We rejoice in all that God does and is doing. As Psalm 27 states: “One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to enquire in his temple.” Through prayer, we have the blessed ability to “dwell in the House of the Lord” daily. It is our strength.
As you know, we have been raising support to build a new church building for our mission work in Chancay. We have raised most of what we need. The concrete foundation and floor was poured for the main church auditorium, bathrooms, and for the four classrooms. The outer walls and roof have been put up and we are starting the next phase of installing the windows, doors, electricity, plumbing, and interior walls and platform with the baptistry. We have already purchased 200 chairs.
We still must raise the funds to build the walls of the four new classrooms, complete the bathrooms, and install a septic system and a water cistern.
Thank you to all who have given toward this project. We rejoice in all that God has allowed us to accomplish and look forward to completing this first phase, including the primary church building, bathrooms, septic and water systems, in the coming weeks.
We had another mass evangelism outreach in the city of Arequipa in July. A team from our church with the coordination of other churches in Lima and Arequipa were able to distribute 200,000 Gospel tracts and tens of thousands of New Testaments and whole Bibles. Many were saved as our people preached on the streets, in police stations, hospitals, government buildings and schools.
We will be doing this again in October in Piura, another city in the north of Peru. We are thrilled to be able to reach out all over Peru with the Gospel. Thank you to Faith Baptist Church in Tacoma, WA, Pastor Mark Smith, and Spanish pastor Gabriel Duran for all of their support and help in providing the Bibles for these two outreaches.
In August, my family and a large group from Efata traveled to Arequipa on a mission trip to visit one of our missionaries, Wilder and Ruth Rojas. It was such a blessing to help them in their new mission church and provide clothing and toys to their community and preach the Gospel. After our visit, Bro. Wilder called me to inform me that the attendance at the church had more than doubled and they were completely out of space. We were able to increase his support so he could rent the other half of the building he has been renting.
Right after our mission trip, we had Music Camp at Efata. More than 70 students, both adults and young people, participated. Bro. Joan Zamora was our primary instructor. Two young ladies from the US and others from Peru helped teach voice, violin, piano, and other instruments. I decided to take up the trumpet again after almost 28 years. It has been fun. Two weeks later, I had the honor to play the trumpet in a special with Joseph at the piano, Joy (visiting from the States) playing clarinet, Jessica playing the viola and Jennifer the violin. I am still learning but it was beautiful!
The first week of September, Efata hosted Pastor’s School for International Baptist Church of Peru. This was an intense week where preachers and leaders from many cities in Peru and other countries come for pastoral training and preaching. Experienced Pastors and missionaries from Peru, Puerto Rico, Mexico and the US. come and preach and teach. We housed well over 80 people at Efata. Hundreds attended, many were saved and many other decisions for Christ were made.
I am in the States for the month of September interpreting in mission conferences all over GA for Pastor Henry Vasquez, our national pastor in Chancay (for whom we are building the church) and a national pastor from Bolivia.
Family News
God is blessing our family; our children are keeping busy in school and church activities. Thank you for your needed prayers.
It is wonderful to know that God is, and that He is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him. This statement from Hebrews 11:6 has been a strong tower of strength to me and has helped me increase my foundational faith and confidence in my Bible and my Savior. I thank God for these “handfuls of purpose” that He gives us on our life-faith journey.
As of the writing of this letter, my family and I are preparing to leave to return to Peru after three months of a short but extremely busy furlough. By the time you read this letter, we will be home and wrapping up our Mission Conference at Efata. We are so thrilled to have Spanish Pastor Fabio Betancourth coming as our special speaker from Bible Baptist Church of Bradenton, FL.
During this short furlough we were able to accomplish several important goals.
We were able to participate and interpret the Servant’s Conference at First Baptist Church, Hammond’s Spanish church for a Deaf Mexican young man who attended.
We were able to see our two new grandsons that were born during this furlough.
We were able to go to Joy’s Graduation from Bible College.
We were able to see most of our kids and family in the US.
We traveled over 15,000 miles and visited many of our supporting churches and several new ones.
I was able to take care of all my medical appointments with the VA.
One of the most awesome goals we were able to fulfill is the raising of more funds for the new church we are building for our mission work in Chancay, Peru, two-and-a-half hours north of our Lima location.
My, how God has provided through you, our wonderful supporting churches and friends. We were able to raise the initial $25,000 for Phase 1 to build the church building which is under construction as I am writing this. This is going to relieve the pressure from the landlord taking back over half the building they currently rent.
Once the church auditorium is done, we will be working on the four classrooms and the bathrooms. If you would like to help us with this second phase, it would be a great blessing. In this letter, I have included some pictures so you can see the progress.
Regarding the Deaf school, we increased our students from 5 last year after we reopened to 23 this year. We plan to open our High School again next year, and we are working towards that goal. Please pray for this very necessary part of our ministry in Lima.
The mass evangelism outreaches in Piura and Arequipa have been delayed due to Customs issues for the containers with the Bibles – Typical Peru! Pray we can get the containers in and reschedule our dates for the events.
Family News
Our children are looking forward to going home. They love Peru much more than being in the States.
