Our Garage Sale

28 November 2015
We held our first garage sale to clear out our belongings and raise some funds for our Peru trip.  There was one outstanding happening at this event which I will never forget and which I want to share with you.

This was becoming emotionally difficult as we were getting rid of a number of our sentimental belongs.  Then an older man purposely walked past all our tables of stuff and directly up to me where at the time I was standing on our driveway at the back of it all.  He looked me in the eyes and said (in my words):

“I saw your article in the North Shore Times recently and I want to tell you that you are doing the right thing.  I had the opportunity about 30 years ago with my family to go to Rwanda and do what you are going to do in Peru, but we chose not to go.  There were various reasons at the time, but in hindsight none were worth stopping us going.”

By this time he had tears in his eyes and his face was full of regret.

He went on to assure me our mission to Peru will be the best thing I could ever do with my family, and to never to look back as he did.  He then turned and walked down our driveway into his car and drove off.  He was not there to buy anything but to provide a most timely assurance.

My sentimentality issues with my “coveted possessions” and any doubts that were remaining were addressed then and there.

Our first garage sale for Peru (16 Oct 2015)

Chris

Adventure in Compassion

16 October 2015

Our family have always been active in our community.  And so the North Shore Times ran an article on our family going to Peru – Adventure in Compassion.  See per link here;

Click to download PDF

We were so honoured to have this community exposure and awareness for our cause.

Chris

Klaus’ Inaugural 2015 Australian Tour

22 October to 15 November 2015
Klaus arrived at Sydney international airport in the evening of Thursday 22 October with a terrible cold! I hurried him off to his hotel to try and sleep it off as we had and early start the following morning.

Friday 23 October we were on the road at 6:30am for a radio interview at FM94.9 on the Central Coast of NSW. Then we tripped back to Sydney for an interview with Ray Notley of Pioneers followed by two more radio interviews throughout the afternoon - Vision Radio in Brisbane and LightFM in Melbourne made over the phone.

Radio interview with Dr John at FM94.9 on the Central Coast, NSW (23 Oct 2015)

Then to cap a busy Friday off, Klaus presented to Rohde & Schwarz (R&S) in North Ryde. This was well received and so much so, regional Broadcast Media Manager, Nils Ahrens and National Sales Manager, Richard Popple addressed Chris to say this was a fantastic thing we were doing as a family with Diospi Suyana, and acknowledging that we needed to upgrade our R&S ETL broadcast test unit for our work in Peru, they had decided to upgrade it for us gratis!

This upgrade is valued at AUD$25k and is in fact real money for R&S Australia who are a separate business unit to their principle company in Germany, so it comes out of their own back pocket so to speak. This upgrade will enable my ETL unit to operate with the Latin American digital TV standard (ISDB-Tb) and for FM radio work. I was so honoured that day let me tell you!

Nils Ahrens of R&S presenting the ETL upgrade to Chris Welch (11 Feb 2016)

Another highlight of Klaus’ trip was presenting to Radio Frequency Systems (RFS) in Kilsyth, Melbourne on Monday 9 November. During his one hour presentation, a visible impact was observable on many faces in the packed out training room. At the end, Mick Bennet - Director of Engineering, Broadcast and Defence, stood up to say “Chris, how can we support you?” Moreover RFS had just completed a successful trade show in Peru some 3 weeks earlier, and in fact RFS had riggers in Peru at that time installing a digital television tsunami warning system for the Japanese.

My requirements for antenna systems are yet to be determined (subject to licensing), and I committed to get back to RFS in due course.

Klaus and Chris outside of RFS factory, Kilsyth (9 Nov 2015).

Again I was honoured by another key industry supplier for my sacrifice and work with the underprivileged of Peru.

Just prior to the tour, we were approached by a family in Melbourne who’s son Joshua had read Dr John’s book “I have Seen God” detailing the indisputable workings of God to see the inception to completion of Diospi Suyana. They located Sandi from an internet search which amazingly led to them organising a presentation at the Stairway Church.

This also so happened to attract and reconnect old Sydney home-schooling family friends Peter and Kim Kamper, as Peter had travelled throughout Peru and held a special place with him. Peter has subsequently helped with marketing of the Welch’s in Peru mission and Diospi Suyana.

Dr John and Chris Welch with the Berry family (8 Nov 2015).

Other presentations of Klaus’ tour included various churches in Sydney (including of course our own LifeSource church and Torchbearers), Melbourne (including the Stairway Church, St John’s German Lutheran Church and YWAM) and the Brisbane area (including Outlook Christian Church, Toowoomba). Of special note, the Toowoomba presentations included a visit of Joan Maxwell, mum of Lyndal Maxwell who has been working tirelessly at Diospi Suyana with John and Martina Klaus since its beginning.

