Fifteen Minutes in My Shoes

Since my last post, my life has consisted of mostly ordinary activities--if anything about my work here could be considered "ordinary." Yet somehow whenever I sit down to write, feeling like I do not have much news to report, I end up with the longest litany of items to share. You won't receive a magical blessing within fifteen minutes for reading to the end and forwarding this to your fifteen closest friends, but I sincerely hope you do read it all...and maybe you will be entertained or touched by something I've shared. To summarize my last three weeks, I present the most notable happenings in the style of fifteen superlative awards:

The Greatest Disturbance of the Peace

This morning I awoke to the noise of my windows vibrating to loud music and a ruckus in the street below. Intrigued, I peered out my window to see a parade-like student demonstration. The ones at the front of the mob had a microphone and took turns airing their grievances to their flag-waving high school companions. Yes, in Italy students (and teachers) go on strike, as often as once a month, from what I've heard.

Enjoy this 50-second video of the student strike demonstration!

If the video does not work properly, here's a still shot:

The Most Interesting Question Posed By an English Student

Flipping through my children's New Testament storybook, a girl asked, "Is the story of Peter Pan in here?"

Perhaps the Most Eye-Opening Dialogue: Out of the Mouths of Babes

The above-mentioned middle schooler is also the winner of this category. As she read "John Baptizes Jesus," she was surprised to see the picture of Jesus being baptized in the river and remarked, "Adults don't get baptized!" Thus we had a conversation (in Italian, as she's a beginner at English, her fifth language) about motivations for baptism and how babies do not understand what is going on. She shared her personal experience of being baptized as a baby. "Yes," she said, "my mom told me that I was red and crying." Though this brief dialogue may not have changed her worldview, her mind was opened up to a radically new idea, and I was impressed by her insight.


Most Likely to Happen Like Clockwork: A River Runs Through It


My youngest student comes two evenings a week, and in addition to his new-found love for playing Hangman with Bible vocabulary, toward the end of each lesson he keeps his ears tuned for the chorus of the duck reunion...yes, each day at the same hour, without fail, a paddling of ducks congregates on the river behind the church building.

The Most Exciting (and Delicious) Evidence of Autumn

A roasted chestnut vendor has set up shop right along my commute from home to church/work!

The Most 3D Sunday School Craft

Having finished our series on the life of David and moved on to Solomon, this week we studied the construction of the temple. Though nothing like the real one in scale or splendor, our craft allowed the children to attack a heap of toilet paper rolls with their architectural ingenuity.

The Latest/Earliest Arrivals at Sunday School

The Ghanaians hold their worship service after ours, and each week toward the end of Sunday School, the two adorable siblings pictured below arrive in anticipation of their class. So they jump right in and participate in our craft!

The Longest Thursday Night Bible Study

This week our meeting at 8:30 p.m. lasted until 11! We discussed recent church happenings (mentioned in the prayer requests below) and other pan-Italian church affairs, and I must say it was all very informative and interesting, as well as encouraging to hear others wrestling with some of the same dilemmas and challenges rattling around my mind for months. Mission work isn't easy by any stretch of the imagination, but I am blessed to be partnering with such heartfelt brethren dedicated to the expansion (in depth and breadth) of God's kingdom.

The Greatest Culinary Undertaking

Today I made homemade tortillas! A family friend had shown me how last fall, and this was my first time to make them on my own. As much as I love Italian food, eating something different (and especially Mexican) every now and then is a nice change of pace.

The Most Ambitious Project

I have inherited the task of updating the nine-and-a-half-year-old church directory! A lot of comings and goings have happened in that time frame, so I am attempting to collect and organize the data of the estimated 40 Italian speakers and 80 Ghanaians.

The Longest Half-Mile

Our church has been collecting items to send to a Christian man in prison in Zambia; he is the leader of a congregation in the jail, and our church has helped him out in the past through sending Bibles, etc. I was entrusted with the task of writing the letters to accompany our shipment of clothes, shoes, personal hygiene items, English hymnals, and schooling fees for his children...and also with the task of packing up and sending said shipment. In order to transport these two boxes (totaling 65 pounds) across town on foot to the post office, my rolling grocery bag became a precarious dwarf-sized dolly. We only had one mishap on the not-so-smooth cobblestone road, and after an adventure of filling out all manner of customs forms, the boxes are now on their way. Please pray that they make the rest of their journey unscathed!

The Most Impacting Literary Work

Speaking of Africa, I would like to make a book recommendation: The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. The story begins with a missionary family's arrival in the Congo in 1959 and is a fascinating account of issues post-colonial, cultural, religious, familial, and political. Though I have thus far read only 70%, I can already tell that it will join the ranks of my new favorite books, along with Francine Rivers' Mark of the Lion series, which I devoured this summer. This fascinating and enlightening trilogy dramatizes early Christian life in the Roman Empire.

Favorite Quotes (From a Friend's Blog)

This category resulted in a tie between two quotes that I discovered in moments in which I truly needed to hear them. Thanks, Catie! [http://centerstreetsynopsis.blogspot.com/]
"If my life is fruitless, it doesn't matter who praises me, and if my life is fruitful, it doesn't matter who criticizes me." -John Bunyon
"To be nobody-but-yourself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." -E. E. Cummings

The Highest Concentration of Tragedies: Join Me in Prayer

Recently hospitalizations and deaths have come in pairs. A young lady at church was in the hospital for a few days, and I went to visit her twice. Thankfully she has made a full recovery and survived a potentially dangerous episode. My landlady's mother, who lives in the apartment below mine and is one of the sweetest elderly ladies I've ever met, has been in the hospital for the last week and a half, recovering from a stroke. Please keep her in your prayers! At the moment she is unable to speak. Two Ghanaian members of our congregation recently passed away. The first was a few weeks ago while the man was back in Ghana for a visit. Then Monday a man in his 40s had a heart attack, leaving behind a wife and six children in Ghana. Such events highlight the ubiquitous nature of human tragedy that sooner or later affects us all. On the one hand, we cannot imagine what those most directly affected are feeling and enduring, yet on the other hand, we can, for we all share the frailty of the human experience. Thank goodness we have an ever-present Refuge to shelter us and enable us to bear these burdens together: "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God" (II Corinthians 1:3-4). Please pray for these families and for our church's endeavors to help them, financially and otherwise.

My Best Attempt to Capture the Glory of God in the Sky

I love beholding the glory of God in nature. When glimpsing a spectacular sunset or traversing idyllic landscapes, I am reminded of God's majesty and sovereignty, and worries and troubles diminish. I took this picture when I was in the mountains in August, and it has become the centerpiece of the new display I made for the church window a couple days ago, along with the words of Psalm 19:1, "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands." What an awesome reminder that God is in control of all and shines down His light upon us!