It was so wonderful to see our two new grandsons. Julianne & Frank’s seventh, Daniel Jedediah; and Judson and Valeria’s first, Joshua Ryan. Thus, so far 15 grandkids. WE ARE BLESSED!
Please know we truly are grateful for all of you, our supporting churches and individuals. Lord willing, on our next furlough, we will be able to see those we were not able to visit this time around. There just was not enough time. You are more than welcome to come and visit us.
We are constantly amazed at God’s goodness and care for our mission work and ministry in Peru and our family. The beginning of this year has been wonderful.
In February, I was in the States for a mission conference and to attend my yearly medical appointments at the VA and eye doctor. I returned to Peru, and we had a wonderful Fires of Evangelism conference where several young people made decisions and several were saved.
The day after the conference, the entire family flew to the States to begin the short furlough that I mentioned in my previous prayer letter.
One of our goals for this short furlough is to raise funds to build a church two hours north of us at one of our mission works. Our national pastor there was advised by his landlord that he would be losing the use of half of his small building in a couple of weeks and may lose the other half as well. We purchased property to build the church and are now raising funds to construct the initial church building for them nearby where they have been renting.
So far, we have raised $12,000 – to God be the glory! We are looking for an initial $20,000 to build a 200-seat auditorium and another $5000 to equip it with water, sewer and furniture. Later we will raise funds to build Sunday School and multiuse rooms as well as a pastor’s home. We plan to begin right away as funds come in.
Please make this a matter of prayer. If you can help with this project for the initial building or for the future classroom and home space, that would be a blessing. Please send the support to Macedonia World Baptist Missions designated “Efata Building Project – Chancay.”
We are planning another evangelism explosion for the second and third largest cities in Peru – Arequipa and Piura – around the middle of the year. We are praying for a soul harvest in both locations. We and the Peruvian churches that are partnering with us will be printing the tracts, and Pastor Mark Smith From Tacoma, Washington and partnering churches in the States will be printing and sending us two containers of Bibles and New Testaments to distribute in these two cities.
The school is moving forward with more Deaf students this year. Our goal is to be able to accept high school students again. We are working with the legal department of the Ministry of Education on this. Please pray that we will be successful. The Deaf need this, and we need to have this influence on the future generation for the Lord.
Family News
Julianne and Frank are having a new baby boy, to be born any day now! This will be their seventh child and our fourteenth grandchild. Then in May, our son Judson and he wife Valeria are expecting their first child. Joy will also be graduating from College in May. We are grateful we could be in the States for these few months to share in these wonderful milestones and report to several of our supporting churches and present our ministry to a couple of new churches.
We return to Peru the first week of June and immediately have our Mission Conference. Fabio Betancourth, Spanish Pastor from Bible Baptist Church in Bradenton, FL, will be our special speaker. We are thrilled that he is coming.
As I mentioned before, we will do a longer, more robust furlough of reporting in 2026 or 2027, the Lord willing. Joseph, our son who works with us, will be going on Furlough for 2025. Thanks you to all of you and we are sorry if we did not get by to see you. There just was not enough time. We will see you next time around, and, as always, you are more than welcome to come and visit us.
The new year is upon us. We look forward to what 2024 will bring. In spite of the political challenges that the entire world is facing, the wars, the persecutions and the lawlessness of the day, our hope is in the Lord. The Psalmist encourages us to this hope in Psalm 42:5.
Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance.
We ended 2023 with some amazing events. First, we had a wonderful Christmas meal for those who live at Efata who wished to participate and for those of the church who did not have a family to celebrate with. We were able to give gifts to all the children that were present and had a wonderful time. We also had several events for children and their families at Efata and at some of our mission works. Many trusted Christ.
In addition, we were able to help a few families in need through the generous donations of you, our supporters.
One dear elderly member was given a new wheelchair which she desperately needed, and she is so excited coming to church in it. Another young girl was given a nice keyboard so she could learn to play the piano, which was one of her dreams.
We baptized six people in the last two weeks of 2023. Lord willing we have three baptisms this first week of January as well.
We know it is the Lord who gives the increase as our church is going and telling. We praise Him for the increase of souls saved and baptisms. Many souls have come to know Christ throughout 2023.
Family News
In March of this year our family will be coming to the States for a short three-month furlough. Though it will not be long enough to visit everyone, we have too much going on to be gone longer.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Pastor, if you would like to have us come and give an update, PLEASE contact me so I can see if we can come to you. I am prioritizing churches we have not been to for a long time and ones in the areas we will be in.
Here is our contact information:
Phone: 813-675-4879 – Voice Only (use Mobile after March)
Mobile: 813-406-2838 – Voice, WhatsApp, Text
Email: jkotvas@efata.org, jfkotvas@gmail.com
In March our daughter Julianne is expecting her seventh child. In April, Valeria, Judson’s wife, is expecting their first child, and in May, Joy will be graduating from Bible College. We have coordinated our visit around these events.
We will probably do a longer, more robust furlough of reporting in 2026 or 2027, the Lord willing, as Joseph, our son who works with us, is planning his furlough for 2025.
