"MIssionary Dan Jones Travels to Peru"
(Dan Jones and Andy Pull demonstrate their carpentry gifts)
Gift-giving during the Christmas season has many different meanings for many different people. For some, the preferred delivery method involves a jolly bearded man bringing gifts in a sleigh. For others, the gift delivery method involves Amazon delivering gifts selected from digital shopping lists right to the front door. For a local jolly bearded man (not Santa), the Amazon (not the company) provided a new opportunity to deliver different kinds of gifts. Dan Jones recently returned from a mission trip to Iquitos, Peru with a new outlook on the meaning of giving.
Iquitos, Peru is a large, isolated city below the mountainous headwaters of the Amazon River, making it largely inaccessible by automobile. For Jones to reach it, he had two choices: airplane or boat. Considering the Amazon boat trip is 2,000 miles long, he wisely chose to fly into the former “rubber boom” city, where trucks and cars are rare and three-wheeled motorcycle-based “mules” are as common as mosquitoes. Having served as a missionary numerous times over the past several years, Jones had faced elements of danger before. “The Amazon jungle was different,” Jones explained. “I wasn’t worried, and I am not by any means a germaphobe, but I took extra precautions because of bacteria and bugs. Disease-carrying mosquitoes and a biological breeding ground of consistent temps near 100 degrees with 100% humidity frankly concerned me more than people with guns. In many ways, I think small and insidious can be more dangerous. But (Praise God!) modern medicine and mosquito netting can greatly diminish concerns in this area.”
The mission trip wouldn’t have been possible for Jones without the gifts from others. Dan and Sandy Berven of Spirit Lake, Iowa had been planning the mission trip since before Covid. Through their efforts at Go Serve Global, much of the planning had already taken place before Jones got the invite to join eleven others on the trip. Jones only had two months to raise funds for his portion of the trip, which is when the gifts of Faith Bible Church in Mapleton helped him pursue this new opportunity.
Through the Go Serve Global organization based in Iowa, Jones’ basic purpose at the Iglecias Genesis Church consisted of giving the gift of construction and carpentry. During his time, Jones helped build furniture for their chapel, including four tables, 24 benches, as well as some tiling and painting. During his 10 day stay, Jones worshiped with the congregation twice. Of the 500 people that filled each of the two services, two-thirds were teenagers. “Those teenagers were dancing…singing. Their praise was very energetic, and they were more interested in that than they were (interested) in their phones.” Although Jones was there to serve, what he got back from his time in Peru was “immeasurable.” Jones confessed that he’d been down on the church in the United States for a long time, but “that church was so alive and energetic.” As the daughter of the church co-founder Bethany Baxter deNoriega explained to him, everything he saw was supported both in prayer and financially from the churches in the United States. “It really kinda changed my outlook,” Jones summarized. “God is not dead nor does he sleep. He’s alive and moving and active both there and in the United States.”
Jones also noted a difference in the adults in the jungle congregation. “The services lasted well over two hours and absolutely no one was looking at their watch wishing it would end so they could go watch the football game.” Besides the service projects and the worship styles, Jones also was able to participate in active evangelism. “We were invited to participate in a dinner for some local prostitutes. The church welcomed about a dozen local women who had never been invited to any church anywhere before. They were treated with respect and love, given supper, and heard the testimony of a lady whom Jesus saved and brought out of that life. They were shown hope and future, and they were told that real and true love was available in and through Jesus Christ. We sat and ate with them. We talked to them like they were real people and I watched tears well up in their eyes as they heard songs of praise to the Lord Jesus.”
For Jones, seeing the outcasts of Peruvian society welcomed with open arms connected back to his own struggles. After growing up in Owatonna, Jones lost his way following his mother’s death when he was thirteen. Turning to drugs and “the prodigal lifestyle,” Jones literally saw the light again in 1983 when a tornado went over his pup tent. “I eventually turned my life around, but not right away.”
Along with his time in Peru, Jones has also served mission trips in the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, and Israel. “Short term missions are a wonderful, glorious thing for people to do. Number one: to see how the majority of the world lives because they live much differently than we do. We are blessed far more than we realize. Number two: there’s an aspect of Christianity (that teaches) it’s not about us. So when we go somewhere else and give of yourself, and the Holy Spirit pours into us more than we ever expected or anticipated…it changes people.The love of God poured out on me in a way that was indescribable and changed me forever.” After returning home to Minnesota from the missionary life, Jones also learned, “I think it’s more important to be an everyday missionary.”
After receiving supporting gifts from Faith Bible Church, and then from the people of Peru, Jones returned the gift by preaching about his experiences to his home congregation at Faith Bible Church and also writing about it on his blog at Kinship Radio.
(To learn more about Peru, visit: https://kinshipradio.org/home/dangerous-places/)
(Dustin at Iglecias Genesis Church repurposes an oil drum for his lectern.)
Originally published with the Maple River Messenger.
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