Mission Peru!!

LIGHT OF THE WORLD BALLET traveled for the first time to South America on its seventh mission trip. Our team of eleven flew into Lima then flew to northern Peru to the region of Piura. Our host, Pastor Jon Edwards, an American missionary living in Peru for 12 years, is associated with Betesda Lifeline Network and serves with Pastor Julio Cavassa and his wife, Janet. Their focus is to bring people to the Lord and help them overcome poverty and face today's challenges. Ps. Julio pastors Betesda church and is developing a training center.

The challenges Betesda is working to improve is the 21% illiteracy of women and violence towards them, the 49% of household heads with only an elementary education, and training and encouraging area pastors.

Ps. Jon and Ps. Julio with their family showed such hospitality and organization making this a smooth -running endeavor. They provided the team many opportunities for ministry time, relationship building, numerous performances and preaching opportunities in a variety of venues. We saw over 60 salvations!

Light of the Word Ballet dancers performed lively dances to Spanish Christian lyrics. And the

narration of LWBallet's story ballet "The Crown" was re-recorded in Spanish for this trip. The performances gave a deeper meaning to God not looking for our good works but for our hearts. The performances were enthusiastically received and prepared the way for Dave's preaching about identity in Christ. We saw salvations and hearts touched. Ashley shared and challenged the audiences with their walk with the Lord. Many dancers on the team had the opportunity to give their personal testimonies to the audiences.

There were short performances in public squares where crowds easily gathered. Also there were two school performances (17 saved) with an opportunity to visit school rooms to meet with the students.

It was at the school where the first salvation occurred with a 17 year old student with Dave. Later that week he came up to Dave saying, "I have Jesus in my heart." There were other performances and preaching in four churches, a mother-daughter dinner, and a pastor's conference.

While dancing in the town square, we met the governor of northern Peru who took the time to promote one of our large municipal performances. There was radio coverage and magazine photos taken. A truly divine appointment which opened the way for about 500 to attend the performance & approximately 40 raised their hand to receive Christ!

There was a precious mother-daughter dinner where 50 squeezed into Betesda church and Pat taught on relationship and the power of life and death in the tongue. They enjoyed the ballet company's dances and a drama. The mothers and daughters were led together in creative worship with the dancers.

Our team was able to connect with the people of the surrounding area of the Betesda church several times by a walk in the neighborhood and at gatherings at the church. Even though there was a language barrier, the people made it so easy with their incredible warmth, affection and eagerness to be with us.

Dios Le Bendiga (God bless you), Peru!

Thank you all for your prayers and support for this mission.

With our love & gratitude we give thanks to the Lord for you!

In the Light of Jesus,

Dave & Pat Rollinson, Mission Leaders

Ashley Rollinson, Performance Director

LWB Company & Trainees

Huntington Elementary School

This past Tuesday we got the awesome opportunity to go perform and teach at Huntington Elementary School, a public school that is right down the street from our house! (We actually walked to the school, it was so close). A lady from Amy and Alyssa's church was kind enough to write a grant to have us come and perform U R Special (a short ballet based on Max Lucado's book) and teach some dance workshops for the kids. It is still so amazing to me that we got to go into a public school here in Central New York and share about the love of God, even though we didn't get to say it in so many words. But through the ballet they got a small picture of the way God loves us as our Creator and our Father.

We did the ballet 2 times for 2 different groups of kids, pretty much back to back (boy was that a workout!), and then had a little lunch break before splitting up to go teach the ballet workshops. That was pretty fun - I taught with Amy and Alyssa, and the kids paid attention pretty well! We actually taught three 40 minute workshops back to back, so by the end of it all we were definitely a little tired. Besides teaching them stuff like skips, chasses, the positions of the feet, etc., we also talked to them about the ballet, asking questions like, "did you understand it?" "who was caring in the ballet?" The thing is, since it is a public school, we can't share about the Lord openly, BUT if someone else asks us about it, we can share! And so in one of the classes, one of the kids did ask us - and we got to tell them that God is their creator and loves them because He made them! (To which the little girl next to me says, "but God died." I was a little shocked at that statement, before gathering my thoughts and saying, "yes, its true. But you know what? He came back from the dead He's alive!")

I'm praying that more doors would open for us to go into public schools and share the gospel, even if its somewhat of a secret mission, so to speak. :-)

~Gwen

The Determination Center

On Tuesday, February 22, we had the chance to perform at The Determination Center, an after-school program and activity center for inner city kids. The children were very excited to have us there, and we had some special audience members that day- my Mom and sister were visiting! The company started the performance with “Alive”, and then we trainees performed “Digee Dime”, followed by “The Crown” all together.
We were performing in the gym, where they had a nice, large stage. There was only one problem with the stage- on one side, the door to get on and off the raised stage was locked, and there were no stairs to exit the front of the stage. We asked the woman running the activities to unlock the door, but she could not find the key, so we placed a bench beneath the stage to step up, decreasing the four foot drop to a three foot jump/step. We made our entrances and exits on that side as graceful as possible, trying to remain in character and not distract from the story. When we exit from the tormentors scene, we are running away from Wisdom because she brings out the Crown of Thorns. Rather than stop running, stepping down carefully, then start running again to reach our dressing room, Gwen took a giant leap off the stage! Breanne and I were not quite so adventurous, and took the step as smoothly as possible.
The children were a great audience, and afterward, we taught them some ballet steps, which they learned with a lot of excitement and eagerness. It is always my prayer that during these performances when we don’t have the chance to pray and talk with them, that they will really understand the message of the story, and that God will provide a Christian in their life who will be able to answer their questions and encourage them to pursue a relationship with God. Ashley was able to share her testimony and the salvation message from the microphone, and I pray that God used it to speak to them. God Bless!
~ Cayla

Believer's Chapel

On Saturday, March 5th, LWB company danced at Believer's Chapel. We performed “Praise You In The Storm” in Spanish. It is so neat to dance to another language! After dancing, the leadership and congregation prayed for us for our upcoming trip to Peru. It is such a blessing to have a church who is so supportive of the ministry and who is committed to covering us in prayer. Thank you so much Believer's Chapel!

Amy

Eagles Wings Academy

On Friday February 18th we were able to perform The Crown for the Eagles Wings Academy. The company performed Alive to start and we finished with healing hands. The audience did a very good job following the arm motions. Our stage was their cafeteria and we used the kitchen and the library as our wings and the bathroom as our dressing room. We were able to pray with the students afterward and the kids seemed to have a good time talking with some of us. I was blessed to be able to talk to one of the teachers. She seemed very kind. As we were getting ready to go, a few girls came into the bathroom and were quite astonished at our mess, as we had costumes and crowns all over (we thought it was rather cute). I pray that they were blessed by our coming.

~Krystalan