No Chrome................

 JungleMaster doesn't have any "Chrome". I think we're made out of something more like cast Iron. A Canadian friend of mine says Cast Iron is, "The American Wonder Metal". Maybe that's not a great analogy, but what we don't have is anything that tears at the heart of the average North American Christian. Sad to say, but for the most part all we do is church plants and leadership training.

Deep in the jungle there isn't any orphans; families take care of extended members. People aren't starving; in the jungle everything you need to survive is either growing in your back yard, swims by in the river or walks by in the jungle. These are the things that cause us to jump in and throw our resources to fix the problem.

Training a 50 year old jungle pastor to become a missionary is not very glamorous, (unless your a 50 year old widower). Self-sustaining mission centers only are exciting to book keepers and economists.

with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation." Revelation 5:9

Yet what we're doing will produce missionaries to extend into the deepest reaches of the Amazon. Its estimated that there are at least 150 unreached and un-contacted people groups in the Amazon. So who is it that will reach these people? It won't be you or me; we don't do well in the jungle. It has to be them; those that live there now. So how will we ensure that those tribes are represented? We need to empower and send. Thats what we do, not too shiny....but solid, like cast iron.

I have to laugh at Gods sense of humor, we've not only had the longest transition to full-time ministry in history at 13 years, but now hold the title of shortest term full-time missionaries in history, 4 months......BUT now I'm going for the most transitions back into full-time ministry, we'll return as soon as we can get funding up..........Oh well.

I haven't given up, I'm now working at a manufacturer of aluminum boats, doing ministry in the jungle, and busting my hump taking whatever extra project I can to make a buck.

Tom

So what happen?..Partly economy, partly unfulfilled promises but mostly I'm my own worse enemy. We launched the year with three planned trips in 4 months, it takes lots of work to put together a trip to the jungle. Then there was the time I was in the jungle, almost 7 weeks. Mostly its my lack of ability to self promote and raise funds, I knew that I needed to be sitting down with people one-on-one and asking for support but there was always something to interfere. Something that I could call more important than setting up appointments, I hate asking for money. That seems odd because I believe what we're doing in the jungle is one of a kind, out of the box, most effective way possible to mobilize the brothers there to take the gospel to the ends of the world that is going on today. I really believe in what we are doing and God being behind it. I guess that its too easy to hope that God will just make the money flow in. I've read all the books on funding, to separate the role of God in moving people to give and my role of letting our needs known without being pushy or too much of a salesman is difficult.

The other issue we have is designated funding. I don't know if you can really call it a problem, but its an issue. We made a commitment in March that we would never borrow from, or use funds from one account to another to make the budget in Peru or support us. So as we have funds in the bank ear marked for projects we can't use them to fund the monthly operations of JungleMaster. That's great but we're running the risk of bankrupting the ministry with cash still in the bank. That's why I had to go out and find a job, the only solution was for us to give up our support to fund the work in the jungle. Is that still borrowing from one fund to keep another going? Yes, but its the only fund that I have discretion over, so what do we do? To those of you that send money for us as support, please bear with us and have patience and when giving increases we will transition back to "fuller-time ministry".

In San  Jose

What's the hard part? Janet and I have put everything into this for years, for 80% of the time we didn't get any support from JungleMaster, for two years we took $300 dollars a month and for 3 months we took our full support. We hoped and prayed as we went into full-time ministry that we had paid our dues and God was finally rewarding us....it just didn't happen, and maybe it's all because of me. Its just hard for me when its my family that has paid the highest price for this ministry.

Mostly though I need to say how much I appreciate everyone that has hung in there and supported us and this mission through the years. The steadfast friends that have sent funds year after year, the brother in Oklahoma that saved up and sent a cashiers check for $1:00, the 10 year old that saved his lawn mowing money all summer long and sent it to us.....these are sacred dollars.........We often pray through each name as we send out our prayer letters; as we put on the labels its a reminder of a name, a family and a relationship, its just a small way we can make an offering back to those that support us.

Last Friday, I had talked to an on-fire supporter of ours, I told him of our need to find ways to get the budget straightened around; he shared it with his wife who proceeded to drop to her knees to ask God to help. Their little girl listened into mom, ran upstairs and grabbed her piggy bank and came down and said, "Here mom, give this to the people in the jungle"...my oh my....that makes me tear up.

You still can help....there is the seemingly "not so obvious idea" of giving, also... how about hooking us up with someone in your church. Having an opportunity to speak before a congregation and let the Holy Spirit touch hearts bears amazing fruit. One Sunday can literally change our economic future. We went to a small community church of 25 people and in two Sundays raised one time gifts of over $3,000.00.

We also want your stuff. Everyone has something of value that has been just sitting around collecting dust that they don't want. It maybe too much of a hassle or just not worth your time to sell, ship and deal with. We have a team of people ready to come get it and clean it up to sell it for JungleMaster. We have had lots of weird stuff that we have been able to move,... give me a call at 360.510.1563

I'm also working on writing a book, its title is, "The JungleMaster" following God in the Amazon. One day when you read about all of the stuff we've been through it will blow you away. Its not a "Jim Elliot" story, more of a "Annie" meets "Godzilla".............................

We won't quit, God will provide......has provided and will continue to bless...

Thanks...Tom and Janet

Jimmy was just doin the Lords work....

Today Janet and I are celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary, last week we began to think we should do something special but there were a lot of obstacles in our way. Over the week God took our "Perfect Storm" and created a "Perfect Calm" .....Our daughter Tessa had cheer camp from Thursday to Saturday, I finished a bunch of projects on Wednesday that allowed us to pay our bills, one customer gave me an extra $200.00..that gave us a bit of extra cash, we owned a tent and we guessed that we could go camping for the same amount of money as staying home plus a bit of fuel and 8 bucks a night at the National Park. So that was it; we went camping for two nights for our 30th and we went to Mazama (as it sounded a little like Mazatlan, it was a bit exotic too).