In September we hosted a Pastors’ School sponsored by International Baptist Church here at Efata. The week was extremely busy, and many good decisions were made. Over six hundred were in attendance every night with dozens of pastors from all over Peru. It was a blessing to be a help to International Baptist by providing our infrastructure for this conference.
In October, Efata hosted our Ladies’ Retreat which also was a great blessing. The men of the church did all the cooking for three days for the Ladies.
In November we had our Bible Conference for the Deaf and the hearing. Deaf Pastors Bruce Kelly and Todd Reynolds preached for the Deaf, and Pastor Dario Balcazar preached for the hearing. What a tremendous week that was! Several people were saved, and the messages were exactly what the church needed.
We also celebrated Thanksgiving with a nice Turkey and all the trimmings for all who live here at Efata. It was a wonderful time of giving thanks to the Lord for all he has done for us.
I was able to fly to Piura, a city in northern Peru, to coordinate the evangelism explosion that we are planning for next year in that city and in Arequipa. Piura and Arequipa are the second and third most populous cities in Peru. We plan to do evangelism and Bible distribution with one container of Bibles for each city.
We are working very hard with several events and outreach activities for the Christmas season. I will send an end-of-year report out in January for these events.
2023 in Peru
Family News
In October, our family celebrated 25 years as missionaries to the Deaf and beyond. Wow, how time flies! I can remember when Lisa and I and the five children we had at the time stepped out by faith to serve the Lord as missionaries.
I resigned from the sheriff’s department and from my position as assistant pastor at LaBelle Baptist Temple to go on full-time deputation in November of 1998, and on December third of 1999 we moved to Peru.
None of this would have been possible if it were not for the faithful prayer and support partners and churches that have sustained us throughout these many years. We have done this together. Thanks to all of you who have been a part of this great missionary endeavor. Many of you have been with us from the beginning, and we rejoice with all who have joined us along the way.
Sorry for this letter being a bit later than usual. I have been traveling and there has been a great deal going on. I am reminded of Jesus in Matthew 9:35 going about all the cities and villages teaching and preaching. What a blessing to be “busy about the Father’s business.”
Ministry News
In June, Efata Christian School for the Deaf celebrated its 53rd anniversary. What a blessed time we had. Deaf came from all over Peru and some from other countries to celebrate this monumental occasion. Due to COVID, we were not able to celebrate the 50th anniversary, so this was the memorial celebration. It was so good to see so many former students and to catch up with them.
We were able to reopen the school after the COVID shutdowns in a limited fashion, but it is a start to a new future for us as we work to rebuild after such a long time.
Various pastor friends of this ministry came and participated in the events. We were especially happy to have Evangelist Jim Sloan, Pastor Reggie Rempel and Missionary Steve Houghton, all longtime friends both to me and to Vernon Miller, the founder of Efata. Several of our missionaries sent out of Efata and some of the former teachers and workers were present. We were blessed to have Deaf saved and baptized, and others reconciling their lives to Christ.
Two weeks later, we had our missions conference. It was good to see our people recommit to missions and our responsibility to support our own missionaries. In addition, at the end of July through the first two weeks of August, we were privileged to take a group of 30 members of our church on a mission trip to Ecuador to visit, encourage and support our three missionaries there. This was a wonderful time. It was such a blessing to see our missionaries and their families working and serving. Several were saved during the trip.
In July we had our first follow-up meeting with several of the churches in Lima who participated in our massive evangelism event back in May. We are working and planning to duplicate our effort next year in two other key cities in Peru. It is wonderful to see local churches band together to bear the cost of printing the tracts and reach out to the local pastors in the two cities we are targeting for the first quarter of 2024. We are grateful to Faith Baptist Church in Tacoma, Washington, who as of now have three containers of Bibles in the process of being prepared for us for this endeavor. What a joy to work with Pastor Smith and his team and the churches that support their efforts to send Bibles and materials to us.
During the mission trip, I flew to the States for a VA medical appointment and was able to report to a couple of churches in Florida. While there, I had the joy of interpreting for the Deaf for a conference in Orlando with my mentor and friend Steve Houghton. After this I visited several English and Spanish churches in Washington and Oregon to present our ministry and attended a wonderful Spanish family conference in Riverview Baptist Church in Pasco, WA. It was great to see good solid Bible believing fundamental Baptist Spanish churches growing and preparing young people for the Lord’s work.
Lisa and I just returned for Chiclayo where I preached for one of our missionaries to the Deaf and hearing for another family conference. What a joy for both of us. It was a great time. Many made decisions for their families.
The first week of September, we have the blessing of providing facilities and assistance for Pastor’s School again this year, hosted by International Baptist Church here in Lima. This conference is always a great help, encouragement, and challenge.
Family News
Lisa is very busy preparing for a ladies conference in October. She is helping teach our grandchildren and continues to teach the Deaf girls in our Deaf Bible Institute Home economics class.
The kids are doing well. Jessica and Jennifer continue with their schooling and are fully involved in the ministry and learning their instruments. Joel is really doing much better in his language abilities and loves to help Mom in the kitchen.
Once again, thank you for all of your care and support – both in prayer and finances – for this blessed ministry to the Deaf and hearing of Peru and beyond.
