Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Our first morning on the island, group devotions were at 5:30am. Well, they were supposed to be. Then we had personal devotion time, exercise, and breakfast of Imana and Nshima. Imana is a soy protein source that we brought with us. Nshima is a staple food on the island. It looks like cream of wheat but is made from corn meal and eaten with your fingers. We had Bible study training around 8:30 to learn how to share the second coming with people. I was paired with Panji so that he would be able to interpret for me. Door-to-door ministry is done differently here. When we walk up to the door, the host pulls out a mat or log for us to sit on. We explain who we are and that we’d like to share a Bible study with whoever in the house is interested. It seemed, more than not, people were interested in the study! We talked with a few people, giving them the study and inviting them to the evening crusade. At our last house, we met two guys about our age. They were fluent in English and actually went into their house to grab their English Bibles to study the second coming with us. They were fully engaged in the conversation and even asked questions about the state of the dead. Too bad we talked about that on the previous night during the crusade. But they were still interested in coming to future crusades! This made me excited about doing ministry!

After outreach, those of us who had just arrived were to separate for our respective villages. Michael said a phrase that we learned to expect throughout the trip. “Plans have kind of changed.” He asked Michelle and I to stay back for a couple days and help Dr. Tim in the clinic instead. So we joined the team at the crusade site and helped them run the health screening. Chama ran registration. Michelle and I did blood pressures. Isaac checked BMI. Daniel looked for cataracts. Then everyone waited in a nice long time to talk to Dr. Tim for health consultation. Edwin was at the end of the row for spiritual advising. We were able to see about 30 people that afternoon but unfortunately had to turn many away due to time constraints.

Chama and Mushinka ran registration. Michelle and I checked blood pressures


Villagers waiting to speak with Dr. Tim

The next event was the children’s program. Chama began to sing with them and teach them Genesis 1:1. The children pronounced it “Genesis one versE one.” They said the E at the end of a lot of words. Michelle and I joined them in singing and Michelle told them the story of Cain and Abel. There were about 50 kids and they listened very well as Michelle spoke in English and Chama interpreted. They were able to answer all the questions afterward. We went back for a quick meal before the crusade. It’d been almost 12 hours since breakfast, but thankfully it didn’t seem like it. We returned for more songs and storytelling with the children until the crusade started at 7. Christabel found me again! The topic was spiritualism and witchcraft. It definitely wasn’t as quiet as the previous night. I kept looking around and it never seemed as anyone was talking. The adults and the children all seemed to be listening(on my side), but there just seemed to be a noise in the air, making it hard to concentrate. Considering the topic, that is understandable. I started praying for the devil to leave so people could hear the message. At the end of the meeting, Michelle and I got hounded by kids wanting to shake our hands. It was kind of funny. But then they all started asking us to pray for them. Of course I did it in English and tried to keep my wording simple. They would laugh when I finished and others would grab my hands and ask for prayer too. It was kind of awkward but I hoped they were getting some kind of blessing out of it.

Michelle telling the children a story

Praying for the children

In getting ready for bed that night, we had a little incident with a big, orange, furry spider in the outhouse. Sorry, Michelle, for questioning your status as a country girl. I would have used a different hut too! This day, I also learned a new phrase in Bemba. “Mulishani mwebasungu!” means “Hello, white people!”