We made it home!

We just wanted to let you all know that we made it home to Atlanta safely this morning after a long night in airplanes, long lines, and very little sleep. But we are so grateful that the Lord has made a way for us to be here for a few days with friends and family during this Christmas season. Today was low key, but the rest of our trip will be packed full of visits, shopping for various things for Peru, and lots of driving around!

It was quite the ride to get here, by the way. We had planned to leave Peru on Tuesday night, but when we went through the Immigration line, they told us we couldn't leave the country without our Carnet residency cards. We tried to explain that we were in the process of applying for them, but we were still waiting. They said they could reschedule our flight for Thursday night so that we could go to the Immigration Office in Lima to get a letter of permission to leave the country without the Carnet cards. We were almost sure that would be impossible to get within two days, but we decided to give it a try. By the miraculous hand of God, we did not get that letter the next day but the Carnet cards themselves! And there wasn't a single problem with our trip last night. God is able to do the impossible, even in the slowest country in the world!

Sudo-Thanksgiving and Other Activities

This past week has been a busy one for both of us. We briefly celebrated Thanksgiving with the women and children at Pat's Place with dinner and ice cream for all, but that came at the end of a long, busy day, which has become the norm. Alex is still looking for land for the new Extreme Home Makeover project. Property is not advertised in papers here, as people cannot afford it. The people basically just post a piece of paper on a pole or on their own house advertising it is for sale. Alex is also involved in many other administrative tasks for NCCM, plus working remotely for his company Client Profiles--not a dull moment!

Holly has also been working hard on her teaching materials and preparing her lessons. Any teacher can tell you that this is a long and tedious process. There is a lot of material she has to read, and then she writes out how she will teach each lesson. Each day is a process. Sometimes it feels like our work is not getting done, but we are working all day long.

On top of all that, we have been trying to get our residency ("Carnet") cards, and that is also a huge process. This week we went back to the Immigration Office to turn in more paperwork. We were then informed that we must go to Interpole to have a full background check done. With that, we must go to 2 different banks and pay money for different taxes. Then we can go to Interpole. Once we finish at Interpole, then we have to go back to the Immigration Office. We will see what happens after that. So far we have paid a totoal of $150 us dollars in fees and taxes, plus taxi fare for those days. It is a complete learning experience and always changing. We are learning about the Lord's patience and being reminded constantly that we are not in control.

On Wednesday Pastor Gino and Carmen took us out for a fellowship dinner. We ate at a Tony Roma's restraunt on the ocean, which reminded Holly of Martha's Vineyard. I had chicken quesadillas, and Holly had a huge steak. It was really nice to have that time with them. After dinner, we went to Starbucks for dessert. There are only 2 or 3 in Lima and all an hour away, so it is a treat to go. While we were there, Holly shared her plans for teaching english and proposed a schedule. They loved it and said that it looks great. They then had us share it with all the pastors last night in a meeting to get their feedback. All the pastors are looking forward to the classes, and Gino wants all of them in it.

Friday was a long day, as we went to the orphanage and cooked a special breakfast for the girls. We had to be up at 5am to leave the house by 5:30am. Once we finished with the breakfast, we had to go to Lima to do more work for our residencey cards, then we had a meeting with the Pastors at 5:30pm. After the pastors' meeting, Alex cooked a nice Italian dinner for Greg, Bridget, and Holly. After we ate dinner, we set up the projector, and watched "The Lake House." We had a good time with them, as it has been great having other missionaries here that we can fellowship with, including Greg, Bridget, and Heather who are all apart of New Covenant Creation Ministries.

We are looking forward to coming home to Atlanta November 28-December 10 and are just so grateful that God has provided the funds for the trip. Although it will be cold there, we hope it will just bring us into the holiday spirit before we come back to Peru for our first 80-degree Christmas! And we hope to see as many of our friends and family while we're in the States. Thank you for your prayers and love. We hope to hear from you soon!!

With the hope of Christmas,

Alex & Holly

Home for the Holidays (minus the holidays)

We are blessed to be able to come back to Atlanta November 28-December 10, including a quick trip to visit my grandmother in Las Vegas December 3-6. If you are interested in getting together with us during that time, please let us know at hollyjcompton@gmail.com.

