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Reflections from March

Greetings friends,

We are blessed and thankful to update you with what has happened in March.  After the team from Global Tribes Outreach left, we took a trip back to the Iquitos/Nauta area of Peru to visit friends there. It was great to reconnect but it also was a time of reflection, at least for me, as I contemplated on why things didn’t work out for us to return to the place that we felt called to when we first went to Peru in 2017. 

Toward the end of our trip we visited with the David Mahone family in Iquitos and I aired this question with him. He simply said, “the call is not the destination.” It impacted me and I have contemplated this a lot. So I put this image together to help me remember it. What do you think about this statement? Send me your reply please.

We had a great time revisiting the orphanage and reconnecting. We spent part of a day there reconnecting with staff and the kids that are there. Lots of changes. It was a little sad to see the chicken project not functioning. It had so much potential. But a highlight for me was to see they now have a carpenter shop there and are making caskets to sell. It had been a dream of mine (except for the  making the caskets part) to have a shop there to teach some of the boys.

We stayed with Joel, Amy, and Carmen McGee in Nauta.. We learned to know them just before we left the jungle in 2018. I helped him replace a well pump that was stolen on their mission property that they are developing for a vocational training center.  We also passed on to them the “blessing suitcase” full of goodies that we had received from our friends in the states last October. We had great fun buying stuff and packing it for them and then seeing their happiness as they went through it.

Please pray with us for peace in Peru. Politically things are kind of rocky right now.

Please pray with us for the renewal of our visas. We started the paperwork but anything could happen.

Pray for the second marriage seminar classes we will be teaching at Jose Olaya starting this month.

Blessings, 

Stan & Ruth

P.S. Don’t forget to comment on the thought that the call that God gives is not a destination where we arrive at. Have you had a similar experience?

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The marriage class is finished! Ruth & I both were sick in January so we were not able to finish the marriage class until last month (February). The last session was a review of the previous sessions. Each couple signed a commitment that doubled as a certificate, committing to keep God central in their marriages. 

Last month we announced the birth of Eliot Samuel – parents Efraín and Mariel. We have claimed Eliot as a grand-baby! We were able to hold him for the first time this month! Cautions were being taken because of Covid circulating again.

This month plans fell together rather quickly for a team from GTO (Global Tribes Outreach) to come and help us for 3 weeks. Lexi, Alexis, and Cherise helped with cooking and baking, making baby cribs, and helping others in the community. 

They took turns sharing their testimony at the youth meeting 3 different weeks.

They also went along for the first joint-service at Apipa, a poorer community on the outskirts of Arequipa. It was a small church – now it is smaller since the landlord threw them out of their church building. Right now they are having church in the yard of one of the brothers there. Pray for wisdom for us to know how much to involve ourselves there. We are already feeling spread quite thin. 

Please continue praying for the spiritual health of the church that meets in our house. 

Pray for wisdom for the church as they contemplate helping with an outreach in Apipa.

Pray for those who are participating in the workshops. Also pray that God would send people to help us in this ministry.

Praise God for the relationships we’ve been able to establish through these workshops.

Praise God for the donation of money we received which allowed us to fulfill an order for baby cribs.

Blessings, 

Stan & Ruth

Dear friends,

This verse from Isaiah 43 is fitting in several ways for this month. Of course it’s Valentine month, but it also is the theme verse of the first episode of the series “The Chosen”. He has called us, intimately, by the special name He has given us, and claims us for His own!  

We started showing these movies as a way to occupy some of the youth that were hanging out in the church that is in our house on Sunday evening. Now it has developed into a mini-service where we have a time of worship, a discussion on the Bible characters and the story presented in the movie, and then of course the movie and the popcorn. This makes our Sundays really full as we have a service at 11am in our house, a service at 4:30 pm at the church in Jose Olaya, and then back to our house for the movie service at 7:00 pm. 

In December we celebrated our 27^th wedding anniversary. Willie & Nancy, the local pastor and his wife, took us out for lunch to celebrate. Nancy is from an Andean mountain village several hours away. She brought her dress outfit for special occasions along and had Ruth dress up in it. Several days later Ruth and I took a small get-a-way trip to the same area, Colca Canyon to celebrate our 25^th as we had not been able to celebrate it in 2019. Colca Canyon is one of the world’s deepest canyons – over twice as deep as the Grand Canyon, and a well known place to see the world’s largest flying bird, the Andean Condor. What a blessing to have a beautiful place like this literally at our back door!

We finished up our marriage classes at the end of January, a little later than we had planned. Covid Omicron variant swept through Arequipa in mid January and into February along with the regular colds and flu that comes along with the rainy season here. Ruth and I both got sick with something so that pushed the class ending back. Many people in our neighborhood were sick, too,  but wouldn’t get tested because that would force them into quarantine and they would not be able to work. While many churches closed again for several weeks, the church in our house remained open. It’s a blessing to see this group’s faith, advancing the kingdom in spite of Covid.

