By Nathan

The Big Storm

Nathan with sample of hail.

We lived through a HUGE storm.  It hailed so hard and was so windy our big flowery Bougainvillea fell down!  It also rained.  It rained so hard that the high school yard – all the grass – was water!  Our front yard was also flooded and so was the side (the space between our house and the neighbor’s fence).  The ditch in front of our house was so full rushing water and was so deep it would have drowned me, even if it wasn’t rushing!

Where three rain ditches (drainage ditches) meet there was a waterfall!  There was a sort of tunnel over a pipe.  Since the water was so high, it went over the tunnel.  One of the three ditches had a concrete covering, so cars could drive over it.  The ditch the waterfall went into also had that, and rainwater couldn’t come in, so the waterfall went into an “underground river,” and came out the other side as a rushing creek!  It went on for blocks and I don’t know where it ended. 

There were puddles that were so deep they came up to my knees!  Some were as long as eight to ten feet across! 

Let me tell you what I did.  It all started as any other day.  I woke up dressed for school (Ed. note: this is common – no pajamas, just the next day’s clothes are often put on the night before and slept in!).  Mom said no school for me.  I looked outside.  Then I went outside.  Our neighbor came and when we saw the sports box, that is, the box of sports tipped over in the water on the side, Ald0 told me to roll up my pantlegs and take off my crocs, so I did.  Then, once he had taken off his sapatias (ed. note:  those are flip-flop sandals) and rolled up his pantlegs we waded and got the sports box from the water.  Then we went out back and saved the tool crate and, like the sports crate, was tipped over in the water.  Then we went to the street.  We helped Aldo’s dad, played in the puddles, and explored. 

Exploring on our block where the water overflowed the drainage ditch.

Then we decided to play with boats, and when we did, we lost one, but then we found it, and then we lost another we didn’t find that one.  Then mom got a phone call that we could go to Asuncion in one hour.  So we packed up, and went.

By Samuel

29/09

The Big Hailstorm

This was the biggest storm I have ever been through.

Two of the Floyds came over.  They were named Luke and David.  They have an older brother, whose name was Daniel, but he stayed behind in San Francisco with his dad.  Well, in the middle of the night, I heard a big pounding on the roof.  I had no idea what it was (in the morning though, I learned it was hail).  In the night, I woke up and decided to go to check on my bird, Marie. 

Marie the Parakeet usually stays indoors, but that night she was out.

Usually, we bring her in.  So, I went into the kitchen and looked at the wire chair we put her in for the night.  She usually sleeps behind her cage.  When I looked, it was too dark to see (by the way, the lights were out {ed. comment: power was out}).  So, I decided to go back to bed.  But when I was just about to turn, I ran into something.  Something that was very soft.  It was actually Mom!  I asked her if she had brought Marie inside.  Mom said that she didn’t bring her in because before the storm, it had looked like a beautiful night.  She made me go back to bed and told me that she would go outside and get her.  And then, somehow, I got to sleep.  (In the morning, Mom told me that she went out in the middle of the hailstorm and Marie had her head stuck up into the hail!) 

            In the morning, when I woke up and got out of bed, I saw that the living room was flooded and the kitchen was flooded too!  With Nathan, Luke and our neighbor, Aldo, went outside and saw that the front yard was flooded, the backyard had puddles, and both of the sides were flooded.  Chairs were knocked over; leaves were blown of trees, the sports box had blown over and was floating in the water, and, worst of all, our bougainvillea tree was knocked over.

Our Bougain Villa after the storm.

  So, we went out into the street, and looked around.  The drainage ditch was full, and down the street, where the ditch was shallower, the whole street was flooded!  We went over to the high school, and saw that it was a lake!  We had an idea.  We went inside and brought out some toy boats.  Each one of us had one.  What we did was we made our boats go along in the drainage ditch and then we would stop it at one of the bridges.  Well, on accident, Luke almost fell into the ditch and that made a splash, which made the boat go underwater.  So, we went looking for it.  Nathan and Luke went over to look where the water went after it crossed the ditch, but Aldo and I stayed behind.  When Aldo was watching them leave, I pointed to a big pile of junk (including leaves, sticks and grass).  When Aldo saw it, he ha an idea.  The pile was coming up to a bridge.  We each had a big stick.  I stood on the bridge and put my stick in the water so the junk couldn’t go through.  Aldo used his stick as a shovel and looked into the junk.  He saw the boat!  So Aldo grabbed it and gave a shout so that Luke and Nathan would know we had the boat.  After that we tried out another boat.  And that one sunk!  We looked for it a long time but never found it.  So Aldo went to his house and we went in our house.  Mom said we should get to work.  I raked.  Mom had a visitor.  Then her cell phone rang.  It was the Camerons.  They said that they had a new plan.  It was that we would be leaving in an hour.  We went somewhere, and then just Mom, Nathan and I went to Asuncion (Dad was in the plane coming back from the U.S.A.).  That is how we got through the biggest storm I was ever in.

