to getting engaged. There are several young men that are rotating to teach the bible studies. We are also doing an apprenticeship study with a group of men in the church. We worked through two books on leadership and also The Peacemaker by Ken Sande. One of the men will teach The Peacemaker in Sunday School the next two months. Several young adults are teaching the children Sunday school classes. Meg has been teaching the toddler Sunday school class.

    The woodworkers are doing well. Ford Franklin is an intern from Pear Orchard in Jackson, MS and has been working with them these last few months. They just delivered an order from two former interns who are trying to start a business selling their products. Look for Black Palm products. Please pray for one of the carpenters and his family, they are having problems with his step son. The Bible studies with a mechanic have also been going well. The other day he told me that he is understanding more and more and that once a week is not enough, he wants me to teach them twice a week now. God is waking up a hunger for His Word! 

    Lastly and most urgent, pray for the school that started this year with our church, Geneva School. Meg is now the President of the board and is doing a great job trying to get things in order. The first school year ended with several complicated challenges. This led to one pastoral case that I asked for prayer about last week please keep praying. Please pray for finding a new director, a couple of new teachers and God's direction and blessing to allow the school to become sustainable. Please also pray for our family and a healthy balance of all the responsibilities.

May His Kingdom Come!

Stuart and Meg (Satomi, Samuel and Ezra) Mills 

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Ramblings

Sometimes I find myself getting frustrated with my brothers and sisters because they don't pursue God. I wonder if I am being like a gardener who gets frustrated that the plants don't go water themselves or a shepherd who gets frustrated that the sheep don't lead themselves to pasture. But does God really want Christians to stay so needy and not grow to maturity?

A veces siento que me frustra los hermanos que no buscan a Dios por si mismos. Pero me pregunto si es que estoy como un jardinero que se frustra porque las plantas no se riegan a si mismos o un pastor que se frustra porque las ovejas no se llevan a pastorear. ¿Pero realmente quiere Dios que los Cristianos quedan tan necesitados y no crecen en madurez?


I need an app or blog that will allow me to post something with a link to click to show either english or spanish.
Necesito una manera publicar con el link de escoger cual lengua mostrar lo que publico.

Notas de una predica de 20 de Abril

Jesus es el buen Pastor que da su vida por nosotros

Introducción:

Uno de mis favoritos pasajes es cuando Jesús sana el ciego en Juan 9…

El contexto mas amplio es de que Jesus responde a los fariseos que no saben que son ciegos cuando rechacen a Jesus. 

El responde diciendo que es el portero del redil de las ovejas y también que es la puerta de las ovejas. Sigue diciendo en nuestro pasaje que es el buen pastor. Después de nuestro pasaje dice que los suyos le escuchen y que es uno con su Padre y por eso querían apedrearle. 

El punto principal aqui es que Jesus es el único pastor que da su vida por todo los suyos de su propio poder. 

Ezequiel 34 es un ejemplo de los mal pastores que no cuiden el redil y de la profecía que Jesus cumple la promesa del buen pastor quien venia en nombre del Hijo de David. Salmo 23 del mismo David es un ejemplo de como es el buen pastor.

1.Jesus no huye, mas da su vida por nosotros

Explicar: 

Él no busca lo suyo como los demás como un asalariado. Como en Ezequiel 34 Jesus no apaciente a si mismo. El cuando viene el peligro si afrenta y guarda. Pero aquí mas habla Jesus de la copa de la ira del Padre que tomó en la cruz. Jesus dio su vida por nosotros. Cuando dice los asalariados refiere a todos demás que no son Él. Jesus es el único verdadero Pastor. Todo los demás que quieren ser líderes no son de verdad. Aquí habla de el Joseph Smith, habla de Mohamed, hablad del este Coreano Moon. No hay ni un otra pastor de sus ovejas. Todos buscan a si mismo pero Jesus es quien dio su vida por nosotros y quien es nuestro buen Pastor verdadero.

Ilustrar:  

Si usted fue encargado de guardar 50 millones de dollars y viene una banda con armas a ti, cuantos de ustedes le entregaría. 

Si fuere tu propio dinero cuantos de ustedes pelearía. 

Pero, mas profundo si fuere tu hija, ¿quien no pelearía hasta la muerte por tu hija? Así Cristo muestra que él nos cuida así. Jesus es nuestro pastor como nuestro padre y él no nos abandona.

Aplicar: El punto de Jesus es que podemos confiar en él por la vida. No nos prometió que no permitiera que moramos pero si nos prometió que esta con nosotros para siempre y que nos da vida eterna. Mateo 10:24-33. Igual como el da su vida por nosotros a veces tenemos que dar nuestra vida por él, como nuestros hermanos en el Medio Este sufriendo persecución y muriendo como mártires.  Jesus no les falló. La promesa de Jesus de ser nuestro pastor es algo mas profundo que solo a este vida de tener tranquilidad. Nos promete algo mas eterno y mas grande en la resurrección y la nueva Tierra. Pero si le podemos confiar que nunca nos faltará y que nunca nos falle haste la muerte. Hay mas en la vida que el temporal de la muerte. 