Baby Eliot Samuel was born in late January to Efraín and Mariel, our “adopted” children from Venezuela. They migrated to Arequipa the same year we came to Peru and don’t have any family here so we have become close friends. I made them a changing table/dresser for the baby as well as a crib that came from our workshop. Armond had made this crib for another family, but they ended up moving away before they needed it.

Thank you for your interest in the ministry here. Some things you can join us in prayer about:

• Our paperwork from the states that we need to extend our visa is being delayed. Pray that it will come through so we don’t have to make an extra trip to the states next month.
• Another church has asked for the marriage seminar. Pray for wisdom and the ability to communicate the message clearly.
• Pray that God would supply a speaker from the states for special meetings in September.

Blessings, Stan & Ruth

Dear friends,

We are thinking of you this Holiday Season and wishing you God’s blessings. We helped the church Esperanza de Vida’s youth do a musical featuring Jesus from his birth to his resurrection in 10 minutes! I think you might enjoy it even though it is in Spanish (English subtitles). Here is a link to it.

Wishing you God’s blessings this holiday season,

Stan & Ruth Schrock

The months are flying by and already it’s time to write about what has been happening last month. We are heavily involved in several churches. In September, the church that is meeting in our house asked Ruth and I to do a marriage seminar. We have not done anything like this before and our Spanish is not that good, so we turned them down for a month or so. But they kept asking. God started convicting me with the story of Moses, how he gave the excuse that “he couldn’t speak” and God asked him, “who made man’s mouth.” So I gave in and told them that we would but that I needed 4 weeks prep time between classes. I did not have much material for this class in Spanish so I knew it would all be from scratch. And there are cultural martial differences that also add to the difficulty of this subject.

And then God sent an “Aaron & Miriam”, a Venezuelan couple that have a background in counseling to help us. So starting the first week in November we started a marriage class. We knew that 4 weeks apart was not ideal before we started and after the first week we decided it wasn’t going to work. So we have classes every other week. Efraín and Mariel have been a huge blessing helping us in correcting our Spanish, knowing the hot topics in marriage for the culture, and being an encouragement to us when in reality, they could probably teach it better. We plan on having a total of six sessions with the last one being a special one for the couples.

Are workshops are also open! We call them “Talleres en Acción” or Workshops in Action. Ruth has several a week, teaching neighbor girls and youth from the church how to bake. The pastor’s wife has also been coming along. The time they are waiting for the cakes and cookies to bake is used for discipleship. The other week one of the girls who was dealing with a lot of depreciation, mainly because of the pandemic, gave her heart to the Lord! Its great to see God working through the workshops already.

I’m teaching one student in the carpentry shop. I have others that have asked but with the teaching load and other responsibilities, I just don’t have the time. I hope that after the holidays I’ll be able to take on several more students.

We also celebrated Thanksgiving with different US missionaries and their families in our house. Some had not celebrated it for several years US style. Other missionaries are such a blessing and an encouragement to us.

Prayer Request

• Pray for the marriage classes.
• Pray for the workshops and the students.
• Pray for Camila, the young girl that just received Jesus.

Christmas blessings,

Stan & Ruth Schrock

Here is a link to a short video about our work here in Peru.

October 1^st, the day Stan and I had been looking forward to for a long time. Denver along with 5 others arrived from the states. It was great having a bunch of youth around. Everyone did so well with pitching in and helping wherever they could.

After they were here a few days we all went to Cusco for 3 days to visit one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world, Machu Picchu. It was amazing! Nothing could have prepared us for this experience. We toured various Inca ruins, learned how to shop for alpaca clothing and ate at some great restaurants. It was the beginning of rainy season in Cusco so it rained some every day. I think everyone was glad to get back to Arequipa.

Besides touring, they helped out with cleaning the Jose Olaya church and getting it ready to open, painting the roof of our house to waterproof it for the rainy season, etc. The church that meets in our garage, Esperanza de Vida, also enjoyed the teaching they gave both Sundays that they were here. David, Denver and Caleb all shared during the 2 Sundays that they were here. The church is asking for
Bible teachers to come and share. (Maybe that is something that you would be interested in doing.) Anyway, their time here went way too fast.

The Sunday the group went back to the states, the church at Jose Olaya opened its doors. What a joy it has been to reconnect with people. For some of them it was the first time we had seen them in person for 18 months! The attendance has been very good with more and more young people coming as well.

My plan has been to teach some baking skills. One day Nancy, a friend and neighbor, asked if I would teach her to bake. So one afternoon we got together to bake cookies and cupcakes. We really enjoyed our time together and it was rewarding to see her sample her own results with great pleasure! She had no idea she could freeze cookies so she was delighted that she could keep them in her fridge freezer ans share them as the opportunity arose.

Another thing we accomplished in October was that the brothers form the church helped move Stan’s tools from the old small location to our place. He has been arranging things, wiring lights and getting things ready to teach woodworking.