Cutting Medical Costs

Our dear friend Emma with Nathan & Samuel

10 ways the United States can cut medical costs;

Lessons from Paraguayan public health care

(Christie’s observations after taking care of Emma for a week in the National Hospital)

1. Don’t invest in any TV’s, either for patient rooms or waiting areas. 

2. Let patients’ families bring their own sheets, pillows, blankets, towels, toilet paper, etc.  They can wash them out in a bathroom sink when they get dirty and hang them somewhere outside.  Paper towels aren’t necessary either.

3. If a light bulb burns out, don’t replace it, especially if it’s just in a bathroom. 

4. Make the families go buy all medicines and supplies (syringes, IVs, etc.) that their patient needs. 

5. Don’t provide a place for visitors to sleep.  The floor of the hall or waiting room will be fine for them to sleep on.  For that matter, you don’t need to have very many chairs or benches for them, either.

6. There’s no need to have fancy medical equipment.   “Old-fashioned” thermometers, blood pressure cuffs, etc. work great. 

7. Cook simple meals for the patients: tea & a piece of white bread for breakfast, soup for lunch, and rice with a hard boiled egg for supper, for example.  Don’t provide dishes for the patients; they can use their own and wash them themselves. 

8. Once the batteries run out in the clocks around the hospital, don’t bother to replace them.  Nobody really cares what time it is, anyway. 

9. Let the families clean the rooms their patients are staying in.   Expect them to provide all cleaning supplies except brooms and mops. 

10. If door handles fall off, don’t replace them.  The most prepared employees will carry one around in their pocket to use when they’re closed out.

 

 

2009 Paraguay Prayer Marathon

Starting Friday, Aug. 14 at 8 pm, Paraguayan believers will be starting a 24-hour prayer marathon for their country.  Join us according to the following themes:

 

MARATON NACIONAL DE ORACION 2009

14 – 15 de agosto, 2009

 

Culto de apertura                                                                    20:00 – 21:00

            (Opening Worship Service)

 

Si mi pueblo se humillare                                                         21:00 – 22:00

            (If my people will humble themselves…)

 

Avivamiento                                                                           22:00 – 23:00

            (Revival)

 

Por la Esperanza                                                                     23:00 – 0:00

            (For Hope)

 

Contra Hechicería, Vicios                                                       0:00 – 1:00

            (Against witchcraft and sinful addictions)

 

Juventud                                                                                 1:00 – 2:00

            (Youth)

 

Corrupción                                                                             2:00 – 3:00

            (Corruption)

 

Por la Política Nacional                                                           3:00 – 4:00

            (National Political Leaders)

 

Convivencia Pacífica                                                               4:00 – 5:00

            (Living in Peace)

 

Evangelismo Integral                                                               5:00 – 6:00

            (Evangelism to the whole person)

 

Capellanía                                                                              6:00 – 7:00

            (Chaplaincy)

 

Alabanza y Adoración                                                 7:00 – 8:00

            (Praise and Worship)

 

Formación de Líderes                                                             8:00 – 9:00

            (Leadership formation)

 

Misiones                                                                                 9:00 – 10:00

            (Missions)

 

Medios de comunicación                                                        10:00 – 11:00

            (The Press)

 

Vida Digna                                                                             11:00 – 12:00

            (Living with dignity, or living lives worthy of our calling)

 

Transformando Juntos Paraguay                                              12:00 – 13:00

            (Together transforming Paraguay)

 

Familia                                                                        13:00 – 14:00

            (Families)

 

Niños                                                                                     14:00 – 15:00

            (Children)

 

Empresarios                                                                           15:00 – 16:00

            (Businesspeople)

 

Peticiones Personales                                                              16:00 – 17:00

            (Personal prayer requests)

 

Autoridades                                                                            17:00 – 18:00

            (Authorities)

 

Unidad de la Iglesia                                                                18:00 – 19:00

            (Unity in the Church)

 

Gratitud                                                                                  19:00 – 20:00

            (Thanksgiving)

Winter Youth Camp July, 2009

from Dan…

The morning of the winter youth camp broke cloudy but without rain.  It had rained for the three days before and no buses were running out of Yuty.  Would camp be canceled?  Should we go?  My hope was for cancellation so we would not be the party poopers, and since things in rural Paraguay do tend to shut down for rain… but since the whole thing had been initiative of a daughter church outside of Villarrica, I did not want to move in and suggest canceling, nor did I want to fail to encourage the effort!  Fabian, barely 20 years old, was the leader of the youth for that church and was the point man for the camp.  I called him at 6 am to ask how it was going, as nonchalantly and neutrally as possible.  “Everything is ready,” was his reply.  I was in.