Klaus also connected with our LifeSource Church Latin American friends, and made his 1 hour Diospi Suyana presentation in Spanish. Many of these special new friends of ours are from Peru, and have been amazing in their support of the Welch family and we appreciate and love them very much! It is beyond co-incidence that there is such a significant community of Peruvian’s in LifeSource Church (rather we believe this is a God-incidence).

Dr John presenting to our Latin American LifeSource home-group friends (24 Oct 2015)

Dr John presenting at LifeSource Christian Church (15 Nov 2015)

Diospi Suyana resources at LifeSource Christian Church (15 Nov 2015)

LifeSource Church (left to right) Ps John Iuliano, Chris & Sandi Welch, Dr John (15 Nov 2015)

Further presentations were made to schools, such as Pacific Hills Christian School (PHCS) at Dural, NSW. An amazing connection was made between Dr John and the principal Dr Boyce who shared in a passion for Peru having been there many times himself. In fact he committed to visit us next year in Peru, and furthermore would work toward getting a group of students to visit us on a mission trip!

Dr John presenting to PHCS year 10 students (6 Nov 2015)

PHCS (left to right) Dr Boyce, Chris Welch and Dr John (6 Nov 2015)

Prior to our Melbourne journey, a meeting was held on Saturday 7 November at Chris’ parents Tony & Dawn Lonsdale’s home at Tumbi Umbi on the Central Coast, NSW. This included a wide spectrum of family and friends with an interest in Diospi Suyana – a number having already read Dr Klaus’ book “I have Seen God”. There as standing room only and we were very encouraged by the amazing support received.

Central Coast presentation by Dr John (7 Nov 2015) at Chris’ parents’ home in Tumbi Umbi

One more radio appointment was had, this was with Hope Media FM103.2 at their studios in Sydney on Friday 6 November. A presentation was made to CEO Phillip Randall and Engineering Manager Stephen Wilkinson followed by an interview with Dr John and Chris Welch.

Hope Media visit by Dr John and Chris Welch (6 Nov 2015)

Klaus also presented at Chris’s work - TX Australia (TXA) Head Office. This was an important visit to enable colleagues to understand the project which had called Chris to the change after 28 years working in Australian broadcasting, and 13+ years at TXA.

As a finale’ to Klaus’ tour, a visit was paid to TX Australia’s flagship VHF main transmission site before Klaus flew out of Australia on Sunday 15 November. This site was one of a new AUD $4M transmission building in Willoughby which was also one of Chris’ last projects with the company. It sits directly beneath Australia’s tallest free standing lattice steel tower (233m) adjacent the Channel Nine studios.

TXA Willoughby site main transmission hall (15 Nov 2015)

TXA Willoughby site building (15 Nov 2015)

TXA Willoughby site 233m steel lattice tower (15 Nov 2015)

Chris

A really honest diary moment…

October 30 2015
An extract from my diary:
“This Peru journey has me exhausted. I am ready to stop. We have done nothing but prepare (for Dr Klaus John’s upcoming visit and for ourselves) for months!

It is consuming my every day. Chris went from telling his boss to telling the whole world  and we haven’t been accepted by Pioneers yet and we have no info/support brochure yet. I feel silly now AND still it is filling my every day. Are we stupid? So far we have $150.

God please help us. Please make this work. Increase my faith. Dr John is here in Brisbane now. Please get us the support we need. Please help us to be wise….”

Blessings, Sandi

About our (many) Vaccinations…

July 2015 to February 2016
Yellow fever, Rabies, Typhoid, TB, Hep A & B…
The kids have been amazing!  We have a plan of attack – they choose to count down the days until the appointment.  Then they are ready – as they sit, arm exposed, waiting  - Sandi gives the littlies lolly snakes or lollipops (in the mouth works best) and they amaze the Dr’s with their compliance – and even more with their sincere thankyou’s afterwards!

It has been funny to watch the definition of a great day change – Solomon now proclaims a great day to be any day he doesn’t need to have a needle!

I think I deserve a lollipop for managing the spreadsheet of ‘who has had what when’. ☺

Blessings, Sandi

Vaccination Surprise

14 July 2015
We were surprised to learn how many vaccinations we needed to have to live in Curahuasi. At last count there were 9 needles that we had to have. The first appointment turned out to be very eventful! We discovered that I was pregnant! So baby number 8 is on its way! Very exciting!!!

What did I say last post about trusting God with his plan?  Now I really have to!