Prayer Request

• Pray for the churches as they continue to open for worship
• Pray for the workshops and the people we reach through them
• Pray for the marriage class that we are teaching

Blessings, Stan and Ruth

Dear friends,

The month of September was very busy. Not only were we preparing for Denver and a group of friends from the states to visit us in October (more on their visit next newsletter), we also did a lot of fixing up on our garage to get it ready for a new church!

Last newsletter I reported how that Ruth and I were invited to a church that was meeting in a house across the road from our house. We eagerly accepted the invitation to have church in person because Christians in Action did not have any plans at that time to open their doors. We were overwhelmed emotionally to have church with Peruvian believers for the first time in a year and a half!

They were meeting in a living room of the pastor’s house. From the first Sunday they were already praying that God would provide a bigger place. We watched as the attendance grew from around 15 the first Sunday to around 20 the second Sunday, and 24 the third. From the first Sunday, Ruth and I were both struck with the thought that maybe this is why God miraculously provided us with our BIG house.

So after 3 weeks of praying and considering how it would impact our private lives, we decided to offer the use of our garage to the church La Esperanza de Vida. I approached Pastor Willie about the idea, thinking that they would want to consider it and talk it over with the others. But immediately he was excited about it and talked to the other leaders. They all trooped over to our house that morning to take a look.

The garage was a mess! It still had several hundred bricks and about 4 ton of sand left in it. But they saw it as a miracle, as an answer to their prayers. They immediately organized a work day for the following Saturday, bought material (besides the sand) to pour the floor, installed ceramic, bought decorations and installed a sign. The following Sunday we had church in our house!

Several days later Ruth and I were talking with Pastor Jose. He told us that a missionary that he was working with returned to the states in 2016. He immediately started praying that God would send someone else. That was the year Ruth and I felt the call of God to come to Peru!

In life, we often cannot see what God has planned for us, we just need to take the next step in faith. And then sometimes God gives us a gift, in the glimpses of the past, where we can see Him working it all out!

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

The church Esperanza de Vida is asking for help! They would love to have someone come and do some intense Bible teaching. Is God asking you to come for a week to teach?
▻ Pray that God would send Bible teachers.
▻ Pray for the marriage classes that Ruth and I will soon be starting.
▻ Pray for the church Esperanza de Vida and the pastors Jose Choque and Pastor Willie.

Blessings,
Stan and Ruth Schrock

A note to clarify the following September newsletter:

This was the newsletter that we sent out in September. October Newsletter will come out tomorrow. I realized that when I went to post October’s, I had forgotten to post September. Sorry that the news is old. Also, each newsletter is a reflection of things that happened the PREVIOUS month. Maybe I should rename them Reflections from______ to give more clarity. Anyway, thanks for understanding.

Dear friends,

We are so grateful for the time we spent in the United States from the middle of May to the Middle of July. We were able to see many of you and your encouragement was a big blessings. Upon our return, we immediately set to work getting ready to move to our new house. Many of our household items we purchase used from a missionary family that returned to England. Some of the youth group from José Olaya church helped with loading and unloading the truck. We hope to move the workshop ministry soon.

Something that really bothers Ruth and I is how slow the churches are to reopen here in Arequipa. The Covid-19 infection levels are lower then they ever have been. The government has allowed gatherings since the first of the year and yet the fear and caution among the believers, even in the leadership is troubling. But there is good news! The leadership of José Olaya met for the first time in person in August! It was an emotional time as we talked about the blessing that we are all alive and could meet together.

We have noticed that many are hungry for fellowship. One of the reasons for our move was so that we could open our home for hospitality to others. Since we have moved, hardly a week goes by that someone does not stop in. We have also restarted a game afternoon where we interact with people playing games and are considering a video teaching night.

We were invited to a church that IS meeting in a house right across the road from us. It was a REALLY special time for us to meet together for worship with other Peruvian believers for the first time in over 1.5 years!

They already are involving us in teaching and preaching. My first thoughts were “Lord, I can’t speak the language well enough”, and God immediately brought to my mind the story of Moses and how that he made a similar statement. So when I do, the Holy Spirit is definitely going to need to anoint my tongue because on my own I really can’t do it.

Pray with us:

• that God would use our home for encouraging others and diminishing their fears
• for the believers and leaders of the churches of Christians in Action that they would focus more on Jesus and less on the troubled waters around them
• for the new church start-up across the road from us, La Esperanza de Vida, that it truly would bring the Hope of Life to this neighborhood

Blessings,

Stan & Ruth Schrock

We just had a fundraiser for the workshop ministry in our home area. The newsletter below is pretty much what we had at the fundraiser. We are extending it 10 days for our online friends. If you would like to contribute to this project send your contribution to the address on the brochure. Funds that arrive before July 7th we will dedicate to this project.

Blessings,

Stan & Ruth