 

The rain started a few minutes before arriving at the Floyds’ home in San Francisco, 45 km up the road, halfway to the asphalt.  “It’s raining,” Tony astutely observed.  We called Fabian again to ask about the plans.  He reassured us that camp was on.  I left Tony to gather the San Francisco youth and we would rally in Caazapa, another 45 km up the road.  On the way the youth who were planning to walk 5 km from their home to the main highway with all their mattresses and backpacks called to say they would not make it to the highway.  No one wants to start a three-day camp wet to the bone.  I offered to get them at their home.  Why not, we were out 4-wheeling, what’s a little detour?  The rain was not letting up.  After a couple of wrong turns we found their wooden, thatched roof farmhouse, put their mattresses carefully on the roof-rack wrapped in a tarp, and were on our way again.

 

Half an hour later we rolled into Caazapa, where the dirt road yields to asphalt.  Three more youth joined our little band, but they would go on the bus since we were full.  Almost simultaneously I heard from Tony and Fabian.  Tony reported that they had not yet left because no one wanted to go to a camp in the rain.  Paraguayans from rural towns rarely even leave their houses in the rain, let alone leave town.   Fabian reported that the praise and worship team could not come due to the rain and the flu.  At that point Tony decided that the San Francisco contingent would not go, period.  Rather despondently, our group pressed on, having come this far already, to see what would happen.  We were pretty sure that the 9 of us would be the only ones at the camp besides Fabian and the local youth group.  We would spend the night, enjoy fellowship with them despite our disappointment, and head home the next day. 

 

We arrived at the school where the camp was to take place… the rain was still falling.  The grassy schoolyard was dotted with growing puddles of water.  I was going over all the inside games I knew, since that was to be my responsibility along with encouraging the counselors.  Happily there was a nice roofed passage between the two rows of 3 rooms, and a full covered veranda across the back.  So we had dry space to meet in and play in.  It seemed to be coming together… there were cooks, youth from four churches, and some adult believers from the community.  We were 24 young people in all plus leaders. 

 

Puddles were all we could focus on at first!

As we began organizing teams for games and groups for devotionals, a difficult reality came out… there were no Bible teachers.  One was stuck on the other side of the mud with a delivery truck.  Another lived off the asphalt road and had no way to come.  So, no worship team. and no Bible teachers.  When I called Christie I expressed regret for bringing our youth out in the bad weather. 

 

I also realized my job description was about to grow to include teaching, as I asked if there were any other options.  There was someone who could teach one of the sessions, perhaps the next night.  Besides that, I was on.  After we finished our organizing and our leaders’ prayer together for the camp, I excused myself to ask God for a message for the youth.  As I studied the camp theme verse, God answered my prayers and with very short preparation I knew what I needed to share with the campers. 

 

At that point, I noticed that no one had come to ask me to start the first ice-breaker game, which was supposed to happen before dinner.  It was almost dinner time.  I asked Fabian if we should do the game before dinner or after, and he gave me a blank stare.  He and his dad, mom and sister had done a marvelous job preparing for the camp, had worked hard transforming and cleaning the school, recruiting the cooks and others, and inviting all the youth.  Unfortunately they had no idea what running a camp entailed.  Again my job description grew to include running the program, though I hoped to include Fabian in every way possible.

 

Dan with Fabian discussing the next move.

From then on, it seemed like all the adjustments that were made for the small numbers worked incredibly well.  The Bible teaching seemed to connect with the young people.   The young people connected with each other.  Youth who were there stepped forward to play the guitar and sing to lead worship, and did wonderfully.   The team activities and games for points were simple and fun.  The sun came out and dried up enough puddles to use parts of the school grounds.  God met us there.

 

For the last evening worship service there were as many people from outside of the camp as there were campers and leaders, and both campers and visitors joined the talent night.  Part of the team competition was to act out some Bible stories, and the campers rose to the occasion with very creative renditions complete with costumes.

 

The last day of camp the sun shone brightly and we could hardly remember the dreary rain and auspicious beginnings.  As we worshiped and I taught the last message, I was filled with awe at how our God put His hand on all that happened.  God took Fabian’s initiative, the campers’ hardiness and talents, and my willingness, to build eternal principles into a few young peoples’ lives.  We had so much fun that there is another camp this Saturday.  And rain is in the forecast AGAIN.

From email of 4 July 2009

THE LAST PAGE (thoughts, reflections & stories)

 BACKWARDS MATH

I’ve mentioned it before, but it bears repeating: we are so proud of our boys and how well they’re doing in both sets of school – Paraguayan and American.  Today we finished our year of home-schooling, so they’ll have two weeks of neither set of classes! 

Nathan is doing a remarkable job keeping up with math in both systems, despite major potential confusion.  The Paraguayan way of doing division is completely backwards and upside down from how we do it.  See if you can decipher this long division problem:  (note from blogmaster:  if you really want to try to see how this works, try writing the numbers in two columns with a vertical line between.  Only 63 and 782 are on the right side, the rest are on the left.  Have fun!)

