Monday, June 16, 2008

Let's Go Crazy




This last week was a great week as we finally have gotten into a routine with the kids and our schedule. With all this improved adjustment also came a sense of giddiness as we found ourselves tickled about every little funny moment. We were really getting into the role playing during our T4T (training for trainers) small group. This picture shows our fearless leader, Brett, and his wife Nicole as they helped us to focus on the task at hand.

Of course these moments spilled over onto our children's lives as well. Connor begged me when it was time to get his haircut, "Can I pleeeeease have a Mohawk?" Ken said, "Absolutely not!" I said, "Sure!" Talk about role reversals. We told him he could keep it until commissioning service. He has loved it!


There is a beautiful fountain here at ILC. The kids love to run around it while we adults place bets on who will fall in first. It has been so hot here the week before last (Highs of 103) that when it was only in the 90s this week we spent a lot of our time outdoors. On Father's day we recorded a message for Papaw by the fountain.



Later I got a chance to play some soccer in the tournament. I was more than just a little intimidated by one of the opposing team members who is over 6'3". I learned to just move out of the way when he came towards me with the ball. Now, I will say in my defense that I did scrap it up pretty well with the girls. The South American team did end up winning the tournament with cheers of "OLE, OLE, OLE" resounding on and around the field! Ken had an opportunity to go fishing this week with Anthony. I call this picture "Fisher of Men" since they didn't catch any fish that day.




This last weekend I had the privilege of teaching a CPR class to some of the people here. We had mannequins and a DVD to use for practice. It was a great class and Doug was so nice to help me out in teaching since he has several years of EMT experience. Something important I had to convey to the students...if you are trying to reach emergency services in another country check and see what the official number is for that country. 911 in one country I found out was the number you call to get a pizza.


Last week we completed our contingency training. Basically this training teaches you what to do if you are ever held hostage. Although it was only 3 days of training, it was pretty stressful for some people as they do real life role play with people randomly selected in the group. I had a little training in the military, but it was not nearly as intense as what the people selected for role play went through. Connor decided to have his own scenerio on the playground with some of the other TCKs (Third Culture Kids). They determined that they would use tickling as their form of punishment. Eventually the hostages escaped and made their captor the recipient of some merciless tickling.



Here are a few pictures from these last two weeks:



Connor and Kayleigh show off their new pillows with Miss Bobbie.




These strawberries are "HUGE" Mama!






"Uncle Mark" reminds us to pray for the mentally challenged of Italy.












Our last cultural worship we had Arabic Underground House Church. It really gave me an appreciation for the freedoms we have here in America to worship the Lord without fear of being persecuted. It also reminded me to pray for those that do not have that freedom.




Thursday, June 5, 2008

Worship As One

Cultural Worship is every Sunday evening at 6:00 here on the "compound" ( and Jacque, no, they haven't given us any Kool-Aide to drink yet). It gives us a chance to experience what "church" will be like in other cultures.
Two weeks ago we had Latin American night. Yours truly had the honor of playing the keyboard for the service. We had 3 guitars, drums, a bass guitar, shakers, and I even got to play bongos for one song! The entire service was presented in Spanish. We had thought we would be using an overhead projector to give them the words to the songs so they could follow along, but at the last minute we were told that there would be no dependence on audio/visual equipment as a crutch for our worship time. I was reminded of the words our Minister of Missions, Jeremy, used to say to us..."You can't just be flexible...that is too rigid. Be FLUID!!!" So, it was an eye-opening experience for people who had never been in a Spanish only environment. No doubt Ken was thinking, "I better really pick up the Spanish quick in Costa Rica." Another interesting "non-Western" idea is that childcare is NOT provided in most other cultures during church services. This proved to be very interesting as well during the Latin American night as I looked up while playing bongos to see my 2-year-old running down the aisle toward the stage saying "Me play! Me play!"

Last Sunday we had African worship night. We went outside and sat on the hill by the gazebo with the lake as the backdrop to the setting. The women wore long dresses or skirts like the African women would wear, and even some of the men who had been to Africa wore skirts like the natives would, or at least the ones really comfortable with their masculinity. So the men sat on one side and the women and children on the other side. At this point I am thinking Ken considers it payback for having to watch Cade by himself the week before. It went well though.

The music was so cool, and the sermon was great because he would speak for about 5 minutes in Swahili and then sum it up in about 3-4 sentences in English. As he was coming to the conclusion of the sermon he was talking about how we should not fear things that come our way and right about that time a strong wind started to blow as dark clouds rolled in. We just wrapped things up in time to run to our Quad and watch the rain come pouring down. As the storm blew over and the sun returned everyone went outside to see a beautiful double rainbow! When I thought of the contrast afterwards between the Latin service, the African service, and even our own Western style worship I recalled what it says in Revelations 7:9-10:

After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice: "Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb."

How amazing to know that when we get to heaven we will not lose our language, culture, and personality; but we will all worship the Lord as one!