It's hard to believe that Thanksgiving is just next week, for which we'll be in Peru, of course, as well as for Christmas and New Year's. Thankfully, Alex's company (for which he still does some contract work via internet) is paying for his plane ticket so he can come to their Christmas party on December 7, so we only have to pay for my ticket, which is what Alex's projects will pay for. Even our breeze through Vegas was an amazing deal. We are truly grateful for the blessings of the Lord and the chance to be with friends and family even just for a few days. Then we will return again at the end of February for the New Covenant annual banquet on the 29th (mark your calendars!).

This week has been very good and productive. Alex has been looking for the next house or plot of land to use for our second Extreme Home Makeover while I've been home working on my English lesson plans. We also are trying to get our Carnet cards (residency registration), which we thought would be easy since we already have our visas, but apparently we need one more letter from the overseeing church here. Carmen is supposed to get the letter for us soon, but we haven't heard for sure yet. We are scheduled to meet her Tuesday at 10am to see if we can get the Carnet cards then. Please pray for that to happen easily! It costs us $10-20 in taxi fare every time we have to go into Lima for a few hours.

We have finally found an apartment that's a short walk from Pat's Place. It has one main bedroom but a huge living room area where we can also put an office, dining room, and possibly a guest bed too. We will sign the lease next Tuesday, but it won't be ready for us to move in until we return on December 10. Then we will furnish it and settle in. We are so looking forward to having our own place and some privacy again. It has been more than 6 months since we had that; we just pray that the Lord will provide the rest of the funds we need to make it home sweet home.

We hope that you and your families have a wonderful Thanksgiving next week! Please write us soon and let us know how you're doing!

Much love in Him,
Holly & Alex

Hope House Medical Clinic

Last Wednesday Alex and I were also able to work with the NCCM team at the Hope House Medical Clinic. We both assisted in the Vision Clinic testing each person's vision with the chart. We saw a record 144 patients total in less than 4 hours! More than 40 people were saved, and each person had the opportunity to receive prayer after they saw the doctors. Rebecca and Henry were the Peruvian physicians that assisted us, plus Victor, the dentist. It was truly an incredible, although short, day. I am a bit sad that we won't get to do it again until April or June.

NCCM Team's EXTRA Day!

So Friday night Alex and I saw the NCCM team off at the airport at 10pm and went home and straight to bed. We were so exhausted after a long but rewarding week with the team and looking forward to sleeping in the next morning. At about 8am the next morning, Heather came to our door saying, "Alex, Holly, I need to speak with you guys urgently!" We wondered what could be so urgent, and we soon learned that the team had never left! Their flight was canceled due to a faulty plane part that had to be flown in from the US the next day! So the team was up all night long waiting in lines. American Airlines said the local hotels were full and only gave each person food vouchers (usable only at Papa John's at the airport!). Thankfully, American Airlines did pay for two vans to bring the team back to Pat's Place by about 10am where we offered them beds and a great meal before they were back off to the airport for a 2am flight Sunday morning. We know they have safely reached home now, praise the Lord! And although it was a hard journey for them (including the fact that AA lost ALL their luggage on their way to Peru at the beginning of the week), Alex, Heather & I were so glad to have them here for the day for fellowship and laughter one last time. They were the first missions team to stay on the 4th floor!

November NCCM Team Free Day

Yesterday Alex and I joined the team again for their free day and got all our Christmas shopping done! We visited some of the same places we have seen before, but the different faces made it just as fun. We joined together at the beginning of the day to pray for Peru at the highest point in Lima at a well known cross. From there we visited the Indian markets to shop, ate lunch at Pizza Hut, and concluded the day at the oceanside mall. There we enjoyed Starbuck's, I got a 10-minute massage, Bruce and Vicki decided to race (and I think they're still deciding who won), and Bruce attempted to drive a bus (oh God, help us!). It was a very busy but enjoyable time of speaking English and laughing at my new pet rat, Remy. (hehehehehheheheheh)

Daughters of the King Conference: Keys to Freedom

On Thursday night Alex and I joined the NCCM team for a night of ministry at the Daughters of the King conference which focused this year on "Keys to Freedom" in Christ. At this church in Callao, we had several speakers who preached the Word and gave their testimonies. We gave the women the opportunity to receive Jesus as their Savior and to ask the Lord for the filling of the Holy Spirit for the work that God has called them to do. In the center of this collage is the board at the front of their church which focuses their hearts on conquering the world for Christ--"Hacia La Conquista Del Mundo"--which is our mission as well. God used our hands and voices to touch their hearts deeply and encourage them to do the same for others.