 49320   63

 522       782

  180

  (54)

 

In English we’d write the same problem:

           782 r. 54

63│49320

       441

         522

         504

            180

            126

                54

 

Because Nathan learned the Paraguayan way first, our American way of doing it seems backwards to him.  As I help him work his way through it, I can’t help but reflect on the “backwards math” of our church plant.  Our goal is “multiplication.”  Win people to Christ who will win others, who will in turn reach others . . . At best we’re doing very small “addition” – slowly, a bit at a time, a new person comes to church and/or comes to Christ.  But in the frustrating times it seems like it’s “subtraction” – believers drifting away from the church and their Lord or just moving away to Buenos Aires.  And we pray against “division” – immature people clashing over minor issues that split groups in the church.  In such times we must cling to the hope that God, the Lord of the harvest, is also the God of multiplication and will bring about the kind of math we’re praying for in Yuty!  (In His time, of course.  This advanced math doesn’t come quickly.)

 PARTYING FOR JESUS?

You wouldn’t think that part of our job description as “church planter” would include “going to parties.”  But since we have arrived in Yuty we’ve attended many.  We have asked you to pray that we would be salt and light in this community, and that our presence here – even at parties! – would make a difference.  Two of this month’s parties illustrate how God is answering your prayers. 

 June is “John the Baptist party” month in Paraguay.  Schools take advantage of the traditional holiday to sponsor a party as a fundraiser, and the traditional food and games (many involving fire) attract a crowd.  When the administration of our boys’ elementary school asked us if we would rent them our sound equipment for the party, Dan refused.  But he did say that if they didn’t sell alcohol at the party he would lend our sound equipment for free, never considering they would take us up on the offer.  To our great surprise, the principal said she thought it was a great idea.  She’s never really liked the fact that they sell alcohol at an elementary school, family party.  When she presented the idea to the parent commission, to our even greater surprise, they accepted the idea, too.  So for perhaps the first time in the history of San Juan parties in the Yuty area, there was no alcohol sold!  (Dan even got to play Christian music for the first bit of the party, before the designated music CD showed up!)  When the police arrived part way through the party, the principal told me, “Well they won’t have any work to do tonight!”  Thankfully, she was right and there wasn’t any trouble with the nearly 1,000 people present.  Now we’re praying that they saw such a difference without alcohol that they’ll want to continue the tradition even when free sound equipment isn’t in the equation.    

 Birthdays are the most common types of parties we attend.  This is usually not an event that includes men, so just the boys and I go.  There aren’t any games like we have at parties in the U.S.  Instead, we sit, get fed, pose for a picture, and get a treat bag to take home.  We go as often as we’re invited, even though it’s not Nathan and Samuel’s favorite activity.  This month the daughter of a couple who had taken our marriage class turned one.  After the party was over, I gave some people a ride home as it was raining.  The lady in the front passenger seat was a woman whose six year old son had died two weeks earlier, after five months in intensive care in Asuncion.  He had been hit by a car when he ran out into the street after his ball.  Meeting her and giving her a ride opened the door for a relationship, and we have now had multiple visits and a significant conversation together at a key time of deep mourning and loss in her life.  I have been able to contrast what she heard the priest say at her son’s funeral: “This boy did not die for his own sin; he was innocent and had no sin.  He died because of the sin of his parents” with the comforting news that God understood her pain uniquely as He, too, experienced the loss of His Son.  I pray that as we spend more time together she will grow to understand God’s love and forgiveness that gives us the hope of eternal life, rather than the condemning, wrathful, unjust God that has been presented to her.  To think that this opportunity arose because we went to a birthday party!

 ANOTHER WORLD

We arrived in Paraguay more than 14 years ago, and in many ways it has come to be our home.  Yet in other ways it is still another world for us.  We try to help people through problems we will never experience and can’t really comprehend. 

 A lady from a village visited to tell us the story of her son’s imprisonment due to confusion over a dead cow.  A cow he had been responsible for swallowed a grapefruit and died, and while they were butchering the meat another cow in the village was rustled and killed.  Being found with the meat of a dead cow, he was accused of rustling and killing the stolen animal and was arrested.  Thanks to a lawyer, he was released after just a couple days in jail.  But the fees they now owe the lawyer add up to more money than they would see in years and years of work on their subsistence farm. 

 This month we also walked with a family whose husband/dad had died suddenly, the very night his daughter was married in Buenos Aires.  The family faced the crisis of what to do with the body – wait until his wife and three daughters arrived from BA, or follow the law and bury him within 24 hours?  No one knew what would happen if the unpreserved body in its open coffin stayed laying in the living room for 48 hours.  How do we help a mourning family walk through this difficult decision we would never have to face?  (They ended up getting permission from government officials to wait.  Thanks to the cold weather, the body was fine, the rest of the family arrived, and Dan did a great job of presenting the gospel at the graveside service.)

