Today, April 10, is Presidential Election Day in Peru and there are no church services anywhere in Peru during the morning hours. Elections are always on Sundays and one of their election laws prohibits any type of public meetings during voting hours, so we have church services in the evening after the polls are closed. The voting process requires that they dip the tip of their index finger into a bottle of permanent purple dye; this avoids allowing people to vote more than once (very practical) and for a week or so after the election everyone walks around with a purple finger! Another election law is that all Peruvians of voting age must vote or pay a heavy fine. As a result of this law the Peruvian people take their politics seriously. Peru has numerous political parties ranging from the far left to the far right and all sorts of ideologies in between. This also creates a lot of travel for these dear folks because they have to vote wherever they were last registered. Since registering to vote in a new town is a bureaucratic process and takes money, the majority of the people just travel back to wherever they came from in order to vote. The bus lines always take advantage of this and raise the price of bus tickets; so is life during election time, heavy traffic on the roads and purple fingers! Anita and I have lived in this country for twenty-eight years and it has always been this way; life is interesting on the mission field!
Each month I ask you to continue to pray for our son, Capt. Joshua Stanton USAF. He proudly serves our country as an Air Force pilot overseas. He has a wife and two small, precious, little girls waiting for him back home. We also ask you to continue to remember my father, Ralph Stanton, in your prayers; he is battling with prostate cancer, and is back in the hospital again in Dickson, Tennessee with a kidney infection. He is also having test done for Alzheimer and dementia while being treated for the kidney infection. This ordeal has been understandably hard on my mother, she needs our prayers also. Mom and Dad have been married for sixty-three years now, truly an example and inspiration to all of us. Anita and I will be traveling back to the States for four weeks from the middle of May to the middle of June. We plan to see our grand-kids (one we’ve never seen and she will soon be a year old!) but we plan to spend most of the time with my mom and dad. Thank you so much for your prayers.
Do you all remember the young lady, twenty-three years old, Dany Luz Presentacion? Many of you helped her financially back in the fall of last year when she was going through Chemo Therapy for ovarian cancer. She also had open heart surgery when she was sixteen years old. Well, she is doing great now; finished her college degree in elementary education and recently got a job teaching in a private school here in Huánuco. Danitza is one of many young folks that are like sons and daughters to Anita and me. She came by the house the other day to visit and show us how much her hair has grown back; so I had to take a picture and show you this radiant trophy of God’s mercy and grace! We thank all of you again that had a part in helping us to help this fine and faithful young Christian woman.
Sufficient funds have come in to help the Cayumba Grande Baptist Mission with the purchase of their property in Tingo Maria. Thanks to those of you that had a part in this project.
We still need more funds to help with construction for the Calvary Baptist Mission I pastor here in Huánuco. Anita and I hope to have something built and secure by the time we leave for the States the middle of May. This work has grown numerically and matured spiritually during this past year and it is time for us to move to a larger location. The property has some old, adobe mud structures that will be torn down so we can build to suite or needs. We know our heavenly Father will provide the funds; maybe He will use you to help with this project.
Another matter of prayer is the need to increase giving to the General Fund of Baptist Faith Mission. BFM has financially aided Anita and me since 1983. We work under the authority of our home church, Jordan Missionary Baptist Church, of Sanford, Florida, but Jordan Baptist is not large enough to support us full time, and thus, BFM helps our home church with the funds to keep us on the field in Peru. The Mission provides excellent medical insurance, monthly stipends for housing, transportation cost and other expenditures necessary to live in a foreign country. The directors of BFM have calculated that if each household and church that supports the General Fund of BFM could increase their giving by $10.00 more per month, the financial needs would be met. Pray about it and give as the Lord leads you. If you would like more details of the financial workings and situation of BFM you can go the webpage: www.baptistfaithmissions.org or the BFM blog at: www.faith-works.blogspot.com
Thanks again for all the prayers and support. We look forward to seeing everyone next year (2012) when we come to the States for furlough. Until next month.
In HIM by HIS grace,
Sheridan and Anita Stanton