August 14th, 2019

Ambassadors for Christ in Peru 

and for a few months here in the USA too :) 

​Dear Praying Friends, 

Thank you so much for your consistent prayers and encouragement. We thank God for allowing us to have a good finish to our first term of service for him in Peru. It was sad for us to leave our friends in Peru, but we look forward to arriving back in Peru on November 13, 2019 to continue being a part of the disciple-making work that God is doing in Puerto Maldonado and the surrounding jungle. Please continue to pray for God's glory to spread in Peru. As is the case wherever you live in the world, there is much spiritual darkness that needs the light of Jesus Christ the Lord. 

God has also been so kind to give us a great start to our first furlough. We have thoroughly enjoyed spending time with churches, family, and friends here in the USA. So far we have spent time with these churches: 

Calvary Baptist Church in Winter Garden, FL
Holiday Bible Church in Holiday, FL 
Calvary Baptist Church in Lutz, FL 
Centerpointe Baptist Church in Huntersville, NC 
Harvest Bible Church in Lancaster, PA

It has been encouraging to see and hear about what the Lord has been doing in these churches since we moved to Peru in October 2016. We have enjoyed reconnecting with friends and meeting new people that have become part of the churches. We thank the Lord for their partnership in the gospel and for the opportunity God has given us to encourage them to keep proclaiming Jesus Christ as Lord and making disciples of Jesus Christ.  

Below are links to two messages that I preached to our sending church in Florida. I've enjoyed preaching from passages that teach us about our work as disciple makers to proclaim that Jesus Christ is the Lord and the spiritual light that shines into the darkness of human hearts. 

Matthew 9:35-10-7
2 Corinthians 2:14-4:7

Questions and prayers answered to the glory of God! Our biggest questions before coming back to the USA were travel schedule, housing, and vehicle. God once again showed his sovereignty over all things and provided for those needs in a way that only he can. The schedule to visit our twelve partnering churches came together very easily after we prayed and emailed each of the churches about a specific Sunday. Eleven of the twelve pastors responded by saying that the specific date would work, and with a slight tweak the twelfth church was on the schedule as well. We praise God for working that out for us. The schedule God provided gives our family some stability by being able to spend several weeks at a time in our geographical hubs - Florida, the Carolinas, and Pennsylvania. 

We asked you to pray that God would provide housing in Florida. He did that by directing us to an airbnb rental house that we rented for our first stay in Florida and have reserved for the last few weeks that we will be in the USA. It is less than a minute drive to our sending church's property and very close to family and friends. Thank you, God!

He provided us with a very nice Dodge Caravan from First Baptist Church in Bellefonte, PA. And it "just so happened" that a couple from the church had a trip planned to Florida that took them very close to where my parents live - making it relatively simple to drop the van off for us before we arrived in the USA. Kelly's parents plan to drive the van back up to Pennsylvania from Florida when we head back to Peru in November. Only God could bring all those details together in just the right way and timing. We thank God for providing safety for us in our travels. 

Disciple Making 2019: We thank the Lord for spiritually and physically sustaining us through the travels, transition, and reverse culture shock from Peru to the USA. Through it all, God remains faithful and has been daily encouraging us through his word to keep persevering in disciple-making work for his glory. That disciple-making work begins with our family and expands out from there. We thank God for giving us daily opportunities to teach our girls about the Lord. We thank him for family and friends that help in that work. 

We are also praying that God would send more laborers out into his harvest fields. God has given us specific opportunities with each of the churches to encourage others to continue following Jesus. When we were growing up, God used the testimony of visiting missionaries to direct Kelly and me toward serving the Lord in South America. We pray that he would use us to direct others toward that type of service as well. 

​We thank the Lord for giving us opportunities to proclaim Jesus as Lord. Would you pray that he would open up some doors like that with our neighbors here in Pennsylvania? Thank you so much for praying for us and supporting us financially. We look forward to seeing you soon as we visit your church!

Jay & Kelly Cross
          Alexia, Isabel, Esther, & Lilian

"For we are not proclaiming ourselves but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’s sake. For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ. Now we have this treasure in clay jars, so that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us."       
                         2 Corinthians 4:5–7(CSB)

2019 USA Church Visits

6/30 Calvary Baptist Church (Winter Garden, FL)
7/7 Calvary Baptist Church (Winter Garden, FL)
7/14 Holiday Bible Church (Holiday, FL)
7/21 Calvary Baptist Church (Lutz, FL)
7/28 Centerpointe Baptist Church (Huntersville, NC) 
8/4 Harvest Bible Church (Lancaster, PA) 
8/11Harvest Bible Church (Lancaster, PA) 
8/18 First Baptist Church (Lebanon, PA)
8/25 Community Baptist Church (South Riding, VA)
9/1 Temple Bible Church (Elizabethtown, PA) 
9/8 Harvest Bible Church (Lancaster, PA) 
9/15 Open Door Bible Church (Middletown, PA) 
9/22 First Baptist Church (Bellefonte, PA) 
9/29 Collierstown Baptist Church (Collierstown, VA)
9/30 BJU Global Opportunities Week  (Greenville, SC)  9/30 - 10/3
10/6 Iglesia Bautista de la Gracia (Hendersonville, NC)
10/13 Grace Baptist Church (East Flat Rock, NC) 
10/20 Calvary Baptist Church (Winter Garden, FL)
10/27 Calvary Baptist Church (Winter Garden, FL)
11/3 Calvary Baptist Church (Winter Garden, FL)
11/10 Calvary Baptist Church (Winter Garden, FL)