The church at Mogollon that we’ve been working at
It’s been all about Vacation Bible School for us and about 75
kids from the surrounding community this week in Mogollon.
To handle all of these 75+ kids, there are 7 of us with 2
translators. The translators, as you can
imagine, are the key people for something like this considering they’re the
only ones who are truly bi-lingual (I’ve realized I know enough to at least
barter at the market and go grocery shopping).
Anything we say has to be repeated in Spanish to the kids by either
Sylvia or her assistant, Mayi, which limits us a lot in what activities and
games we do.
One thing we’ve made part of our daily introduction is a
skit to illustrate part of the story of Jesus, starting with Jesus choosing His
disciples, then performing His miracles, His crucifixion and finally His
resurrection. With the rain keeping us
from having VBS today, the crucifixion and resurrection re-enactments may have
to be combined for tomorrow’s last day… really, God only knows.
Crazy story about the skits, though (and source of the title
for this blog):
We were doing the skits of Jesus’ miracles on Wednesday,
specifically focusing on the time when He walked on water and another skit for
when He calmed the sea in the storm.
Speaking of storms, a massive thunderstorm started about 10 minutes into
our two hours with the kids. The
combination of the heavy rain drops hitting the tin roof and the deafening
thunder coming from lighting strikes that couldn’t have been hitting more than
100 yards from the church, it was pretty hard to hear the story being narrated
(even with the microphone and speaker).
As the storm was at its peak, we just happened to be doing
the skit about Jesus calming the storm.
Our narrator, Rachel, was yelling just to get Sylvia to hear so that she
could scream it in Spanish to the kids…and even then, they were having trouble
understanding the story because of all the noise. I was playing the role of Jesus, acting as if
I was asleep up on the stage/boat while the rest of our team was playing Jesus’
terrified disciples. Just about when
Rachel got to the part about the disciples being woken up by the terrible
storm, a huge crack of thunder absolutely rocked the building, knocking out the
power and causing most people in the church to scream (I did not,
ironically…must have still been in character).
We finished the skit, showing the kids that Jesus calmed the
storm and moved on with our loosely planned curriculum (if you could call it
that). The cool part was that before we
left for the day, the storm outside actually calmed down… enough for Pastor
Manuel to take the kids back home in his truck, at least.
Pastor Manuel picks up and takes home the kids who live too far away to walk by themselves
This week has been insane in terms of what we plan for and
what actually happens. Without fail, our
plans are turned upside-down and God ends up working in some obscure way to
show us how awesome He is. Today, if it
hadn’t been cancelled, I was going to take the kids 12 and older aside and lead
them in making bracelets with shoe string that I got at the open market this
morning. The purpose of the bracelets (the
same design I wear from Haiti) is to have something to remind us all to pray
for and encourage each other with the love of Christ. I’m planning (tentatively, given the course
of this week) on taking them through the first few paragraphs of 1 Corinthians
to back this up and then lead it into a discussion about salvation and what
that truly means, so I’m looking forward to that.
Other than that, our down time has been filled with getting
to know our surroundings in San Juan.
We’ve eaten some ridiculously good tacos, empanadas and some of the
best, freshest fruit juice I think I’ve ever tasted. As a squad, we’re starting to give some more
focus to putting a dance routine together for the Awakening next month in
Ireland. If you don’t know about the
Awakening, it’s a week-long worship concert for World Racers, both current and
some alumni. There’s a massive dance
competition at some point of the week that all active squads compete in, with
huge bragging rights at stake.
Thank you for reading!
I hope all is well with you and that you are seeking for God to work
boldly through your faith. Please pray
for the support accounts of all P-squad racers who are not yet fully
funded! From team Crash, only Lia is
fully funded… so there is much prayer that is needed!
Link to my photobucket album for the DR: www.photobucket.com/kjwrdominicanrepublic
