After a rough start to the month and other than my legs being covered with very itchy, ugly red ant bites, Indonesia turned out to be pretty great!!
(FYI: they look better after getting an injection and taking some antibiotics and antihistamine pills, but please pray that they will continue to heal and I don’t end up with any scars!)
At the beginning of the month, I celebrated my 27th birthday at Sun Plaza Mall. After a day of shopping and eating food, we ended the evening at the movies to see Jurassic World 2.
Fun fact: At the beginning of the month, my team decided to see if we could have a streak going of watching a movie every night…and we almost made it! We also may have seen three movies in the theatre.
One of my favorite parts of ministry this month was putting on several kid’s programs! A couple afternoons per week we taught English to children in the neighborhood. We had a blast playing games, singing songs and telling bible stories.
On many other afternoons/evenings, we traveled to nearby towns to share the love of Jesus to kids. Every time we left, we had kids hanging on us and surrounding our car not wanting us to leave!
But besides kids programs, we led several young adult gatherings.
The church we are partnered with has a young adult meeting once a week. On two occasions, we led worship and teachings. One week I was able to share with the group about finding and chasing after God’s calling and purpose on their life.
We also went to a couple other churches to lead young adult gatherings. At one church, we were told it was a revival meeting, so Anna gave a wonderful message on the gospel and Ashley closed out the service with an altar call. Two young adults raised their hands to receive Jesus that night! Puji Tuhan! (Praise the Lord!)
On the other night, I along with Ashley were able to share our testimonies. One girl came up to me after the service and said that my story encouraged and help built her faith, which was really sweet to hear!
During the second last week, we continued to hear teaching after teaching from Pastor Dave and Frances, which we loved! Monday-Friday from 9am-3pm they taught a seminar to adults from the church and nearby churches. About 30 or so people came/day.
We have been so blessed by them and have enjoyed being able to spend time with them. We even celebrated Jess’s 23rd birthday together at a nice Western Buffet called Traders.
When Pastor Dave asked if any of us knew how to create a website/blog, I volunteered to help him. Over the span of a few days I was able to help him create a website where people can download his books in several languages. There is still more work to be done, but it was a pleasure to be able to do this for him.
I highly recommend downloading his 6 books! www.davebergxyz.wordpress.com
On Sundays, our team was in charge of kid’s Sunday school and sharing our testimonies with the congregation. Marah even preached one of the Sundays!
On our last Sunday at church, our team sang our favorite Bahasa song. It came as a huge surprise to the congregation. Once we started singing, nearly everyone pulled out their phones to start recording us. After the service, we were told our team was the first team to have sung a song in Bahasa!
Pulling out phones to take pictures and videos of us “bules” (Caucasians) was an everyday thing. We were quite the celebrities. After every service, every adult meeting and every children’s program, we had Indonesians in line to get pictures with us.
I don’t think there was a time we were out in public where at least a couple people didn’t asked to take selfies with us. Apparently it’s a cool status thing to show off to friends and family. There’s probably about 100 pictures of us on Facebook somewhere. All I can say is I’m glad I’m not actually a celebrity and in the limelight.
Roles did reverse however when Jess and I wanted to take a picture with our body pump instructor. Who could blame us though? I mean check out those biceps.
On our last night, our host and his family put together a special farewell party for our team. Several of the church friends and family came to say goodbye.
Despite the friends we made, beautiful scenery, and having a great month, I’m ready to say goodbye to Indonesia.
ONTO MONTH 11!! Blog coming shortly about how my squad will be spending our last month in the Philippines!
