Great View: not of the city, though

I just returned from a couple of days in Lima, the capital of Peru. My teammate, Craig, and I had a couple of tickets for a conference we were to attend. Well, the conference was cancelled and Craig and I were looking at losing the tickets, so we decided to use them and take advantage of the time to get away from Arequipa to get certain things done.

Note: we have nothing against Arequipa, but if you are close to a phone, someone will find you and you'll never get anything done!

Contrary to many people's thinking, South American coastal cities are not all beautiful, colonial style, palm-trees-by-the-white-beach paradises. Lima is a massive city with a high degree of poverty. As you fly into Lima-Callao airport the sight that greets you are dirty factories, warehouses and partially finished brick buildings. To add to the "charm", at this time of year (June through September) the clouds close in and hang close to the ground. There is no sun until October and there is a constant, cold damp feeling in the air. Really, the view isn't great at all. Our view wasn't that great.

The view that was fantastic was the view we got of church. Craig and I were able to sit down and truly evaluate how El Camino is doing. We sat most of Monday at a street café in Miraflores drinking great coffee and working through an evaluation of each ministry. In between we walked around the historic district and enjoyed some sights worth seeing in Lima.

There is much to praise God about in El Camino. People's lives are changing. More are coming to church and to the different programs. Leaders are stepping up. On the other side, there is still much immaturity. Immaturity in that people are very slow to move to service on their own, slow to trust God in everything. They continue to make huge issues out of small problems and communication is a tremendous challenge for many.

Then, on Tuesday we were able to sit in the pastors' meeting at the Christian Bible Church of La Molina and hear how God has been working there. We encouraged the pastors and prayed with them in their many challenges.

The view was great: the view of God's work in people's lives. We were hoping God would have given us a better view of the city :-)

Brad