As we were loading the truck, Janet and I decided to make this a ministry trip too and we prepared some of our handouts and committed to stop at every church we spotted along the freeway. Our first Church was the Valley Baptist Church in Sedro Wooley. We pulled into an empty parking lot and I jumped out secretly hopeful that no one was there and I could just drop the stuff off and run. I grabbed the handle of the door but it opened so unexpectedly that I found myself standing in the office area of the church. Within a couple of seconds a frazzled guy with a cell phone stepped into the hall and gave me this really skeptical look.

"Hi, my name is Tom Clark and I'm a missionary in the Amazon, I know you get a lot of this....." I was cut off by Pastor Mike,

"Yes we do and I'm really busy now, could you drop your stuff off, I'm in the middle of a problem right now could you please?..."

"Sure no problem" I said, "Tell you what brother, we'll be praying for you as we drive east too"

I left him with our stuff and didn't get a mile down the road before I realized that God had called us to make this a ministry opportunity too. It wasn't about us dropping our stuff off but about us seeking the needs of these guys that served in the small churches in rural communities. We prayed for Pastor Mike as we pulled into the various churches we saw, some were empty, some had VBS going, when we reached Concrete we found the "Community Bible Church",... Pastor Rob was outside helping his daughter get the lawn mower going. I stopped and introduced Janet and myself and even offered to help him fix his mower. He graciously declined yet we drove off realizing that these guys serving in the community churches were the heroes of the faith. Without big staffs and lots of help they did the preaching, mowing and painting all on their own.

Janet and I continued to stop and leave our information packet and we stopped at 12 churches over the two days to Mazama and back. The second day we realized that on one of the stops my cell phone must have fell out of the truck, after thinking it through I realized that I lost it in Marblemount. The phone has all my contact information and it would be another huge loss to us, second only to the computer that was stolen out of our house two weeks before. We were heading to Winthrop when Janet noticed she had a voice message, "Hi, my name is Jimmy and I found your phone at the Marblemount Chapel, I'm bikin to Idaho and I........(we were cut off)

Janet and I figured that Jimmy must be coming through Winthrop and if he was making time he should be there about the same time we were. We went to town looking for someone that looked like a Jimmy with a southern accent, everyone looked like Jimmy at that point...........

On the way back to Mazama Jans cell phone rang again, "Hi, my name is Jimmy and I'm just doing the Lords work. I have your cell phone and I need to get it back to you"

We spent several minutes making arrangements for Jimmy to leave the phone at the Shell station in Marblemount and thanking him for helping us out. We explained to him how he was helping a brother in ministry and how he was being used by God.

When we lost our phone God had one of our brothers who was committed to doing "His work", ready to cover our backs. When we were we pulling out of Marblemount, God had His man Jimmy peddling in....

I guess that whether we're on vacation celebrating an anniversary or biking across the State of Washington, we can be doing "ministry" every moment, its an eternal perspective that I need to be thinking about or I just get lost in my busyness....But that's what we are called to do...., No?

Yes, Jimmy was doing the Lords work, Thanks Brother!

'First will be Last'
This is the latest newsletter......

Medical Mission

We gathered a huge amount of equipment at home and as we traveled into the Amazon we culled down the equipment to what we believed would be the best things to have on hand while in the jungle. The Team was amazing. With the broad expertise of a nurse, para-medics and an engineer; God had hand picked a great combination.

The team set up the church as a clinic and had stations for check-in, pharmacy, triage and consultation. The church turned out to be a solar cooker and even with the huge amount of stress working in the heat for two days, plus the massive amounts of bugs that attacked from the dirt floor, not even a single breath of displeasure was voiced. In total our team saw 116 people over two days. What a huge blessing for the people of Dos de Mayo and a huge blessing for us.

As people walked out of the jungle they were registered at a check in by Reyna our Peruvian nurse, moved on to John, John, Craig and Rich for triage. Alivia handled the shots and handing out the meds. Ed kept track of the Pharmacy. It worked! BUT!!...it was really hard work...you have to give these the med team huge props, they suffered in that hot box, were devoured by bugs and stayed in there and got it done. It was so much harder than my tasks, only after I had returned from the trail and shortwave radio did I realize how much they had gone through.....It was so bad that even with the heat they had to wear long pants and shirts tapped down to keep the bugs out. 

The one relief was the late afternoon swim in the little river that flowed by the village.. (And a bunch of bug repellent) ....

Up-Date on our fuel issues.

As you read this it may be a bit of a shock that we were stranded 390 miles deep in the jungle with no fuel and needing 190 gallons to get back to the beginning of the only road that leads to an airport and our ticket home.....

We had planned on having a canoe with a peci-peci bring fuel to withing 40 miles of our destination, but once we discovered that we were in trouble we had to get a hold of the crew in that boat and have them bring the fuel all the way to our location. If not for the fact that the shortwave radio was working in Dos de May we wouldn't have been able to do so... With the Sat-phone we may have called out for help but it would have been 3 days before anyone could come...We wouldn't have starved but we would have missed our flight possibly. 

The whole issue was caused by the boat owner who had never been to Dos de Mayo, even though this guy is the director of tourism in the area and has many boats taking people all over the river. Needless to say when I went into rescue mode I was up-set. Using my best Spanish, I let those guys know what huge idiots they were and they only had to tell me the truth about how much fuel they had and let me give my input. Never again will I hire a boat and let the control of our logistic get out of my hands.

