This past month our church spent four weeks studying the temple in the Old Testament. We concluded with the reminder that while there currently is no temple on Mount Zion in Jerusalem, the location where God placed his name forever, and there is no glory cloud indicating his presence since it left Solomon’s temple in Ezekiel 11, yet the church gathered is God’s temple, because his Spirit dwells in us. As Paul tells the Corinthians, “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Cor 3:16). This temple, the church body, is holy, and anyone who destroys the unity of that temple risks the wrath of God.

This month marked our first Lord’s Days “not-from-the-couch” in 2021! We have continued our normal Sunday morning Zoom meeting for the Bible reading, teaching, and discussion questions, but in the afternoon, we are meeting at the public beach park to pray together in groups and sing several songs as a church. As Pastor Andrés has reminded us many times over the past year and a half, it’s not ideal, but it’s what we have available for us right now, so we’ll take it!

Our city was moved to “phase 3” this past month, which means we can go wherever we want without a permission, although still only within the city and with a 10 pm curfew and limited to 15 people allowed in homes. Because new cases are increasing as winter gets closer, we don’t imagine we’ll have this freedom indefinitely, but we’re enjoying the chance now to visit our church family in person. We’ve found the sheer amount of human contact, although welcome, to be a bit overwhelming, and we are exhausted after spending all day with other people. (I imagine this is what people who get out of prison or who are rescued off a desert island go through.)

At any rate, our weeks are spent visiting our church families, continuing our Bible studies with several couples (now in person!), and preparing for our weekly meetings. Winter in northern Chile is a little different than what you might expect: it’s certainly not cold (at least by North American standards), but when the sun goes down (or if the day is cloudy), the wind starts blowing, and it gets quite cool. Again, it may only be upper 50ºs or low 60ºs, but that’s inside as well as outside, because we don’t have heat or air conditioning and our windows are nowhere close to air tight. We are always thankful to see the sun each morning, yet another reminder of God’s faithfulness and care for us!

This is our June 2021 email update. You can sign up to receive our updates in your inbox here. You can download a printable PDF here.