Consumed With Longing for the Word of God

Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.

Psalm 119:18

In this longest chapter in the Bible, we find great praise to God for his Word, the Bible. Psalm 119 has 176 verses with a primary focus on the greatness of the law, testimonies, precepts, statutes, commandments, rules, and words of God. It is and immense work that can be meditated on for a lifetime without exhausting it's content. Charles Spurgeon wrote 349 pages on this Psalm alone in his Treasury of David. In the 18^th verse of this Psalm, the Psalmist begs for his eyes to be open so that he may behold wondrous things out of the law of God. He has a passion in his pursuit to know God through his Word. His soul is consumed with longing for the Word (v.20), he delights in his testimonies and seeks council from them (v.24), his soul longs for the words of life (v.25), he meditates on the wondrous works of God (v.27), and he clings to the testimonies of God (v.31). He begs God to teach him (v.33), give him understanding (v.34), lead him (v.35), incline his heart (v.36), turn his eyes from worthless things (v.37), confirm his promise (v.38), and to turn him away reproach (v.39). He longs for the precepts of God and the life that comes from them. His attitude toward the Word of God leads him to trust in his Word (v.42). Is this our attitude toward the Word of God? Do we hunger and thirst for is? Do we long to read it the moment we wake up each morning? How different would our lives be if our attitude was like the Psalmist's? How much would we be transformed to the Bible if we passionately pursed understanding it. Meditating on the word should only drive us deeper into the Word. The more we read the Bible, the more we will want to. Today we must be resolved to cry out to God to open our eyes, to give us a longing for the Word so that we delight in it and are changed by it. Our soul must long for the very words of life more than our body longs for food.

The Fire - Nate Pfeil

I watched this many years ago and just saw that it resurfaced so I had to share it.  It is such a powerful message that should wake people up to reality.  Only 12 minutes.

A Year in Cusco

As I arrived to meet with my friend Rony for our weekly Bible study, I found that his mom and two brothers were there.  Rony's mom is Quechua and she is very funny and kind.  I'm not sure how old she is but she looks old and probably is only around four and half feet tall.  She is busy and a hard worker.  She talks a hundred miles per hour in a mixture of Quechua and Spanish, often switching languages every other sentence.  Rony often explains to his mom the errors of her ways concerning God and teaches her what I have been teaching him.  The long conversation of this day was about chickens and eggs.  Rony's mom was convinced that her chicken eggs were worth more money because her chickens only lay a couple eggs every three days.  Rony was telling her that she could buy chickens that would lay a couple eggs every day but she was not convinced.  As the deep conversation about chickens and eggs proceed in two different languages, I started to think of how far we have come over the last two years and how much our lives have changed.

 

It is hard to believe that we arrived in Cusco exactly one year ago.  We have been out of the States for over two years now.  As I think about this, I'm amazed at how good God is, how He has cared for us so well,  and how comfortable we are living in Peru.  It seems that we are as much at home in Cusco as we are in the States.  As we seek to buy land and build a house, we confirm that we have no exit plan.  We have learned to depend on God so much and we have seen Him work in so many different ways in our lives, that we would never change anything if we could.  The church is advancing slowly as we are established and the work in the jungle keeps increasing with every trip.  I can think of nothing else that I would rather do.  Each morning I wake up, I look out the window and thank God for another day in Peru and pray that he will give us many more here.

 

Buying Land Outside of Cusco

We have been looking for land in Cusco and out of the city but found it was way to expensive.  The cheapest we found was $70,000 for a small piece with no access, water or power.   The cheapest we found land so far was $70/meter (so an average city lot would be $70,000) and the average was $300/meter (city lot for $300,000).  These prices are impossible for us so we have been praying about finding land.  It seems that God could be answering our prayers.  I spoke with my friend Keith, who has been a missionary here for many years, and found that his church has some land up on the mountain by his house that they would be willing to sell us.  Joe and his wife Jayne and Kim and I looked at the land this week and found it was exactly what we were looking for. We want/need to buy land together so that we can watch over each others houses when we are away and for safety.  The church said they would give us this land for about $10/meter.  It is surrounded by trees (rare in Peru) and we basically have the whole mountain to ourselves.  There are no other people living up there.  We are hoping to buy about an acre (4000 meters).

 

In the picture below, our land would be the blue part and the green section would be Martinez's land if things work out like we hope.  The white is the entire land and they have no plans to sell it, only plant more trees.   The red line is the road.  We are excited.  We have a few things to confirm first.  We may have to become honorary members of a Quechua community to get permission to tap into their irrigation pipe so we will have water.  We will then run this into tanks and filter it for drinking.  We are going to put in a generator and solar panel system for power and dig in a septic system.  The road getting to the property is a little steep and needs some improving but for the price of the land, it would be worth spending some money fixing the road.  Once we build and move into the house, it will save us a lot of money and allow us to live on less money in Peru.  We should know if this land will work out in a few weeks.  Please join us in prayer for wisdom and discernment in this move as well as God's will to be done, since he knows all things perfectly.  Here are some pictures. 

 

 

 

 

 

Church Picnic

The whole church went on a picnic on Friday. There were 25 of us set up along a gravel bar next to the Vilconata river, about an hour outside of Cusco. We took a bus to a town called Urcos and then a taxi to the spot on the river. It was a beautiful, sunny day and great fellowship. We did do some fishing for Rainbow Trout but the only one who caught one was Wehrner. Wehrner had never fished in his life. I had to set up the pole for him and show him how to cast. His first cast almost hooked his kid and then wrapped about 7 times around his pole. A few casts later, to his own surprise, he was reeling in a big trout.

 

 He was as shocked as we were but I don't think I have ever seen Wehrner more excited in his life. His twin boys surrounded the trout as if their father just reeled in a gold bar. They wanted to touch it so bad but the fish kept flopping around.

The rest of the day was not as exciting but it was great to be away from the city, relaxing by the river. We had to wait over an hour on the side of the road for someone to gives us a ride back to Urcos so that we could catch the bus back to Cusco. I really believe that doing trips like this with the church really builds solid relationships and unites the people in a strong bond with each other.