Sheridan and Anita Stanton served in partnership with BFM in Peru for 32 years from April 1983 to October 2014.

Anita and I were missionaries in Peru from April of 1983 until October of 2014 (32 years). 

Here’s a timeline of the major events:

• 1973 I graduated from High School and began studies at Lexington Baptist College.
• 1974, June 7^th Anita and I were married.
• 1977 I graduated from LBC and our daughter Leah was born.
• 1978 I was ordained to the Gospel Ministry and began pastoring the Jordan Baptist Church of Sanford, Fl.  Also, our son, Joshua, was born.
• 1982 resigned the pastorate of Jordan Baptist to begin preparations to go as missionaries to Peru under the authority of Jordan Baptist and legally and financially aided by Baptist Faith Mission.
• 1983, April – we arrived in Iquitos, Peru. Leah was five years old, and Joshua was four when we arrived in the Northern Jungle town of Iquitos, where the Amazon River begins. They grew up in Peru and came back to the States for college. Leah and Joshua are both grown now, married with children, and live in the United States.
• We lived for seven years in two different jungle towns of Peru: Iquitos and Pucallpa. Those were our “formative” years as missionaries. The Lord used us to start our first church in Pucallpa and then assume the directorship of the Pucallpa Baptist School (begun by former Missionaries, Del and Ada Mayfield). Anita and I worked with the school for five years and the Lord blessed with an increase in enrollment from 250 students to 870 in our last year there. 
• My wife, Anita, (a graduate of the University of Kentucky) spent years in Peru developing Sunday school curriculum for our churches. Many of her materials have been used as Religion Curriculum in the Peruvian Public schools. She completed the curriculum series for children of all ages. She managed her home and took great care of her husband and children! She has always been a Proverbs 31 wife and mother.
• During the late eighties, the terrorist situation created an extremely difficult time for missionaries in Peru.  We felt it best to move to the capital city of Lima at that time. There we stayed for the next seven years and were able to help start three more churches.
• It was also while in Lima I began traveling and teaching Bible classes in five different cities of Peru. This quickly turned into the Baptist Institute of Biblical Studies, which we continued until we left Peru in 2014.
• When our children returned to the USA to begin college, Anita and I felt it would be best to move and work out of the town of Huánuco, 6300ft above sea level in the Andes Mountains. The main reason for moving there was because of the town’s location in the center of Peru. The location allowed us to have our Institute classes there instead of me traveling all over the country. Because of the towns central location our pastors could travel to us. The first classes there were an immediate success in that they not only received the teaching but now Pastors had a venue for fellowship that they had never had before. This large-scale association significantly helped the unity among our pastors and preachers in Peru.
• Jungle, coast, or the Andes Mountains; everywhere we worked in Peru, we were always involved in church planting. The first church started was Iglesia Bautista Jordan in the jungle town of Pucallpa and the last church organized was the Iglesia Bautista Calvario in the Andean Mountain town of Huánuco. During those years we were directly involved in the planting of seven churches and indirectly with about thirty (working with Peruvian missionaries in starting new works).
• For most of those years I prepared course materials for the Bible Institute, pastored the mission we were involved with at the time. I also traveled around Peru to visit and encourage the churches and missions.
• 2008 I graduated with a master’s degree in Biblical Counseling from Luther Rice Seminary
• 2012 I graduated with a PhD in Christian Counseling from the Louisiana Baptist University.
• Hosting mission teams became a ministry for us also. Some years we would host two or three teams a year. These mission teams were always a blessing to our work in Peru. 
• People very often refer to missionaries’ great sacrifices in leaving their homes in the USA, but we never considered our ministry in Peru as a sacrifice; that is until our grandkids came along. We are thankful for webcams, faster airplanes, and internet phones!
• In 2014 the Berea Baptist Church of Hiddenite, NC extended a call for us to come and be their pastor.  After thirty-two years (half my lifetime) we knew it was God’s will for us to leave the mission field of Peru and come to North Carolina to continue the rest of our years in ministry here. The Lord has been very gracious to us here and we have grown to love the dear Saints of Berea Baptist very much.
• 2018 the directors of Baptist Faith Mission invited me to serve as a director of BFM. I enjoy the opportunity to serve in this capacity and in some small way, give back to the ministry of Baptist Faith Mission in helping local churches send and maintain their missionaries on the foreign field.
• Our view of life is that neither the United States nor Peru is our home, but as the Bible teaches us, we are only pilgrims in this world and citizens of a heavenly city. To God be the glory!

Sheridan & Anita Stanton
224 S. Center St
Taylorsville NC 28681
828-962-0149
sestantonperu@hotmail.com

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When you designate your offerings for ‘Veteran Missionaries Pension’ or for ‘Founder’s Month Offering’ [they are the same], they will be applied toward the continuing and on-going financial honor and support of these faithful life-long servants of Christ.

Click here to give now or you can mail your offering to:
BFM, c/o George Sledd
P.O. Box 471280
Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280