How beautiful upon the mountains
are the feet of him who brings good news,
who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness,
who publishes salvation,
who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”
Isaiah 52:7
Going to Argentina changed my life. Seeing my dear friends, both IMB missionaries, was a blessing, but seeing how they minister in Salta and surrounding areas for the Kingdom was a blessing times ten. The Andrews have beautiful feet. That is certain!
Here is a summary of our trip:
We flew from Dallas into Buenos Aires (10+ hour flight) and took a taxi across town to another airport that took us to Salta. When we arrived, the Andrews took us to a futbol (soccer) game that night. It rivaled a Mississippi State University football game with all the excitement and good food, etc. Everyone, including us, was dressed in team colors, too. Throughout the week, we did a lot of shopping at local artisan markets and the good food never ended. The steak and ice cream were my favorites. But wait! I forgot about the empanadas. I think I ate my weight in those.
The town is surrounded by the Andes mountains, and it's breathtaking, even in the dead of winter when things are no longer green. (We missed the snow though!) Even though we weren't technically on a mission trip with a church group, we were excited to do some ministry while there. We visited a lady's home outside of Salta. She made us empanadas (they were the bomb.com), and I shared a little with her and her daughters about how following Christ is not easy because he calls us to suffer from time to time. There's a belief there (much like here) that following Jesus should make all your problems go away, and if the problems don't, then you must be doing something wrong. Well, my dear friend Leann translated my story to the ladies. It was really exciting to talk to them through her. We also visited a mountain village where the people there are sort of catholic with lots of idol worship of random "gods." They set up shrines in various places and bring offerings these gods expecting some type of blessing in return. It saddened us to see the false hope these people have in these handmade gods. Two or three of the sixty or so in the village are followers of Christ after meeting Joe and Leann. Joe disciples them weekly, so there is hope for the gospel to spread in the village.
There are lots of awesome stories of how God is using the Andrews family in the mountain village and in the city and surrounding suburbs. I'll let them tell you those at www.plantinginargentina.com. Towards the end of the trip, we visited their church. It's at a man's home who saved his tithe for ten years to build the church onto his house. Joe preached in Spanish. It blessed me. No really, I understood about five percent of what he was saying, but it was awesome to sing songs I recognized in Spanish with believers 5000+ miles south of my home. God changed my daughter, my niece, and me through the trip. Being around the Andrews family was encouraging for us and, I pray, for them as well. I want to go back. Like now. I cried most of the 10+ hour flight from Buenos Aires back to Dallas. I cried for the people of Argentina, and I cried for the hardships the missionaries there face. Mostly, I cried for selfish reasons because I want to see my friends more than I do.
Please continue to pray for my super cool missionary friends, Joe and Leann Andrews. What they do for Christ is hard. They sacrifice so much for the gospel to be spread in Argentina.
