We didn’t have a lot of free time this month so I didn’t do much blogging. I just thought I’d share a few things from my journal to try to update you on this month.
March 13th-
Yesterday at the village when Pastor Isaac was talking about how he hoped each of us would come back, I started thinking about how I could help in a more practical way. I’m not sure how I feel about the expectations that we are going to fix everything, as though we walk around with dollar signs on our foreheads, but there’s no denying that the need is there. I like what Pastor Isaac said about the villages: they worship idols and lack clean water and so when Christians come in and dig wells they are also able to introduce the Jesus in whose name they provide clean water.
March 14th-
We went to the national thanksgiving and prayer service today. People have been fasting and praying all over the country since Ghana’s Independence day on March 6th. It was really long but I’m glad we went. The pastor that spoke and then the president both said some really good things about not just waiting for God to hand them blessings, but to work for it, trusting that God will bless their work.
March 16th-
We showed the Jesus film tonight at the van station. I was pretty skeptical about it so it was cool to see how many people came to see it – probably about 100 people were there. I LOVED how the crowd clapped and cheered after each of Jesus’ miracles.
After the film, a TON of kids crowded around us, it was a literal mob. They were pressing so tight that I was afraid some of the smaller kids would get hurt. It was really overwhelming. They were pushing each other out of the way to get closer to us and they were holding our hands, hugging us, touching our hair and skin. One girl told me that they thought we were from Compassion and that we were going to sponsor them to go to school. They were so mean to each other, almost cruel. They were trying to embarrass each other. They even started fighting. I was holding the hand of one of the girls from the church and one of the kids whacked her in the head, hard.
March 17th-
We did school ministry today. In the morning, we went to Tower school, which is kindergarten to junior high. I like this school a lot. The worship is really fun, everyone dances and claps and a few of the boys pound on the drums. I preached this morning, about how we are powerful as children of God. I enjoyed it. I liked that when I asked them a question, they actually answered and when I said, “right?” they said “amen!” In the afternoon, we went to the all-boys high school. Enjoyed some more worship and dancing and then Mike gave a testimony and Tyson preached. It’s funny that preaching to 600 high school students is no big deal now.
March 22nd-
Tonight was the first night of our Holy Spirit convention at the church. Tyson preached, so I gave a testimony. During worship, the pastor’s four-year-old daughter was sitting in my lap and braiding my hair.. She pretty much took all of the hair from one half of my head and braided it. She finished right before I got called up to give my testimony and it took her so long to do it that I didn’t have the heart to take it out. So I go up to the pulpit with my hair looking CRAZY and I start sharing a few stories about times when God has made me laugh. However, I really don’t think they translated very well, because no one is laughing. In fact, no one is even shouting amen, and they love to shout amen. So, I’m standing there, with my hair looking insane, wearing big, baggy pants that I got in Asia and the kids have dubbed my “china pants” (they make me pretend to be a sumo wrestler when I wear them), and I’m telling stories about how God is funny that no one understands. Except, I’m kind of telling them like someone who’s really bad at joke telling because I keep cracking myself up before I get to the funny part. I sit down and Tyson gets up to redeem the situation by giving an awesome sermon about the Holy Spirit, in spite of the few hours notice. He gets a lot more amens and hallelujahs than I did…
