Arthur & Mary Alice Ivey 

 

December 31, 2001

 

"I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow.  So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow."

   1 Corinthians 3:6-7 NIV

 

 

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

 

     Greetings to you all in the name of our precious Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  We praise the Lord Jesus for having so wonderfully blessed us and for having sent his Holy Spirit to guide and teach us. We hope and pray that He has been blessing you wonderfully and that your life has been filled with His grace.  We hoped that He blessed you in a special way as you celebrated the birthday of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Thank you for your continued prayers for us.  We definitely see the results of you praying for us.  You are special people called by our Lord Jesus Christ to minister to His children.  Thank you for your faithfulness to His calling.  Thank you for your love for Him, for us, and for His children.

 

     December has been a busy, but rewarding month.  The two Kid's Clubs have continued to grow.  We have had over 250 children at the Christmas celebration in Huancayo and over 400 in Ahuac.  We gave each child that came a piece of paneton (a sweet bread with fruit in it), a cup of hot chocolate, and two pieces of fruit.  We were able to give those that had faithfully attended during the year an additional gift of underwear and socks.   Mary Alice is trying to develop prayer support for these children in the local churches here, but also would like your help.  If you wish to participate in this ministry of prayer, please let us know and we will send you, via e-mail a group photograph of one of the small groups and the names of the teacher and children, so that you can pray for them by name.  The number of young people from the Methodist Church in El Tambo helping to lead these ministries has grown, also.  Mary Alice has continued to prepare lesson plans and meet each week with this team to prepare for each week, plan future activities and especially teach the team members how to prepare and run this type of ministry on their own.  Both you and we have been praying that the Lord will continue adding to the number of the team and specifically for strong young Christian men to help because their influence among the boys that come is much needed.  He has been answering our prayers. He has increased the number on the teaching team from six to twelve, and four of these are young men.  Please pray for those that are helping us now: Pilar, Charo, Brita, Techi, Tanya, Betsabe, Susan, Julima, Genaro, Josue, Jesus, and Iban.  We are now in the process of team teaching and training in preparation to start a new work, possibly in Concepcion.  

                                             

Christmas Party at Huancayo Kid's Club

 

Arthur serving hot chocolate and paneton at Huancayo Kid's Club

 

     Mary Alice had been teaching a group from the Huancayo Church to sing.  They performed a special presentation during Christmas Eve service.  They meet every Wednesday night to practice and now wish to continue meeting to sing together.  In addition to this group, Benjamin has continued his Bible study with some boys from his class at school and has lead five of them to saving faith in Jesus Christ.

 

Children watching drama at Ahuac Kid's Club Christmas party.

 

Children enjoying hot chocolate and paneton at Ahuac.

 

     Arthur has spent the first part of the month traveling to the churches in the Sierra y Selva District with the District Superintendent, Jose Bustamante.  These churches were down in the jungle. This time together allowed them to get to know each other better and discuss some of the needs of each church.  Arthur got to meet the Pastors and many of the members of the churches as well as see first hand some of their needs.  Some of the travel was hard and difficult, some was easy, but it was all worth the effort.  Arthur has also been teaching a youth discipleship group on Wednesday nights that has been growing.  In our last gathering we had 17 young people.  In addition, Arthur has been designing plans for construction projects in the District and preparing for short term mission teams for 2002.  We tentatively have 14 teams scheduled for next year. 

 

     Thanks to one of our supporters, Jim Davis from Dalton First United Methodist Church in Dalton, Georgia,  we now have a web site to help keep you up to date.  It is not yet complete, because he is still waiting for us to send him some of the information, but a lot is available.  Please take a few minutes to visit it at www.iveymission.org. 

 

    Again we want to thank you for all your support and prayers.  Please continue to pray for our adjustment to the new culture and that we will boldly speak God's Word wherever we go.  Pray that God will raise up Godly leaders for the church here.  We pray that God is drawing you closer and closer to Him every day. 

 

    God bless you.  We love you.

 

 

                                                                                                                           Yours in Christ,

                                                                                                                           

                                                                                                                           Arthur, Mary Alice, Benjamin, Joshua, and Mary Beth Ivey

                                                                                                                                    Missionaries to Peru

 

 

The Mission Society                                                      P.O. Box 922637                                                        Norcross, Georgia 30010-2637