Our ability to mobilize our team in Santa Rita to transport fuel is what ended up saving our butts. When we radioed Santa Rita they purchased every gallon of fuel in town and loaded up a borrowed canoe and peci-peci and headed off for a difficult journey. They ran the fuel up river for two days to meet the fuel boat that we turned around from Dos de Mayo to intercept them and then turn around to meet us at check point 4, about 100 miles round trip. These guys busted their humps to get us fuel to get out of the jungle. 

So we loaded fuel in Dos de Mayo, intercepted the second canoe 150 miles down river with the first canoe, had it turn back around to meet us at the 100 mile point. We then transferred that fuel on the river, ran down to San Jose to pick another 80 gallons that we had arranged to have dropped off by the ferry,.

Day One:

Sorry for the delay in getting this post up, I was able to use the satellite phone as a phone but every time I tried to get it to work as a modem, my computer would lock up. I worked on the issue while in Dos de Mayo but with all the issues we were having I didn't want to waste batteries in case things really fell apart.

So here we go, this is the updates as I wrote them while up river.....

Even as I write this, Alivia and the Doctor are working to help a baby from Santa Rita with the flu….Its a little tough with a language barrier but we are working though the issues step by step.

Our boat ride to Santa Rita went really well, The trip from Nauta took just 3 hours! We were a bit over-loaded but beyond that it went well….

By the time we left Iquitos we were on our third Doctor, # 1 broke his leg, # 2 had to work all night in the hospital and couldn’t leave, but # 3 was just the guy we needed. Doctor Antonio is connected with the Health system in this part of the jungle. When we arrived in Santa Rita the 1st Doctor had left town to get his leg set, but he didn’t talk to the nurses at the clinic and give them authorization to release the medication that we had purchased. She required us to phone the number two guy in the medical system to get authorization to take the meds. It just so happened that Antonio knows the guy and has been up river and had the required level of background that the “head Doc” told the nurse to give “JungleMaster” whatever they needed. Problem solved! The “wrong” guy was the right guy to have when things went south. Thankfully no complications so far……..

At 8am we leave for Dos de Mayo, we have our permit, Meds, cook and Doctor. Our goal is to reach Hamburgo aka Check point 6. We’ll stay the night there and head for Dos de Mayo the next morning, about 3 hours up river from there.

Pray for safety and Logistics.

Day two –To Dos De Mayo.

We now have our Peruvian nurse, Doctor Antonio and the medicines loaded on the boat and ready to go.

Last night we were discussing fuel and consumption; with the information we received, realized once again, that we didn’t have enough fuel for our expedition. We ended up purchasing an extra 55 gallons in Santa Rita and loaded up a canoe with the fuel, to run it up river to drop off it as a back up. Once we are returning from Dos De Mayo we will be able to pick the fuel up on the river bank and refuel the boat. The fuel issue was a big point of argument on who knew what, how much the engine burned per hour and how far we had to go. The fact is that I know boats, Ed Alm has a GPS and he had mapped out just how far we had to travel using Google Earth. By the end of this journey I think we’ll know who was right…..



I’m writing this in the boat and we have just past Check point one, the river is chocked with Lilly pads, slight over cast and it’s relatively cool for the jungle. The jungle here is dense, so much so that it would take a huge effort just to travel inland a few feet. Trees along the river form a barrier wall to anyone trying to penetrate into its depths, it’s like a 100 foot tall wall, backed up with a footing of impenetrable brush all entangled as a solid surface. Even Home Base doesn’t have enough green paint samples to cover the multitude of colors along the river. The further we travel, the narrower the river, once we reach Dos de Mayo it will only be a few yards wide. Check point two is just a few miles ahead, more soon I hope.


At check point 3 we picked up a Park Ranger to guide us up river and offer a little extra layer of protection.. …IRENA; the park protection service had used the shortwave radio to call the check point and made, as a requirement for us, to take our new passenger “Israel” with us.


Now late in the day; we only made check point 4, but we were able to get in early enough that we could get settled. This check point has a bunk house and a facility for visitors, other than the ranger had just used a few gallons of gasoline to kill bugs by spraying it on all of the floors it was great, but we elected to use the other “bug filled” house to hang hammocks in and pass on the bug free version.

Everyone is doing great, Thankfully; no problems thus far…



Tom and team…..

Day Three Arrival in Dos de Mayo.

Leaving at 7 am we are making good time, the motorista continued to slow down and not until later did we discover why.

At check point 5 we passed our fuel boat (they had traveled all night) This later would prove to be a bad idea. But we made it to Hamburgo with no issues.

Hamburgo to Dos de Mayo should have been two hours, the motorista had slowed to 15 mph and we were sneaking up on three hours when we started to have issues, twice the engine died before it finally died with just a mile to go. It soon became apparent that the motorista lied to us about how many gallons of fuel we had started out with and that we were painfully short of fuel. It may be 1 mile to Dos de Mayo but we were 390 miles from civilization……

I jumped to the rear of the boat to take over the control of the issues. All of the operators of the boat said there was “NO” more fuel as I yelled back to them that there was always more and we needed to pour everything together in one small diameter container to be able to use whatever was left. They were adamant there was nothing left so I pushed them aside as we were losing ground against the river and I was just a bit upset that they had lied to me and assured me they knew what they were doing.