Extreme Home Makeover - Project 1

In November 2006 New Covenant began its first project of Extreme Home Makeovers here in Peru. The project was for a woman named Martha and her two children, Jason & Jessica. Martha is a faithful church member and servant of the Lord, as are her children. Her husband passed away 8 years ago, and she has been working hard to provide for her family ever since. She has tuberculosis and other health problems that have been getting worse because she works so hard. NCCM decided not only to tear down and completely rebuild her home, but also to include a store front for a source of income for this family. On Thursday of this week, we all yelled out "Move that bus!" and Martha, Jason & Jessica saw their new home for the first time. Here are our pictures of the house and store which used to be one room separated and roofed by deteriorating cardboard, where the only walls to the home belonged to neighboring houses. The Lord has blessed her for her faithfulness and had favor on the entire family. It made us all cry to witness her humility and gratitude as she walked into her dream!

The Inevitable Medical Bills

So Alex's surgery in the U.S. probably would have cost $20,000 or more since we do not have medical insurance, but being that we are in Peru, it only cost $1,500! We are grateful that we only have to raise $1,500 in additional support for this bill. Please pray for God's provision in that area, as we had to put it all on a credit card for the time being. If you feel led to assist us with this, you may make your check payable to New Covenant Creation Ministries and mail it to the address noted at the bottom of this blog page. Thank you so much!

Surgery or No Surgery? That is The Question

This last weekend was an interesting one. Saturday morning at 3:30am I (Alex) woke up with a sharp pain in my left side. Now, as many of you already know, I had my appendix taken out in Peru in June 2006. This time, the pain was just as bad as it was before, so Holly and I guessed it was kidney stones. At 6am, I arrived at San Juan Bautista Hospital. I was taken right into the emergency room (same bed as last year too!) and then right into the ultra sound room so they could look at my stomach. We got the ultra sound back in about 15 minutes, and I had many kidney stones in the left kidney and also some in the right. So the hospital decided to keep me overnight.

Aabout 12 noon on Saturday, they came into my room, and said that I also had a stone in my gallbladder, and it was a pretty big stone according to them. The surgeon said that surgery was not urgent but necessary soon to remove my gallbladder. The surgeon that gave me the news was the same surgeon that had taken out my appendix the year before, so he remembered me. After that, I was taken for many x-rays and forced to drink the nastiest tasting stuff in my life. I had to drink 2 liters of it, and I mean it made me gag every time I took a sip. Of course, I was not allowed to eat, so I was starving by that time as well.

The hospital finally let me eat at about 8pm. I couldn't eat the next morning, however, since we had decided to go ahead with the surgery if the doctor said it was okay; we figured that since I was already admitted in the hospital etc, it would be better to do it now than wait for the situation to get much worse. On Sunday, the surgeon came into my room and said that I was good to go for the surgery and that we would have it around 11am or so. Well, it was 2pm before they took me down to the operating room. Once I got to the operating room, I was greeted by nurses who had worked on my appendix and knew me as soon as they saw me. I am sure they do not operate on many Americans anyway. The doctor that works with our ministry, Rebecca, was also able to scrub in for this surgery as she did last year, which made both Holly & I feel more comfortable.

After coming out of surgery, I was in a little pain but was doing good. I was able to leave the hospital today, which was good. I am finally back at Pat's Place and working on my recovery. I have been given a strict diet, so let's see how well that goes. Thank you for all your prayers and support. We definitely felt the hand of the Lord with us taking care of all things, including giving Holly a bed in my room to sleep in both nights I had to be in the hospital. Hope to talk to you all soon.

Zoo Holiday

Yesterday was a holiday here in Peru--All Saints' Day--so we took the women and kids at Pat's Place to the zoo! We spent several hours there looking at all the different animals, ate lunch, and then concluded the visit with some acrobatics! It was a nice day to relax with everyone, including Alana Lusted to is here a few days earlier than the Atlanta NCCM Missions team which will arive on Sunday. It was the most beautiful day we have seen here in Lima since we first came to Peru--bright, sunny, and the perfect temperature too. Thank you, Lord, for a wonderful day!