Reid Burke Peru Mission 2012

On March 24, I traveled with 15 others to Peru to help children with disabilities in many ways.

Your donations and prayer support have blessed me and others serving with me. Thank you for making it possible.

In the next few weeks, I will be posting pictures and video from the trip on this website.

Giving Up

I’ve been a Christian since 1996, but in the last decade I spent a lot of time struggling with God. I was giving only a little bit of myself, a few hours on a Sunday, and I felt like God was absent. I didn’t want to go all-in, I just wanted my problems fixed. I stopped going to church in 2009.

But other people made me curious. How did they deal with the hard questions? How were they satisfied? Wasn’t following Christ difficult? How do they keep going?

As I re-entered Christian community, I spent a lot of time wrestling with these questions and a lot more.

I’m by no means perfect, but my heart has been changing after I gave up my old self for devotion to Jesus last year. I’m not following man-made rules, I’m following Christ. My heart now breaks for people in ways I never expected. This is only the beginning.

Are you serious?

Yes. I have not been very open about this struggle, so I can understand if this does not make a lot of sense to some of you. I’m taking the opportunity with Awakening this year to respond to what’s been done in me last year.

Why are you traveling?

This is a short trip, but it can have a big impact. I am taking this opportunity to travel with Awakening to do real work for God’s global purpose, not because I feel like I must do good things or act a certain way, but because I feel like it’s an appropriate response to what Jesus did and instructs us to do: love one another and make disciples.

Of course, I do not have to travel to follow Jesus. There is a lot of help needed locally. I am spending a week in Peru to place my local experience into global perspective.

What will you do?

Our team will be working with missionaries from Young Life Capernaum in Peru.

Young Life Capernaum is a ministry dedicated to children and young adults with mental and physical disabilities.