I did find fuel in the 55 gallon drum and poured it in a 2 gallon container, the other two containers added a few drops and I had about an inch of fuel in the small container. I primed the engine and used about half of our precious fuel, pulled the choke and yelled, “Vamanos” ..Lets Go…The engine fired off and we had head way, I was yelling, “slowly and keep to the right bank of the river, stay close enough that when it dies we can pull in immediately.” The fuel vanished in a minute and I had just the fuel in the hose; knowing it was moments before the engine died for the last time, I looked up and saw that the operator was following the left side of the river, now I was yelling forward and had to explain why I had told them what I wanted, “WE Have just a moment left and Dos de Mayo is on the OTHER side of the river, when it dies we need to WALK, and I CAN’T walk across the WATER..MOVE OVER NOW!......”. This seemed to cement the issue of leadership and they moved the boat, I yelled again, “When I tell you, turn in to the beach, DO NOT let the boat drift..” Seconds later the last of the fuel was burnt and I yelled forward for them to turn, the engine was slowing and I knew that pulling the choke would give me a couple more seconds, just enough to get to the shore. When we had stopped we were within a half mile or so of the step of point for the trail into Dos de Mayo.


So here we were; half the team took up the adventure of hiking through the jungle to Dos de Mayo and the other half waited in the boat. We were planning to get to the village and send a boat with a peci-peci back to tow in the boat. I guess it was about 30 minutes of hacking through the jugle until we reached the check-point and the head of the river to Dos de Mayo and about another 30 minutes to Dos de Mayo.


Once in the village we found the church had constructed a guess house and even had a bathroom…. Maybe nothing you would recognize…

So the next day as the team prepared for the clinic, I hiked the 2 mile to the short wave radio to call out and arrange for a fuel drop. (not as easy as it sounds) I think by the time we had a plan in place to get fuel we were on plan “G”, having worked through the rest of the alphabet.

So here’s how it went:

Radioed Nauta to get hold of the owner of the boat. No one could find him, in the office or at home, worked through 5 phone numbers, no luck…radioed the check point to find our first planned fuel boat to make sure that they are still on the river.

Status; We found our fuel boat at check point 6, they were stalled because of permission; Check point six asked for medical help…my reply, “Fuel here, meds there”. They gave permission for the canoe to proceed to Dos de Mayo….

Status; 55 gallons on the way,… all the way to Dos de Mayo.

Status; still short 80 gallons.

Radioed Santa Rita, gave them 5 phone numbers for the owner of the boat, and the names of two people to relay information to him. No one could reach him.

Radioed San Jose to prepare them for the possible fuel drop and arrange for someone to pick up the fuel and start it up-river. The owner needed to get the fuel on the ferry that day to give us enough time to get it up river so that we can make it out on time.

Radioed Santa Rita had them try all of the phone numbers, no one can get the owner.

Radioed Check point 3 to see if the launch from the university was still there and if we could get fuel from them…the launch left the day before.

Radioed Santa Rita, asked if one of the local venders, “Gustavo’ had any fuel left, he had none but could get some in two day…too long we needed fuel now. Asked him if there was any other fuel in Santa Rita, he said he would check and radio back. Gustavo called back and said he wasn’t sure how much and he would buy everything in Santa Rita and get it started on a canoe to Dos de Mayo as soon as he could.

Status; possibly, we have enough fuel on the way….

Total was 3 hours on the radio and a 4 mile hike in the jungle. My expectation was that we would have the first boat in by 4:30 and it was 5pm when they arrived. Then around 7pm we found out that check point one had radioed up that a canoe had just passed them heading for us with 80 gallons of fuel on board.

Amen………………………………..

Its never easy traveling in the jungle, trusting people and equipment, and changes in plan are the norm. Thankfully no complications so far.

After a day and a half without any sleep we arrived in Iquitos Monday morning. Trying to sleep at the Airport was kinda un fruitful, our layover in Lima was only 5 hours, that's not enough time to run into the city get a hotel and return, so we elected to just hang out and wait for our next flight. Everyone had their own little place to curl up and try to sleep but it just doesn't work well.

We did have a little excitement getting through customs, every bag with medical supplies got red lighted. That meant that we received a physical inspection. I'm not sure why they let us through without duties, both the ladies working the counter weren't too happy about  us not declaring the bags of supplies we had; maybe it was our ONG, maybe our promises to be better the next time or our plea for the people of the jungle, but the head inspector just shook her head and said "You can go, just next time declare your stuff first."

The flight to Iquitos was OK, we just had the oldest 737-200 still in the air, The two flight attendents had to put a little shoulder into it to get the door shut. Our original plan was to head straight to Nauta and be in Santa Rita Monday evening but we had some issues getting a permit to enter the National Reserve. Lucho was able to get the permit in hand buy mid-day, we thankfully used the day to rest  instead.

Oh yeah, we also had to change doctors at the last minute, the original Doctor broke his leg.

Tuesday at 8am we will take all of our gear plus the doctor, and our staff to Nauta, get on the boat and be in Santa Rita around 4pm. If this post is a bit funny sounding its because I need to sleeeeeep.. So see ya and keep praying. Two more things, I'm still struggling with the Sat-Phone, it now connects but locks up my computer, some kinda conflict...I still think I will get it to work but don't worry if we lose contact.....and we all are doing great! The group is doing well and I think I can say for each one of us that we are fitting together really great!

See ya soon...Tom

Hi there,

This should be cool!.....my Sat-Phone is working now as a modem and I will be able to transmit from the deepest parts of the Amazon. My plan is to up load daily photos and moment by moment up-dates from the remote little village of Dos de Mayo. Forward This to Your Friends.....

We leave Sunday.
Check out    http://junglemaster.blogspot.com/   daily!!....
Send this link to your friends!
Add yourself as a "follower" on blogger to get e-mail notifications of posts....
Announce this in your Church and small group...