¿Confías usted en Jesus o dudas como Judas o los fariseos?

Sí Jesus nos cuida como el buen Pastor y le podemos confiar.

2.Jesus nos conoce como le conoce el Padre

Explicar: Salmo 139. Él nos conoce mas que nosotros conocemos a nosotros mismos. Dice también en el versículo siguiente de Juan 10:25-30. explica como el nos conoce y nosotros le conocemos y por eso entendemos. Si no le obedecemos significa que no le conocemos.

Ilustrar: Juan 17. Jesus pide que nosotros conozcamos a el Padre como a él. 

Yo conozco a mi esposa y a mis hijos. en otra manera conozco a la mayoría de ustedes. Cuando alguien postula para un nuevo trabajo, normalmente pide referencias. Normalmente esos referencias deben ser alguien que le conoce bien. Escuche alguien decir que ha recibido una llamada de una iglesia para ser referencia de un aplicante pero el que recibió la llamada ni recordaba quien era… Fue un mal decision poner a él como su referencia porque no le conocía bien. Al contrario un amigo mío quien es pastor me llamo para preguntar de mi primo Daniel porque le consideraba pedir trabajar como ayudante de los adolescentes en su iglesia. Yo di un buen referencia porque le conozco muy bien.  

Aplicar: Cuanto mas que Jesus nos conoce y nosotros le conocemos y que el nos da conexión con el Padre. La pregunta es que le conoces o no?  Si no conversas con él por su palabra o por oración o por su cuerpo, la iglesia. ¿como le puedes conocer?  Si somos de él, él nos conoce pero si no, no.  (rf. El llamamiento eficaz)  

¿Como de usted? ¿Le conoces o no?

Sí Jesus nos conoce y nosotros conocemos a Él.

3.Jesus busca los perdidos

Explicar: a los Gentiles ejemplo los Griegos en Juan 12:20-23. No habla de los Mormones. Dice que sea un pastor y un redil. Él incluye a los otros con el mismo cuerpo no que va a tener otro redil aparte. 

Ilustrar: la oveja perdida Mateo 18:10-14. Cuando trabajaba con el campamento y tenia la carga de un grupo de niños siempre andaba contando todos para evitar que no falta uno. Igual Jesus hace a nosotros.

Aplicar: 

¿Como es que a nosotros con nuestra iglesia hay bastante miembros que no acercan al redil los domingos? ¿Ocaso que Jesus falta a buscar los suyos? El buen pastor siempre busca a los suyos. ¿Siempre cae a los hombros del pastor a recoger los miembros que faltan? Si lo hacemos. El martes pasado sí hemos salido buscando a varios. Siempre salimos buscando pero muchas veces no les encontramos. Seguro que nos hace falta en la obra y siempre buscamos hacer mejor. Pero también necesitamos ayuda. ¿Donde esta la responsabilidad de cada oveja? No hay un parte que la oveja debe buscar a Jesus también? A nosotros Jesus nos ha dado la conciencia que nos fastidia cuando alejamos de él. En otro lado vemos que Dios nos permite hacer nuestro libre albedrío. Nos permite alejarnos por un tiempo para enseñar algo como Jonás.

Pero desvío en hablar de los miembros. Jesus aquí esta hablando de los que están lejos, como los que todavía no están en el redil aunque son suyos. Aquí habla de la predestinación. Dice que el tiene otros que no son. Jesus mando sus pastores que les busca. Jesus manda a los misioneros y evangelistas que vayan buscando a los que no han escuchado de él. Jesus dio esta carga a nosotros en La gran comisión, Mateo 28:19 También dio la obra de pastorear a las ovejas en Juan 21:15-19: Apacienta a mis ovejas. ¿Como participamos con él en su obra que nos a llamado hacer?

Si Jesus nos buscó y nos mando a ir buscando a los otros.

Conclusion: La Resurrección es el plan del Padre

Terminando el pasaje de 17-18. Mas profundamente no es una comparación del mal pastor o del buen pastor. Es una explicación de que él es el único para la salvación, es el propietario de las ovejas.

vv.17-18. Porque el es el buen pastor que da su vida para volverla a tomar 

el Padre le ama

el es poderoso para poner su vida y volverla a tomar

La Resurrección era parte del plan de Padre desde el inicio y que el cumplió 

le anuncio antes para que sepan que no era un fracaso que murió Jesus

todo su muerte y su resurrección fue parte del plan de Dios en ser el buen pastor para rescatar a sus ovejas por medio de morir en la cruz y resucitar de la muerte.

Jesus dio su vida por nosotros. Necesitamos creerle para conocerle cuando nos llama.  Aquí hoy día, él nos llama venir delante de él y confiar en él y conocerle. Nuestro buen Pastor.