Blessings, Sandi

The Learning Curve Begins…

July 2015
We have never travelled this road before.  Chris and Jake have been to Cambodia on short term mission trips, but I am a definite novice! ☺  I must confess to spending a month being concerned about buying new warm jackets for the whole family at the July stocktake sales idea!  It made sense to me – high altitude/ snow topped mountains…

But then I had my understanding moment…… I realised after too much wasted time that I had no idea!!!  We are going to a very poor area, where other missionary families describe kids begging outside their window as they eat dinner, and I am worried about new jackets!  Even more – a Dr already working at the hospital emailed to say NOT to bring warm jackets!    So we returned most of them (yes – to be honest not all).  But lesson starting to be learnt - my organising put me in control but this whole journey is showing us that God needs to be in control and is doing this good work, not us.  I need to ask him what needs to be done….


Blessings, Sandi

Confirmations with Radio and School…

27 May 2015

Chris then had lunch with friend and CEO of Hope FM 103.2 in Sydney – a TXA client and fellow Christian.  Chris shared about the Peru chapter opening up for us.  He was so excited and said his station hadn’t supported anything outside of Australia before but he wanted to support Chris with the Diospi Suyana hospital radio project.  Amazingly with the offer of studio equipment and technical support in Peru.   We were so aware of the anointing of God’s hand upon Diospi Suyana.   This was beginning to be like the stories in Klaus’ book for us!

Klaus phoned again to chat and ended with “it looks like you’re the next family to come to Diospi Suyana!”   He indicated at the time that we were to be needed in January 2016. 

So we took the big step of withdrawing Jake from Pacific Hills Christian School (year 10), so he could be at home to learn Spanish and help pack and adjust to distance Ed study.

4 June 2015

We had another amazing appointment – this time with the school principal Dr Edwin Boyce.  We were expecting this to be a goodbye meeting.  However Dr Boyce opened our conversation by saying he was aware of our mission to Peru and it was the best thing we could do as a family and offered to have us present our story at staff devotions.  Furthermore he loved Peru as he had visited there before himself and would put it in his notes to come and visit us next year!

He so encouraged us when he said as we left that this was just the start of our journey together.  God’s anointing on Diospi Suyana continues for us. 

Blessings, Chris

Confirmations…

May 2015 – Chris had been concerned about the mountainous terrain in the Andes and specifically about driving our family around safely.  For the most part there are dangerous cliffs at the road’s edge with hairpin bends at every turn and without the Australian standard of safety railings we were used to!  The Diospi Suyana hospital has received many a patient from buses and other vehicles going over the edge and many deaths are included.

That weekend he went to a church conference night where random bible verse were given out to all entering the centre.  His was Psalm 121:1... 

I lift up my eyes to the mountains — where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip — he who watches over you will not slumber;

We felt like we were ready to commit to this adventure.  Chris and I emailed Klaus together and told him we were still here and interested, and asked what should we do next.  We included the above testimony of Ps 121.  Klaus phoned the next morning to say who wrote the email, we said we had written it together, he said, “It looks like I need to come and meet you then, I will come in October 2015 to Australia”.

Blessings, Sandi

Do we really want to go?

Later in April 2015… Dr John indicated that an initial commitment of three years was needed to complete the proposed transmission project. This was longer than we had thought - but made sense in hindsight as we needed time to learn a new language and culturally adjust to then be useful!  The engineering scope to build a network was big too, and it is hard to know how long it would take. 

It was a searching time – life here suddenly looked different.  God put choices in front of us and we had to choose to trust in the unknown or rest here in short term certainty. 

Chris had unexpected changes at work at his management level.  Were things looking better?  Should we stay now?

We began to complain about our living arrangements (which were a squeeze for us) and were unexpectedly offered a plan to “have” a house!  With all the space we could ever want!  But Peru didn’t fit into the timeframe if we wanted it.  Should we take it?

We believe now God had given us a choice i.e. he was testing us.  We didn’t even have to discuss it though, our hearts said “no”. God had placed Peru in our hearts and we could see how quickly that dream had become bigger than our old dreams.   Soon after without conveying this to anyone else, the offer for the bigger house was withdrawn!

Blessings, Sandi

Now it was time to introduce the concept of moving to Peru with the kids!!

April 2015 – Chris started by reading to the kids as a bedtime story the biography of Klaus Dieter John from the YWAM publication Christian Heroes: Then & Now series. There are 43 books in this series, and I think 40 of them are about missionaries who have long passed on. We have read half of them, and the concept of this faith filled man still being alive was not lost on the kids.

They enjoyed the book and somewhere along the way we introduced the idea that maybe we could go to Peru and help! Keeping it an idea that they could chew over worked well. It helped Chris and I too, as we digested what it would really mean.

It was amazing to see how the older kids all picked out a different Peruvian feature that excited them about moving there. Jake loves an adventure and wants to hike in the Andes and can’t wait to learn Spanish and experience a different culture.