This trip includes;
Rich Bosman, John Swobody, John Shorthill, Ed Alm, Alivia Danskin, Craig Johnson and Tom Clark; when we get to Iquitos we'll pick up my Director, Lucho Rios, Wilder and our cook Alan. Once we hit Santa Rita (180 Miles up river from Iquitos) we pick up two Peruvian nurses and the local Doctor. From Santa Rita we travel 120 miles up a side river to get to Dos de Mayo. We have a huge pile of medical supplies donated by many local agencies and companies.

OH yeah....If you know me and picked up this "forward" from a friend, I need to get your e-mail to keep you posted..Send me a note and get on my list...

Check out my blog and see what happened on the last trip, it will blow you away!...http://junglemaster.blogspot.com/

Want to help? Right now we could use your gift to offset our costs for medical supplies (drugs we purchased in Peru) and transportation. Go to www.junglemasterusa.com and hit the donate link. Or you can mail a check to our office at 1323 Lincoln St. Bellingham, WA 98229

Pray for Safety and all of the Logistics of 600+ miles of jungle by boat....

Only for Him
Tom Clark

Nothing Changes in The Jungle, Except those that Pass through it... True, in fact the jungle seems to be a huge mass of organisms in some kind of a symbiotic relationship. The problem is, as North Americans we become the parasitic infection and the jungle works to expel you the moment you arrive. The secret is to act like a good parasite, imitate something that the organism recognizes.....Imitate the locals...

The local people don't try to change the jungle to meet their needs, they adapt to it. North Americans lather on the deet, slap bugs, bring fans, hide in nets and alter their immediate environment to be like home. The locals slow down, don't overheat, bathe in the river and meet their environment as immutable.

The jungle is no Pandora from Avatar fame, there is a big group of folks now that want some type of utopia in the Amazon,... not going to happen.

Here's the bright side, You can have a great trip to the Amazon, you just need to slow down and be wise, don't let the bugs and heat get ahead of you. Never run when you can walk, never walk when you can sit or sit when you can lay down, never be awake when you can sleep. Eat when its available, always get dry if you have the opportunity. Go with the jungle, not against it. Don't make stupid mistakes and don't get over-confident. Simple Huh?

Ready, Set, Go..
This will be the shortest turn around that I've ever had. 18 days from return to departure. Praise God that this time I'm not as tired as I normally am and I can see going again as a real possibility. (Really Real) When we leave on May 2nd, I will be accompanied by 6 Bellingham'ers...This will be a medical mission to Dos de Mayo, deep in the Amazon.

I've been to Dos de Mayo before and its so deep in the jungle that they like to say that they have been forgotten by the government and the world. We expect about 400 people from the local jungles to start to gather in the village soon, word is out up river and they are coming to meet us.

We have needs too, we have to purchase medical supplies and medicines and expect to spend 1000 dollars on vaccines. If you want to help where there is no help, contact me or go to www.junglemasterusa.com and hit the "Donate" link.

Buy a Horse, Give a Chicken...

We did manage to purchase over 40 chicken and take them upriver to give to local families. If you remember we did a fund raiser that offered to give a chicken away in exchange for your purchasing one of 115 horsepower, so we could get a new motor on our boat in the Amazon. It was funny trying to explain to the folks up river the concept and why we wanted to take a photo of them holding a chicken. The first few folks came up and gave their names, held the chicken and got their picture taken; then promptly put the chicken back. I realized that they were being gratious in following our wishes but didn't understand that they got to keep the chicken.

I had Bob Vance explain again that they were to keep the chicken and take it home and the happy mood we had going even became more joyful. Once things got straightened out it went really well as there was a new motivation for getting a photo taken with a chicken for the gringos.

Soon I'll get photos out to supporters, so if you partisipated, your "family" photos will be coming soon.

Follow Me on this blog and you'll know when there are up dates..plus send the link to others.

So overall, this team did a fantastic job. Everything we wanted to accomplished was done, not just done, but done really well. From the seminar to the well and everything in between, this group blew it out of the park! But the enemy knows just where to hit us when someone is taking ground for the kingdom.

We had three different issues with health of family members while we were gone, Lucho had issues at home with his family, we were attacked from every angle and every weakness. But we came together each and every time stronger than than we started. We kept to our times together at night to decompress and our devotion times in the morning, we prayed for each other and showed grace to one another.
I really learned a lot about myself and areas that I need to change and give up to God. I hope my leadership will improve and each team will benefit from the experience gained from all the trips before them.

This will be the fastest turn around for me that I've ever had as I go back with another team in May. But, God is good and I'm not as tired as usual, I feel that I'm actually ready to go.  Stay tuned as I'm working to get my Sat Phone working and hope to post from the deepest parts of the Amazon....

A friend said that, "God has called me and He has a support team out there for me, but it's my job to find it."

How do I know that this is a call? There is no way that this can be done part-time any longer... To quote a phrase that everyone uses when they listen to what JungleMaster is doing or comes down here and sees the mission, "This is WAY bigger than we had imagined".

This last week in the jungle is proof, We did a seminar for the local pastors that brought out 200 people, 26 leaders from 22 Churches in 19 local communities. To these men this conference was a "Willow Creek Leadership Conference" times two. We are uniting the local churches with the only jungle based missionary sending church in the upper Amazon. Just ask those that where here; it was huge, transformational, uniting and Blessed.....Next year we expect 1000 brothers there and we will have and three days of teaching and a community outreach for the second annual "Missionary Festival of the Amazon"

We also completed a well that is deep and clear, we now CAN produce water projects in the Amazon using the brothers in the church, keeping the funds in the church.