 And so we continue to live in this place where we are in some ways fitting in well and in other ways so foreign.  It causes me to reflect on Jesus’ life on earth – how, though he was made a man, it must have always seemed like another world to him.  Yet unlike us, he knew how to perfectly help those around him, even though they faced problems he would never experience.  Praise God for our Incarnate Lord and his willingness to come to “another world” to save us!

 OUR HEROS

Meet Mercedes, a short, chubby woman whose face beams the biggest smile you’ve ever seen.  She and her husband run a store in the poor part of town, and she has recently opened up an empty house they own for the neighborhood’s weekly Bible study.  This week she added a “chocolatada” – a hot chocolate & cookies party – to the study.  Despite a bad headache all afternoon, she swept the dirt patio clean in anticipation of the night’s gathering.  She made multiple trips on foot from her house, carrying the heavy charcoal brazier and other supplies she was donating for the evening’s snack.  Kids started to arrive early in anticipation of the cup of hot chocolate, and as Mercedes prepared the food and drink we sang songs with the kids.  Their faces shone as they jumped around singing active songs about how great God’s love is and how we need to read the Bible and pray.  By the time Mercedes had served the snack, there were 29 kids (more to come later) and ten adults.  Then the lesson started.  The kids, piled up on the insufficient chairs and benches, listened attentively throughout even though the two-year-old with Down ’s syndrome crawled mischievously throughout the group.  So the 30 kids and 10 adults listened to Dan telling the story of Noah, learned to tell the story through repetition, and then listened as Mercedes (who was rotating throughout the group during the study serving hot mate to the adults) was the first to repeat the story by herself.  Not only did she get the story perfectly, but she added a great little application at the end.  I don’t know if any polished preacher’s “Do you hear me?” at the end of a sermon was answered as enthusiastically as this group’s response to Mercedes, and they burst into applause when she was done. 

 Meet Ema, our maid and substitute mom/grandma, who has one of the weekly Bible studies at her house.  This week some of the people from the Bible study in the above paragraph went to Ema’s house to make up the study they had missed in their neighborhood the week before.  Ema was sad to see that one of the ladies was completely illiterate (as are most of the adults in Mercedes’ study.)  Ema told her that until recently she hadn’t known how to read, either, but how she had learned how by listening to us read the Bible to her.  Desperate for this friend to have the delight she’s experienced of reading (both the Bible and our song sheet,) she offered to go to this lady’s house during this winter vacation to read to her!!  Maybe Sabina will learn to read, too.

 

 FROM THE KIDS

Thanks to lots of young visitors this month (six of the seven kids who stayed here without their parents are younger than Nathan), we’ve got extra quotes:

 Caleb, age 3:

“Jesus doesn’t hold guns. He can just carry lambs.”

 When I looked at a puzzle he’d put together and asked, “Did you do that!?”: “I did did that!”

 At Sunday School, in the moment of silence after all the kids had gone around and said their names: “Can I talk now?  I just want to say something . . .” (anticipatory pause) “Cinco!”

 {We’re re-learning English with the Caleb’s family, our South African colleagues.  I thought I was ready for the language barrier, already knowing the American equivalents of costume, torch, nappy, just now, biscuit, pavement, and many more.  But just since they’ve arrived we’ve also learned spanner, heavies, brolly, Standard 1-6, Rooibos . . . and that “lucked out” has a complete opposite meaning in the U.S. and South Africa!}  

 

David, age 4:

Overhearing a Christmas carol: “Little Lord Jesus?  That doesn’t make sense.  God makes sense.”  (Profoundly true, eh?  To quote another Christmas carol, “Hail the incarnate deity!”  The infinite God of the universe becoming a little baby is indeed hard for our finite minds to grasp, whether we are 4, 44, or 94!)

 At bedtime: “If I’m way too sleepy, can I sleep over half of the night?”

 Dictating an anniversary note to his parents: “I hope you don’t do anything bad.”

 Curious about the rules of the house: “Am I allowed to do anything I want?”

 

Samuel:

Searching for a word for my hairstyle (definitely not common vocabulary in our male-dominated house!): “Piggy tail?  Donkey tail?”  Rescued by Nathan: “PONY tail!”

 “How on earth are you supposed to sit up?  I can see ‘stand up’ and ‘sit down,’ but sit up?”

 

Nathan:

Over the din of the neighbor’s squealing pig, who’s sometimes so loud we have to pause our conversation: “I hate that pig.  I hope he tastes better than he sounds.”

July 4 Email

Note from delinquent blogmaster:  we are hoping that this posting will spur us to write some original blogs in the near future as well. 

7-4-09 (written on the fourth, sent later!)

