Peralta Blue Jeans

Peralta is a very small village town snuggled between mountains in the southern part of the Dominican Republic. It was the set of the second Jurassic Park (hey - did anybody watch that one by the way? :) so you can imagine the natural untouched beauty: everything from bright orange butterflies to bumblebees the size of your thumb to huge red flowering trees. The photo at left is a typical street filled with colorful houses. Mark/I headed out to Peralta with our friends from Chicago (Cam and Christine) so Mark could have some work conversations and we could enjoy building relationships with the people who are a part of our Willow Creek partner church, Iglesia Evangelica Asemblia de Dios and Pastor Fransisco. The church is starting a new income-generating ministry called "Blue Jeans" (I'll give you one guess as to where I'm heading with this... :) that is hoping to manufacture and sell blue jeans to the local surrounding communities. Most of the school uniforms in the DR are jeans and a white polo, so the team is getting positive feedback already that many schools would be interested in ordering their uniforms from Peralta instead of the capital city. Due to inconsistent electricity, however, the team's most recent prayer request is for a reasonably priced invertor, which would allow the workers to continue working while the majority of the town would not have electricity. This is a very exciting ministry, as it will provide both employment for a town that has very little to offer (with the exception of agriculture) and would provide money to the church to offer more relevant ministries of all kinds. After an afternoon filled with conversation and hiking and, we headed to Pastor Fransisco's home for a mean game of Dominos (a Dominican "must-do") by the light of a gas lamp. We discussed the potential of the Blue Jeans project and headed to the medical clinic for sleep. Mark/Cam/Christine and I stayed up late that night, talking about how awesome God is... and how the local church really is the hope in every single community. It was clear in this little town. The Christians in Peralta were filled with deep, deep joy - such an example to the four of us.
As we turned down for sleep, I had trouble sleeping due to the complete SILENCE and DARKNESS (no street lights/house lights whatsoever)... after living in the busy city with nonstop noise, it was freaking me out! The next morning, we woke up at 6am to a zillion roosters, voices passionately praying in the church sanctuary adjoined to the clinic and construction workers sledgehammering down a clinic wall just outside our room. (Up-and-at-em in Peralta...) We enjoyed egg sandwiches for breakfast and hopped on the next guagua (bus) to head back to Santo Domingo.