Jorge Arevelo, The pastor from Lima was there.. his quote, "I have been involved in missions in the Amazon for over 15 years, to see what you are doing is amazing and not been done before, your level of accountability and the quality of the work your doing has never been seen here, God will prosper this far more that you can believe, it will double or triple."

We are going to Dos de Mayo for a medical mission, right now they don't have any medicine there, they take their sick to the church for healing.....Two years ago, when we did the Church plant there they had not had the word of God. Last week the Pastor from Dos de Mayo said that, "We used to only hear the cries of the drunk at night, now we hear the songs of Jesus.

What part of this would God not bless? Yet, I may be at the point of not only the longest transition to missions in history, but also the shortest ministry recorded.

To get all of these group trips planned and completed, then trying to finish up my boat repair projects; all I have done is shoot myself in the foot. I have not been able to do the one-on-one sit downs that is required to raise the funds to sustain full-time ministry. My issues with being reluctant to directly ask for money has made it difficult to be pro-active enough to raise the funds we need to sustain this and we are now out of time. God needs to pour Himself into this thing,.

"So, Tom cut to the chase".You might be saying now...... Even with whats been added over the last couple of months we are still almost 5000 per month short. That includes our support, the increases in staffing in Peru, the softer dollar and completion of projects there. Most of what we have been able to raise for support is getting chewed up with ministry in the jungle.

Am I trusting God if I go get a job next week? Or do I need to make my needs known and see if He blesses? Both?

Just Pray...the funds to do these things come from the least expected places, but God Knows. He's ramping things up exponentially and I know He has a way out..........................

Sunday we were at Jorge Arevalos church in Barranco, and outskirt of Lima, and attending worship there. The music was amazing and electric, afterward there was testimonies from some of the new 40 believers that came to Christ as a result of a Wednesday rally. The guest speaker was a Pastor from Iquitos. After she was done she came up to greet us and thank us for our service to her country and the people in the jungle. She then looked at me in the eye and said that she had noticed that I was tired. Right at that Carl Angell walked by and said to her "this man needs a word from you" pointing to me. She looked at me deep in my eyes and without loosing eye contact for several minutes she proceeded to tell me, "The work you do is very hard and you are the type of person who won't give up..... God has much more for you to do, all of what you are going through is to make you stronger and to make your family stronger, but I want to tell you something......you are not alone, God has been walking with you from the beginning. The work will get harder and you need to be prepared. God will bless your effort and your ministry is about to multiply." I know she said much more than that but she had me blown away and I didn't hear much more than that. She has never met me, nor did she know anything more that that I was a missionary from the US. But she spoke right through me......

Well, after several days of no contact with the outside world I need to continue to update you on our time in the jungle......The well drilling went great, the first thing I noticed was that the guys we had knew what they were doing. We have been training Wilder and Wilter to operate the equipment and we also brought along a friend of ours named Chavo. This is the first time I met Chavo and I instantly liked him. He is a tough guy; here they say, "He is a pussycat that looks like a Lion on the outside". When he shakes your had he's testing to see what your made of.........Joel, Chavo, Wilder and Wilter worked all of the first day in the jungle to get the hole bored. Joel worked his rear off with the Peruvians move by move. By the end of the day they all were covered head to toe with mud, dirt and sweat in 85 degrees and 90% humidity. But; they got it done, hole in the ground 27.5 meters deep and the casing in. We had an issue with not enough gravel and had to call Iquitos and have more gravel sent in by ferry, that meant that we had to arrange for the supplier to send the gravel up river on a promise to pay. Praise God we have a reputation here that opens doors even with credit. Two days later the ferry off loaded the gravel and the guys finished the well, mixed concret and sealed it. After flushing the well, we had clear water. We still need to test it but we are well on our way.

The other thing Joel worked on, was the generator at the mission center. He found at least 5 issues that made it not run well, the major one was a broken flywheel key. Joel fashioned one from a key from another but different motor; with some filling and modification, the last day had a victory!.

All in all Joel really bonded with the Peruvian drilling staff, Joel worked so hard the the team gave him an ovation at the end of his day...it was really cool to watch......

The last day of the seminar we had all the Pastors gather up front and everyone in the church came forward for a hug and greeting, (jungle tradition) when Pastor Javier came forward and began greeting the leaders from 19 local communities, he was completely overwhelmed. For him it was the answer to a 15 year long prayer to unite the local churches as a missionary sending team. Our goal from the beginning with JungleMaster has been to unite all the tiny local churches to produce a powerful force to change this part of the Amazon, for two days in the seminar we talked about this union and now it was happening......to see that joy from answered prayer pour from Javiers heart was an amazing blessing to me...man, I love that guy.....

The Group from Dos de Mayo made the 120 mile trip to the seminar in canoe and by paddle, it took them over a week to make the trip. When we heard this we knew that we had to do something...as a group we collected an offering and purchased them a Peci-Peci outboard motor and 20 gallons of gas to make the return trip.One night we were invited to the area where they were staying and they treated us to a song...it was tribal and a bit primal but a recognizable local christian tune. We were all blown away.....all of our group watched and talked about how just two years ago no one in that village knew Christ and today the children were singing about Jesus. The Pastor of Dos de Mayo said, "we used to hear only the cries of the drunk in the village at night now we hear the songs of Jesus". This broke me and I had to turn and walk out as I was crying like a baby, only to find Larry outside with big tears running down his face too. .....Thank You Jesus for letting us be a part of that change through this ministry.....

Lastly for today....Lucho and I had a meeting today with the Doctor from Santa Rita. I have been really reluctant and apprehensive about next months medical mission to Dos de Mayo. But after this meeting I'm pumped. The doctor is a great guy with a huge heart for the people of the jungle, he is really tuned into what they need there and he was excited about having our team of paramedics and a nurse come with us. We wrote out shopping lists of equipment and drugs and now have a plan in place.