Dear Supporters,

 Happy Fourth of July!  I celebrated the day by teaching English all morning and having hotdogs with my English students for lunch.  In this land of BEEF they laugh at the idea of grilling hotdogs, but I wanted to make it an authentic cultural experience for them.  I hope as you’re celebrating the independence of our country that you’ll also be rejoicing in your freedom from sin, thanks to the blood of Jesus shed for us on the cross.  Independence from that slavery is certainly the best kind of liberty!  In English class we looked at Revelation 1:5: “To Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood . . . to Him be glory and power for ever and ever!”

 June was for us a month of visitors.  We had five missionary colleague families stay with us through the course of the month, and several more come for just a meal.  Hosting these visitors overwhelms us with thankfulness.  We praise God for the Camerons, our new colleagues in Yuty, and for relationships with other teammates that bless and encourage us.  It was especially neat to have three different sets of kids stay while their parents got away for ministry and/or relaxing.  Besides our friendships, this full month of hospitality also made us thankful for our “stuff.”  Our little two-bedroom house accommodated everyone that needed to stay with us, and we had dishes and blankets enough to feed and cover all our guests.  (18 people for lunch one day was the month’s record.)  How thankful we are to be able to share some of the abundance God has so generously given us!

 We’ve now taken the plunge from “dabbling in orality” to actually doing oral Bible studies.  Two of our weekly home Bible studies are following an oral Bible study developed by some of our colleagues.  Participants listen to an MP3 chip during the week which has a Guarani recording of an evangelistic lesson, including a Bible passage and some question/answers.  The traditional Guarani saying, “a string that’s too long won’t turn the top” means that a story that’s too long won’t be re-told, and our goal is to facilitate the re-telling of these stories.  People are also memorizing verses that apply to the stories they learn. 

 Yesterday was the last day of school for a two-week winter vacation, and the “free time” will be filled with camps.  Dan is leading games and heading up the counselors for a youth camp July 10-12, and our annual SIM missionary conference that I’m in charge of organizing is the 12-17.  We covet your prayers for these events, for logistical success and spiritual fruit.

 We are continually thankful for your generosity, both financially and through the time you take to pray for us.  What happens here is a result of your efforts, too! 

 In Him, Christie for the Reiches

Christmas Kids’ Club

 

 Our goal in Yuty is to plant an independent, mature church.  Sometimes it seems like it won’t happen for a long time, as we have only a handful of believers so far, but there are encouragements along the way.  The biggest of those encouragements was this month’s Christmas Kids’ Club, dreamed up and organized by the two married couples in our church.  Using their different talents, they organized a Christmas pageant and taught English, sports, Bible stories, songs, and dance during six afternoons of VBS. 

The climax of two weeks of club was to be a program for the parents in which the kids sang, danced and presented their pageant.  Ladies cleaned the church and brought towels, sheets and string to costume up the kids.  Wouldn’t you know it – there wasn’t any electricity or water for the few hours before the program started.  We’re guessing that it may be because people weren’t able to shower after their hot days of hard work that only a handful of parents showed up to watch their kids practice and perform.  The disappointment about the small turnout was nothing compared to the pleasure of watching the kids enjoy presenting what they’d learned.  What an added blessing it was that God sent us a desperately needed, refreshing rain once it was all over and everyone had walked home!

            In some ways, this resembled a Christmas pageant production you’d do in your church.  Excited kids, some shy and some silly, forgetting their cues and wandering in at the wrong time, are undoubtedly in every Christmas pageant in every country.  But I’m guessing there are some uniquely Paraguayan aspects of our Christmas club that you’ve never had happen in the U.S.:

* It’s 98° F in the shade at 5pm when the club starts.

* The kids are so used to going around in their bare feet that multiple kids FORGET TO WEAR THEIR SHOES HOME!!

*The few cups are re-used for all the kids, not washed out or even rinsed in between uses.

*Most boys choose soccer over dress rehearsal, and the adults decide to postpone the program a day (only 24 hours before it’s supposed to take place!)  No worries about getting the news out to the kids and their families – it’s a small town!

*The girls learn a traditional Paraguayan dance that normally involves reciting poems back and forth.  Instead of the poems, they memorize parts of the gospel presentation to say to each other.

            Thanks for your prayers for our Paraguayan believers.  Pray with us that they will continue to look for ways to minister to their community, and for lasting impact in the lives of the children who participated in the club.

Living Far Away

 

Ferry accross the Tebicuary River

Living Far Away

There’s a verse in the Psalms that says, “Those living far away fear your wonders.” (65:8)  I’ve often thought of that as applying to people in whatever country I’m not in, but after a trip to a remote family of believers last week, I now have a different idea of who is really living far away! 

A very few of you may remember me writing years ago about Maria, the lady who took the long trip into town (on horseback, across a ferry, on foot, by bus, and on foot again) to thank us for putting Christian programs on the radio.  A lone believer in her remote village, she was encouraged by the Christian broadcasts we sponsored three times a day.  Her “husband” asked Jesus into his heart at our house on a visit to town that they took together.  Thanks to radio broadcasts, an MP3 player with Bible passages that we loaned to them, and occasional visits from Ruben, Dan and other believers, Reinaldo and Maria continue growing in their faith.  They now want to get married and baptized.  She dreams of moving to town so that she can go to church. 

