May 8, 2007

His house is full Sunday after Sunday

Twenty years of terrorism and seventy thousand people dead has left an ugly scar in the face of this town where we live, which was the epicenter of violence, terror, heartache and bitterness in Peru.

Whoever was the "who is who" of Huanta had no choice but to "leave town before sun down" in order to survive, "thus the ancient boundaries were removed," and where there are no boundaries there is disorder and lawlessness.

With the capture of its leaders, terrorism has subsided for a time. But now the U.S. State Department has publicly issued in the news papers that the Shining Path Terrorism is back in Peru.

If that is true; it arrives to Huanta in the midst of heavy drug trafficking where a new generation of thugs have discovered that the arm of the law is not that long and its muscles are not that strong.

The terrorist activity has left behind a culture of violence where the far gone conclusion of the people is that "you can actually get a way with murder."

That is because many innocent people are dead, the guilty are free and justice is weak and corrupt, to say the least. There are four-hundred gangs members in Huanta and one thousand gangs members in Ayacucho, a bigger town one hour away.

The biggest money making occupation in Huanta is drug trafficking. The jungle is near Huanta and cocaine has to go through Huanta by all kinds of means.

Mansions are being built all over. Businesses are being created only to launder money.

Over night fiestas are held all over town with any pretext. The results are crime, rape, theft, violence and corruption.

The absence of the father figures, the role models and the conservative branch which is necessary in every society, has halted the continuity of family values and civic progress.

It is in this kind of vacuum that a group of young people who believed in mentoring or discipleship we decided to form a congregation named: "The Carpenter of Nazareth" who in four years have formed five other congregations and are determined to build one or more every year.

So a flower is born in a Swamp, thanks to your prayers and encouragement! Yes, it has to be your prayers!! How else can we explain life and beauty in the midst of ugliness and opposition!

It is the kind of opposition that III John and Jude talk about (please read it), ungodly men who infiltrate the churches with the purpose of dividing, and leading the weak stray; men who have taken the way of Cain; a shepherd who feeds only himself; clouds without rain; twice dead; wondering starts; for whom the blackest darkness has been deserved for ever; men of harsh speech; men who are grumblers and foul-finders who follow their own desire; they boast about themselves and flatter others for their own advantage.

But our Lord did not leave us without an encouraging warning, "In the last days there will be scoffers who will follow their own desire…these are the men who follow their natural instincts and do not have the Spirit."

In this kind of situation where giving up is not an option for a "man with a call," one must exercise discipline base on wisdom from above, clothed with love and compassion and soaked with tears. Remembering always the Master's instruction in Jude 22, "Be merciful to those who doubt. Snatch others from the fire and save them. To others show mercy mixed with fear."

We are extremely please to report to you that several who went stray are returning in the same fashion as the prodigal son with great tears and repentance and public testimonies of reconciliation .

Lately we had the case of four women coming back with four babies out of wedlock. This is not the ideal way for the Church to Grow, But we will take them as they come. It seem that our bucket had a hole, but somehow the water remains full to the brim.

"His house is full Sunday after Sunday"

As for us, we are loved by many and disliked by some, just like in III John vs.9, "Diotrephes who lover to be first will have nothing to do with us … but gossip."

We are here for the sake of the Name. We love our work and are willing with God's grace to be "broken bread and poured out wine for the sake of the elect."

John, Jude and even Jesus had their problems with opposition . "If the world hates you, remember they hated me first"…"if the dogs bark is a sign that we are advancing."

"Lord, keep me from still waters that hide danger, for from the white waters I will take care myself. From the invisible enemies only your prayers can help us. We do covet your prayers.

As Oswald Chambers said "The almighty interaction of God on other lives (is) answer to prayer based on Redemption, not to prayer based on human sympathy or human plaintiveness." When we pray on the fundamental basis of the Redemption, our prayers are made efficacious by the personal presence of the Holy Ghost who makes real in us what Jesus did for us. How God answers prayers is a mystery that logic can not penetrate, but that he does work in answering prayers is gloriously true.

So it is in that confidence in your prayers which is a safety net under our lives that we joyfully leap trustingly every day on your behalf as your representative and dear friends and partners of the King and his Kingdom.

Gerry, Ruthie and Benjie Gutierrez

His House is full Sunday after Sunday