The people of Dos de Mayo said that they don't have any medicine in the village and so when someone gets sick they come to the new church there to pray over them.........

As I was posting this I checked E-Mail and had more issues that need prayer with my son. The enemy is really having a lot of fun with this, he knows our weaknesses. There has been so many different odd, wild and unexpected things this last two weeks with most all of our leadership that it makes me excited to see the results of our victory....But Pray please...
God bless...Tom

7 days in the jungle now and we leave on Thursday AM aboard the Zucker….40 feet of jungle hardwood fashioned into the general shape of a boat.

I tried everything possible to get my satellite phone to work as a modem as it should and could'nt connect so this report is several days of our trip..

You just never know how these trips will go, group dynamics are the source of lots of studies, “no one returns from the jungle the same as they entered it”. This group has seen that come true, to the person they have found new strengths and insights, or discovered that they were much stronger than they had realized.

The well has been completed and we have a new source of water that is much cleaner and not affected by surface water.

We have about 30 Pastors and Leaders and 180 people attending the seminars here. People have been arriving all night, some as late as 1:00 am. The people from Dos de Mayo paddled a canoe for over a week to get to the seminar…..that’s a 10 hours a day for 10 days ….to learn more of God! We have 19 Villages and 22 churches represented at the seminar. 

Pastor Jorge and Ruth Arevalo, Pastor Javier, Lucho Rios, Pastor Bob Vance, Carl Angell and myself got together to plan the two days of the seminar, I quickly stepped out of the way and let them go. We ended up with two sessions each morning and afternoon and a service in the evenings. Ruth spoke on women of the bible and sung for us, Jorge cast vision and encouraged the Pastors to new levels of integrity. We had sessions on inductive bible study and the Biblical view of equality in marriage. The evenings were worship and praying for healing. 

Terry Hunt had all of these jungle Pastors praying for healing over him, as I stood behind Terry touching his back, I prayed with my eyes closed, at one point I’d opened my eyes to look over Terry’s shoulder to see the 26 jungle pastors, arms raised toward Terry, as if the were holding up a wall and shouting to the Lord; interceding for Terry’s health. It was such a powerful image and I could only thank God for these men and feel as if I was in the presence of giants. 

The Holy Spirit was not “just” there, but moving in a powerful way, for Terry and in worship. The second night I came into the church just as the second song had started and the power of God was flowing. How can you explain the presence of God? Electric, primal, humbling, mesmerized, powerful, intense, joyful, moving, phenomenal, active, alive, love, expectant; all would have to be in the description but I would still fall short. God was there.

All in all; the seminar went amazingly well. The Church served over 1,200 meals, housed 250 people and each member of the Missionary Church of JungleMaster was involved in some way. We ended by honoring the attending leaders and their communities by bringing them forward, taking photos of their attendees and presenting them with a bible. The seminar went so well that we committed to next year doing a Second Annual “Missionary Festival of the Amazon”  The brothers in the jungle where pumped!

The team is well and without medical issues, the bugs are still biting in the Amazon though. When we arrive in Nauta we will get a bus for the two hour ride to Iquitos and there we will have a much needed real bed.

The Jungle does tend to wear you down bit by bit, almost as if it’s trying to kill you slowly. Nerves begin to fray a bit too. I called my wife Janet on my satellite phone in the midst of one of those moments. All she had to do was hear my voice and she said, “just show grace”. I didn’t need to explain or describe what was going on, she could hear it in my voice.

Its interesting two hours after I wrote this; we were in Iquitos and trying to get our rooms sorted out, we were here a day early and the Hotel was having issues with no rooms, I had figured out rooming arrangements ahead of time but with the issues at the hotel I couldn’t get the rooms needed. Now I had to rearrange rooms based on all the various issues of who snores, male and female, and who’s getting along with whom. I had several people standing over me making various requests, I was dealing with the hotel staff, while surrounded with stacks of luggage, I hadn’t slept much in the last week because I had given up my tent and been sleeping in a hammock because of various issues,…..and I popped of.... Woops, the enemy won and I had forgotten to “just show grace”. A confession or an apology means nothing if you finish it with a “but I..” so I’m sorry, no excuses.

This trip has been challenging for many reasons, Joel and I were talking tonight about how much ground we took for His Kingdom this trip and the enemy won’t give it up easily.

There is so much to tell you, I'll add stories to this tomorrow...

continue to pray….

Tom Clark

Well its Monday, I think...not much sleep over the last two days..like 3-4 hours. We are all in Iquitos Peru and had an Alligator and Pichee Lunch. We were going to do some shopping in prep for the trip but no one has anything left in them.

We meet a young Mennonite Missionary last night in the airport and we all got together and prayed for Bobby and his little girl...Don't worry brother we will have 200+ Pastors and leaders praying for you in a couple of days......

We had the absolute most hilarious thing happen in security this morning..sorry but every way I could think of wording it, I just couldn't put the two words together and have it sound right. You will just have to ask one of the returning team members to relay the story....Just to tease you it had to do with Mike, Lucho and the possibility of .........

I'm planning on getting this phone to send data from the jungle but haven't got it wired yet..everyone is doing well and blending as a team

Continue to pray
Tom

New day, everyone is getting along great.  The thing that impressed me today is the amazing amount of generosity and compassion is outpouring from this group.  Many people offered to pay for the extra luggage, food and other items.  We are truly working as a great team.

Lucho was MIA until we reached Lima. His phone was down and we had no contact, finally, I looked at Starbucks in Limas Airport....Lucho! He said that "he didn't know when we would get in but he knew that if he hung around Starbucks long enough that I would show up!"