Although Dan has been out several times, I had never been to visit the Duarte family.  I finally went for the first time last week.  Join us on a trip to their house.  Imagine climbing into our well-used Toyota Land Cruiser.  A bungee cord keeps the glove compartment hanging only half-way open as innumerable bumps have made its complete closing impossible.  Every inside surface appears to be a dull red from miles of driving on dusty road.  As you enter, you dust off any surfaces you might brush up against with the available hand broom and open the windows for what’s shaping up to be a hot day already.   Here we go to San Nicolas . . .

We were supposed to leave at 5:30 in the morning, but it wasn’t a disaster that we were a little late because we hadn’t filled up with gas the night before and the service station wouldn’t have been open that early.  After loading the car with a gift bag of some basic necessities for the family, a thermos of ice water for our terere (they don’t have a fridge, so ice is a treat), and some personal items like bug repellant and books for Nathan and Samuel to read, we were off only about 15 minutes late.  We picked up our maid/surrogate mom Ema and her 17-year-old grandson, got our gas, and headed out of town. 

After about a half an hour of bumpy, dusty driving we got to the river, where a ferry made of boards nailed across three canoes takes people, animals and vehicles back and forth.  This was to be the maiden voyage for our truck, as Dan had only been across on a motorcycle and in a friend’s vehicle.  He had tried to make the trip the week before, but Juan Pablo the “boat man” didn’t take him across because the water level was too low.  Today was different; the river had changed enough in the course of the week to make an attempt possible. 

The boys played in the sand while J.P. carried boards from his wooden house near the beach to water’s edge.  An ox cart carrying two sheep arrived just after us; two motorcycles were waiting on the other side.  Once the boards were set up, it was time for Dan to carefully drive onto the ferry.  We didn’t get in the car – passengers have to cross separately because of the extra weight.  Once the car was on, Dan rolled up his pant legs and jumped in to help the men in the river push the ferry beyond the shallow water.  He and J.P. climbed aboard once it was floating, and J.P. pulled the heavy load across, hand over hand, with a cable that stretched from one shore to the other.

The boys continued to play in the sand, while Ema and I listened to the driver of the ox cart tell us stories of vehicles that didn’t make it across.  He thought they were pretty funny.  (Needless to say, I didn’t!)  Fortunately, Dan made it across with no problem.  The motorcycles came back, and then it was our turn. 

Once on the other side, we continued along our bumpy, dusty way.  This stretch of road through marshy wetlands has 10 rickety bridges!  We saw flocks of herons, an owl sitting on a tall termite mound, and other brightly-colored birds, alone and in groups.  Eventually we got to the Duarte’s turnoff, followed an even narrower road through some woods, and (after three tries!) found the narrowest-of-all path through a field to their house. 

Reinaldo left his construction work at the elementary school nearby to help us find our way, and then stayed for the visit.  We were shown to a bench on the swept-clean dirt floor by their wooden house, and watched as Maria deftly tied a cow to the fence, lassoed its legs together, brought a calf to bump its head against the udders to start the milk flow, and then skillfully milked the cow.  When she was done, the cow (and its legs) were untied and the calf finished its meal.  Dan and Reinaldo walked to their field to bring some manioc, the kids went off to play, and the ladies sat to talk. 

In a way it seemed like a conversation that any ladies anywhere might have.  Maria talked about weaning her third child just a few weeks before, told about a visit to her mom’s, and described how her son did in school.  In another way, though, it seemed like we were in a different world.  She described the trip to the hospital on a motorcycle, when she was in the middle of a difficult labor.  She talked about the challenges of being the only Christians in their community and the dream she has of going to church – something she’s never been able to do. 

Once the men returned we visited some more, saw their rabbits (and a giant tarantula in the rabbit hutch), and drank terere.  Then we did a little Bible study together – as close to a church service as Maria has had.  We listened to a recording of the Christmas story, talked about its meaning, sang and prayed.  As we sang a pregnant neighbor came to draw water from their well.  How we pray that the community of San Nicolas will also find living water at the Duarte’s house! 

The trip back was just as bumpy and dusty.  This time to help push the ferry across were some 10 to 12 year old boys who were swimming in the river.  I couldn’t tell if they were taking breaks in their work to swim, or breaks in their fun to work, but it was obvious that they were there to help.  (Before the trip when I had expressed some doubt to Dan about the car making it across, he reassured me that there were swimmers who helped push the ferry.  “You have got to be kidding,” I thought – but there were, indeed!)  One of them caught a couple of small fish for Nathan, who was unsuccessfully trying to catch minnows in the empty pop bottle our ice had been in.  We put the fish in our terere thermos (stopped drinking for the trip home, obviously!) and had an uneventful trip the rest of the way. 

