So when I agreed to head up the salvation story, I thought it would be a great chance to grow spiritually. And it was. However you never know how the presentation is going to go or how people will respond until you get there. And that is definetly true in Swaziland.
At our first care point, Garden Center (obviously the name we gave it), to go-go who was present that day wasn’t exactly fluent in English. She knew quite a bit of English and definetly more then I know of her language but she wasn’t fluent. Now, I knew this going into the day but I thought that I had used pretty simple words and could quietly help her as she needed it. That was not her idea!
As I started to tell the story she yelled at our guy who was acting out Jesus because she said that he was disrupting her with his acting. So as a stunned actor readjusts playing baby Jesus, we continue with our story. But it wasn’t too much longer before we came into another ‘misunderstanding.’ As I was telling the story, I waited for her interupptation to start but it didn’t. Instead she looked at me and yelled “WHAT?” After changing the the way I phrased the sentence so she may be able to understand what I had said better, she again looked at me and yelled “WHAT?” I once again changed the phrasing of my sentence and then she looked out at the kids and yelled “OOOOHHHH!” and then interuppted it for the children. I didn’t even think twice about it, I was used to there usually being a clitch in the language translation, however after the twenty-fifth time I was beginning to wonder what was being translated.
*Side Note: I have now picked up her “WHAT?” “WHAT?” “OOOHHH!” during our night time Phase 10 game as I am ganged up on by all the other players. I’m a Phase 10 pro, what can I say? Just so you know. *
The next day we went to Joyella to do the same presentation as the day before. I knew we would have a much easier time here because of Esther, the go-go who teaches there. She’s awesome at English! And sure enought she was great! Everything was going smoothly. The kids were into the story. And then we got to the part where Jesus got arrested and put on trail. She would turn around and tell me how sad and mean that she thought this story was. As I reassured her that the story would get better soon, she would turn back around and tell me again how mean she thought this story was. Finally we came to the point in the story where Jesus rose again. The interesting thing was, Esther had mentioned several times that she loved Jesus and knew who He was, but she had never heard His story.
So I’ve learned as long as we tell people about Jesus, He’ll do the rest. All we have to do is show up and do what He has told us. Now you may be wondering how the salvation story turned out. It’s always hard to tell since that descion is between a person and God. However at all four care points we had children raising their hands to be saved and praying the sinners prayer. For the rest, the seed was planted.
