We've begun a bible study at El Naranjal!

This past Sunday Greg and I went out to Naranjal to begin a bible study in the community. For the past few months a couple of people have approached us to express their interest in studying the bible with us. In truth I thought maybe five or ten people at the most would be interested. We finally got to the point where we were ready to begin so last week we told Benito (community president) that we wanted to have the study on Sunday. He suggested we come out at 7:30 and he would let those interested know. Well things never quite happen like we think they will. Knowing how notoriously late Peruvians are we decided not to show up until 8. We have always been perfectly on time before and have always had to wait so we thought this thirty minutes would be no big deal. Well of course everyone had showed up at 7 ready to go! Since we were so 'late' in coming they decided to get some work done while they waited. When we arrived everyone was there waiting on us. Benito failed to mention the reason for the meeting, I think, so everyone showed up thinking it was a required meeting.

Greg made sure to communicate that no one should feel obliged to study just because we are helping the community so we probably won't have everyone there again (22 showed up) but I expect a pretty good crowd. Everyone there expressed their gratitude for us coming and there seems to be some genuine interest. We're excited to be out there more often as we'll have the chance to keep developing relationships and we love getting 'out' of the city. Check back in a few weeks for pictures and a report from our second study!