These are small things that add up to be a huge blessing to us and to the work that we are doing through CUDA. Thank you for supporting us in this way. In this issue Katie writes about forced Sabbath, Jaclyn writes about a cookout we did with the orphanages, Jeremy shares his neighbor Alfredo's story, and Jake gives the recommendation for this month.
It's hard to believe that August is a year old already! This year has been full of love and learning.First birthdays are a big production here – food, gifts, party favors, clowns, decorations, cake, and games. We had August's party at a big park near our house. Planning and preparation was a cultural adventure in itself! It took several days to get everything ready. Many friends and neighbors came together to help us make it all happen. It was truly a beautiful picture of community.
Thank you so much for being a part of our work in 2017, and working with us toward the future. People are experiencing justice, wellbeing, and joy in Arequipa. Development is a slow process, but it’s transformational. What is now just a seedling of new life we believe is growing into something much bigger.
August is always a big month of celebration here in Arequipa as the 15th is Arequipa's founding day. This past August 15th Arequipa celebrated 477 years! It is always celebrated throughout the month of August with parades, music festivals, beauty pageants, and food and art festivals. We have also had a big celebration this month for August Blair's first birthday! As you can see in the picture above, she loved her cake!
If you don't have a Lisa Adkison in your life, get one. Lisa is one of my mentors and supporter from our supporting church in Little Rock, Arkansas and one way that she blesses us is by sending the girls on our team Bible studies to do. The first one she sent us was this one, The Armor of God by Priscilla Shirer.
One of the funnest things I do each week is sit down with Alfredo, Paty, Lucia, Nancy, and Carmen and read through a few paragraphs of Cuando Ayudar Hace Daño—that is, When Helping Hurts. If you talk to any of us very long, you’ll know that this is one of Team Arequipa’s required books to understand what we’re trying to be and do in this city. The Spanish translation was published at the beginning of the year, and we’ve been making our way through it together once a week. I think of it in terms of staff development. As we work toward justice, wellbeing, and joy in the city, we renew the challenge to ourselves to continue to develop, to be repentant of practices that may have been easy but aren’t right, and to work together toward reconciliation.
I would like to share with you the story of one of our diabetes patients named Maximiana. Maximiana was diagnosed with diabetes about two years ago. After the diagnosis, she decided that she wanted to change her life and be healthier. She heard about our work at the local hospital and came to visit us. We enrolled her in our monthly follow-up program and referred her to the exercise group that Katie and I lead three days a week.