Sam, our keen cyclist, realised the potential of high altitude living some 2.65km above sea level with the training potential of the even higher mountain highways.

Isaac loved the idea of helping Dad with the technical aspects of the project. Then Sarah heard about the perfect Peruvian horses that walk the Inca trails, and Georgia wants to help the poor kids at the afternoon kids clubs the hospital holds each weekday...

It took our breath away to realise how God was sending us to a place that would hold something special for each of the kids. Interests aside, they were all taken by the idea of Peru - to help the poor, to share God’s love and to help Dad with the project.

Blessings, Sandi

The YWAM book which initially inspired us

Mission in Peru with all of us! And a newborn baby and a dog!

We know it sounds a bit crazy... maybe even a lot, so we wanted to share our journey and let you know how God has confirmed this to us, and constantly encourages us to keep going. We hope it encourages you too.

1995 – Chris and I are dating and in an amazing night of worship at a Black Stump music conference decide/promise each other/declare that we would use the talents God has given us for him. That we would be bold enough to do something...

1996 – Chris receives a prophecy that he would reach millions with the gospel…. We are not sure how this could ever come about...

Life is normal, we work, are promoted, have children (OK maybe 7 is not so normal! ), renovate the house, have a pet dog, homeschool, are involved in church, community, sports etc.

2010 – God tells us to sell the house we have just finished renovating. This was really very hard. We do it, not sure if we have heard right or not, but we rent the “not so renovated” house next door and await God’s next instructions.

2015 – We are still waiting – and we must admit are getting very impatient! We find ourselves losing confidence day by day in our ability to hear anything from God. Did we get it all wrong? We knock on doors of African mission societies, but there are no openings.

March 5th 2015 - A dear friend emails us some YouTube links to a hospital in Peru – I don’t watch them. Chris does and he was impressed with what God was doing there.

March later… The same friend phones me in tears one day telling me I just have to read this book, (Dr Klaus-Dieter John – Then and Now YWAM series), so I buy the book and put it on the bookshelf. I don’t have time to read a book!

My dear friend keeps checking if I have read the book yet! No is my constant answer.

We are frustrated at Chris’ job, hours stress, etc. – I seriously pray for a new start.

March 23rd - I need a toe operation, which is a totally silly chain of events but one that leads to me having to sit on the couch for one week - SO I finally read the book!!! Amazing story but the last page speaks to my heart – Dr Klaus-Dieter John is asked what his next project is after the hospital and school are now established, and he answers to set up a radio and television station to transmit the gospel across the Andes and information about the hospital, medical and education etc. It feels like God is saying that this is for us!

The text which called us to action

I check the publishing date at the front of the book, as surely it is old info by now, but is it was published in 2014 (just last year).

It is March 27th and I excitedly look at the Diospi Suyana website and to my surprise the latest newsletter on the first website page says that Klaus is putting out the call internationally, looking for an engineer to come and set up the radio/television station! Wow! – I pray with Mum, who is visiting us from Perth to help look after the kids (while I read books!!) and can’t wait for Chris to get home from work so I can show him!

Chris agrees! It seems like a perfect fit for our family.

We send an email with Chris’ resume attached to a general Diospi Suyana contact address, and can’t believe it when the next day Klaus himself emails us back! It is a basic email clarifying our interest and suggesting a phone call when he returns to Peru. We respond and say yes we would love to chat when he is able.

Then we wait, and it feels like God is testing us. It is a journey of our hearts. Could we really move to Peru? Do we really want to? – for once all the hard questions seem to have easy answers – “yes” and God cements it in our hearts. And then he gives us a chance to put our decision in to action…

Chris knew about the sale of Commonwealth owned television and radio test equipment on GraysOnline auction from a project that he has worked on for the past 2 ½ years.  This was perfect for our broadcast work in Peru, but the auction ends in only two days. Multiple kits are each worth $250,000 but would sell for significantly less. We wait for Klaus to phone so we can confirm if we need the equipment or not.  Klaus doesn’t call.  The auction ends and we feel disappointed that we missed it.  Then a week later there is a second chance auction for remaining unsold units, but still Klaus does not call!

So we decide that God wants us to step out in faith, in action, in decisively choosing this path for our family, so we bought the test equipment for a bargain price from our savings (God’s money really).

On the 7th of April, Chris brings it home, puts it on the floor, goes and makes a cup of tea to sit on the couch with Sandi and reflect on what we have done – and at that very moment the phone rings… it is Klaus John calling us from Peru to say he is interested in us being involved in this project!

Blessings, Chris & Sandi

Welch family with broadcast test equipment

Our "instruments of faith" viz broadcast test equipment