Be praying......We couldn't find one of our team members that was expected to meet us in Lima, we had him paged, no response..finally we went to Continental desk and we found out that he didn't get on the plane. I checked E-mail and found that his daughter is really sick and he had to stay home.....Pray!!!!

More soon... we are really tired and have another 20 hours to stay up.....

First Day on the way to the jungle.

Have you ever tried sticking 5 pounds of stuff in a 3 pound bag? That would be what getting all of our gear into the two vehicles was like for our trip from Bellingham to Seattle. I guess I should have a real limit on what people can bring, I always start out by saying "don't bring more than you can carry" then we end up somewhere nearer to "how may porters do we have?".... But with all of the special needs, we ended up way more bags than I hoped, Not since Orellana traversed the Amazon has so much been taken into the jungle by so few.

In the morning we break at 4am and head to the airport, flight out at 7:10 am, we will meet two more of the team in Houston, then off to Lima.....

Some bumps as the Extroverts out number the Introverts by lots, pray as we continue to grow as a team....

Wow, we are ready (almost) I have just finished our taxes as I won't be home before the "15th". I got a long ways on the wiring job for the new boat I'm helping my friend Pat build. All of the arrangements are finished for this trip and the next. We head for Seattle Sunday afternoon and will be flying out early Monday......Keep in touch as I hope to post from the jungle via my satellite phone......

The enemy is afoot..... whenever you are about to take ground for the Kingdom the enemy of man hates it. If you're not in the midst of a battle your not any threat, and he leaves you alone. Pray for this ministry and this team going to Peru......we leave for the jungle on Sunday.......

I'm not delusional, I don't think people care about what I'm making for dinner or if I ran around lake Padden today...yet I discovered some people are reading this...I think its more about what Gods doing in the Amazon and not about me or what I'm up too....I'll be more careful what I write here though......

Beyond all that, I'm continuing to be blown away at what Gods doing.. we have just found out that there will be 250 Pastors and leaders at the seminar we are holding in the jungle next week. The only other Ministry that was on the river supporting the local church has pulled out....JungleMaster is IT in a 200 mile radius.......WOW.

Secondly we have Pastor Jorge Arevalo going to the jungle with us, Jorge has an amazing background in leadership, he is running for Mayor in Barranco, a district of Lima, and has the connections to get our Bible Institute up and going and accreditation available for local jungle pastors.Double WOW!!....JungleMaster will have a fully operational Mission sending and training center in the remote Amazon really soon...We will train and equip local leaders for ministry in the most remote parts of the jungle.

Even as God is setting up an amazing ministry through JungleMaster; as things are ramping up at an amazing rate, I still don't see the foundational support coming in to allow us to get all of this done. I know He provides where He calls. JungleMaster is an unmistakable miraculous movement of the hand of God. Only God could have pulled all of this together. So....if you have ever wanted to get involved in what Gods doing now is the time and this is the place. (that means you can give $) It may be time to stop thinking and get on board!

Ok....off the soapbox. Great meeting with the team going in May..tomorrow night is the last meeting with the April team, its a fantastic group, lots of type "A's"...Doing a major video project during the trip that 360 productions is putting together for us. Well drilling, clean water and more.

Way too busy, I continue to aim for my feet and pull the trigger...I don't have time for one on ones to raise funds, I have to concentrate on cash projects to pay bills and finish closing my business. By the time I take the April group and the May group we will be out of funds and no job..........sorry if this talk is to raw for a Missionary candidate (?) Maybe I should only talk about all the amazing blessings and out pouring of Gods hand...all true but there is the reality of where my minds at too. We chose to trust in God and His call, that says we know that he will provide.......

Looking forward to sharing our facilities in the jungle with these next two groups, I'm not looking forward to the flights..once in the jungle I'm out of harms way and feel relaxed though...Keep Praying!

Today all I have to do is; Meet with Mike for a video interview, pick-up parts at Redden, drop off pistons at Reed Machine, order parts for the volvo, work on the 32 footer for 8 hours, take checks by Larrys, May team meeting at 7pm. Start assembling the block for the 350 Chev, pick up program for taxes, start taxes, start prayerletter to get sent before I go, notify team of the meeting tonight and on Weds...............Leave for Peru in 6 days.....

I've noticed that its been a long time since I have posted anything. I'll do better.....

In the last few years I've been working towards full-time missions. As of the first of day of 2010 my wife and I decided to pursue full-time ministry....so what does that mean? On one hand its a lot of trusting in God to provide when all else seems to say "this is a stupid idea".....the other side is "why would God have blessed so much of what we have done in the jungle if He didn't intend to provide for its completion?"

We've been killing ourselves working what has been essentially two full time jobs. Fixing boats and doing ministry. So we needed to make a change, but how do we raise funds? How do I "work" to provide for my family, "Work" to raise funds, and still manage the ministry and take groups to the jungle?

Everything I do; I shoot myself in the foot. If I'm turning a wrench to make money I'm not raising the long term support that I need to do this ministry full-time, If I'm raising funds, I'm not paying my bills. If I'm not 100% pursuing ministry, am I really trusting God?

This is my journey, It may be a bit too raw for the weak but is reality....

I leave for the jungle again in a week, before I go I have a 32 foot fishing boat to wire and install the engine, a 350 chev to rebuild and taxes to get done.................

How did I get to this financial black hole? Its a long story..... but between ministry, businesses that have failed and faltered, kids in college and a lot of bad decisions, here we are.

My wife and I are working at getting this all straightened around, we have a plan....God has a plan......its just being faithful.