What an amazing feeling it was to spend time with these isolated believers and listen to God’s children worship Him.  Truly “those living far away fear your wonders.” (Ps. 65:8)  Pray for the Duartes, and for other remote believers around the world who would love to worship with others but are not able to.  Pray that God would use His Holy Spirit to make His Word clear as it travels over radio signals and through MP3 players to those who have no one to explain it to them.  And enjoy the privilege of fellowship as you gather each week to worship at church!  Don’t make the mistake of taking that blessing for granted, or skipping it for “better things to do!”

Nov 3, 2008 – “The Last Page”

ALL IN A DAY’S WORK?

It’s now Monday, November 3.  (The computer battery didn’t make it for me to finish this on Saturday.)  Yesterday, Sunday, Dan:

– Buried two animals, Samuel’s pet bird and a newborn puppy that a drunk lady had tossed in our yard a few days ago. 

– Taught the adults at church, while one of our youth taught the biggest class of kids we’ve ever had.

– Looked for insulin for a diabetic man whose leg has been amputated.  (There’s none in town at the moment.) 

– Set up next Friday as a starting date for the premarital class. 

– Cleaned out a major puncture wound Nathan got in his foot when he fell off a ledge onto a rake. 

– Drove THREE pregnant women to the hospital in our state capital. (Yuty’s doctor wasn’t in town, the ambulance is broken, and buses aren’t going because of the mud.)  Two were in labor, the third had a c-section today. 

CONTRAST

Two consecutive nights in a row this week we had visits from families.  Although they both consisted of a mom, dad and daughter, the similarities ended there, and I was struck by the great diversity of the people we work with.  Imagine getting to know these people as you sit outside on a warm evening, dodging bugs that are flying around you, attracted to your porch light.

The first family is one of many we know through the boys’ school. Nathan and their daughter were in preschool/kindergarten together. Derlis works at the bank and Luciana is a teacher in the high school. They have a son in 7^th grade and a daughter in 3^rd.  They stopped by on their way home from a prayer meeting – they are members of the Grace & Glory church around the corner from our house.  We used to see them often, as they would come to borrow Christian videos and music – they’re one of the few families in town that owns a VCR. Now that all those materials are at the church building, the only time we had seen them since returning to Paraguay was at an all-night wake for someone who had died.  (Obviously not the place for a chatty, social visit!)  It was nice to get caught up on their news and hear their testimonies.

The next night the visitors were a younger couple, with their young daughter (and enormously big belly – child #2 is due this month.) They are believers who are part of our church when they’re in Yuty, but their primary residence is in a village 19 kilometers out of town. They don’t have salaried jobs; they are subsistence farmers who live off what they grow on their land, and through what the husband earns through small construction or electrician jobs.  They are in town awaiting the arrival of the baby, but he had gone to check on things. Unfortunately, he found that people had entered and stolen some things in their absence.  The day before they came to our house to visit, Teo (the dad) had walked all the way from his village – 19 km of muddy going!  They brought us a big bag of tomatoes and 2 cabbages that they had grown.  Even though they struggle to make ends meet and live in very humble circumstances, they love the Lord and even offered for the Bible study in their neighborhood to meet at their house!  They have one of the MP3 players with Guarani Bible recordings.

FROM THE BOYS

My apologies.  This is the smallest-ever quotes section, due to the fact that I’ve been apart from my boys more days this month than I’ve been with them. 

Samuel’s analysis of a cloud: “It looks like George Washington turning into a girl.” 

As he often does, Samuel was making up new words to the hymn we had sung for family devotions.  Part of his song included the phrase, “’Til my daddy knows.”  Nathan asked him, “What does he have to know?  He already knows almost everything.”

Here is one from Peru, from six-year-old missionary kid Jonathan Krohn.  His mom is pregnant, and Jonathan told me he has a great name picked out for his future sibling: “Bionicle!”  (Think his parents might go for it?)

Since we have so few quotes, I’ll give you a bit of family news… 

PETS… We have five very cute puppies left from our dog’s litter of ten.  We sold and gave some away; we’re almost willing to start paying people to take them now!  They’re all females, which are hard to get rid of in a land where you can’t have your dog fixed.  Sadly, our baby pet bird died yesterday.  We blame the cool weather, combined with a day and night of no electricity (therefore no lamp to warm her up.) 

BIRTHDAY… Dan turns 40 this month!  We are thinking about taking advantage of the event to do a big outreach with lots of friends. Our idea is to copy my brother Mike’s tradition of having people bring something (like a piece of music) to present instead of a gift. Pray that this would be a fun event and provide a platform for us to present the gospel, even though it’s like nothing people would ever have participated in before.

SCHOOL… The boys are excelling in both Paraguayan and home school.  They’ll start their final exams next week in Paraguayan school, and will be done by the end of the month.  We’ll all enjoy having only “American school” for the summer.