Monday, February 06, 2006
Planadas Community (part 1)
Date of Event: July 22, 2005
Two nights ago at about 7:00 p.m., I brought home our new vehicle, a 2001 Ford Explorer with 83,000 km. Yesterday morning one of our missionaries asked if I wanted to try out the 4x4. The children from two new church plants were playing a football game (soccer), and the pastors asked our two families to join them.
We headed out of town about twenty minutes, then the road got a little rougher, then a little worse, and then finally it went down to dirt, sand, big ruts, and rocks. I moved the button, and my 4x4 was on. Then we started going down the side of this mountain in a series of hairpin turns. It’s one of those things that you really have to experience yourself to appreciate: the bouncing, the wind blowing dust so that you can’t see in front of you, the incredible view. Down below it looked like there was about a 5 square mile plateau. On two sides the mountain went up. We were coming down one of these. On the other two sides was a steep drop off. As far as I could see, I saw mountains.
About half way down the mountain the Jesus Film coordinator who was leading us stopped and picked up about 10 boys and stuffed them in the back of his Chevy Blazer. I found out later that they had walked about four miles or so. Instead of taking the road which snaked back and forth, they were sliding on their back side from a higher part of the road to a lower part. I guess it was a short cut for them. Finally, we leveled off and drove a mile on the dirt road to the new church plant just two months old. The North Andean Field (NAF) had purchased the property and on it stood a ‘building.’ The sign read: “Iglesia del Nazareno.” This is where 40 or so worship here at 3:00 on Sunday afternoons. No electricity nor running water. The church was started with the Jesus Film.
