Saturday Post -- 24/12/11

Most Sunday afternoons, we have the pleasure of conversing with our parents via Skype, as we hope to do at some point on Christmas Day. Every now and then, Mum says she’s been speaking to someone who knows us, and they will often ask her “Is it really as easy as they make it look on the blog?” Making it look easy hasn’t exactly been our intention, but to a certain extent, we certainly use the blog as an opportunity to look back on the week past and count our blessings.

However, I am not about to dress up this time of year as “easy”. Christmas is a very different holiday here, in many senses, just one of several big festival dates throughout the year. The biggest frustration, though, is, of course, being so far from family and friends at this most sociable time of the year. And that frustration is exacerbated when those people whom we have travelled so far to try to help seem to go to extraordinary lengths to mess up. Of course, their slip-ups are nothing personal against ourselves, but when set against our distance from home, it rubs salt into the wound somewhat.

A pretty horrendous situation has arisen this week for a parent of a group of children who come to FT’s Community Class ministries and to the church. It would be remiss of me to go into details here, but let’s just say this particular person, through their children and through occasional visits to FT and the church, had plenty of exposure to the truth of the gospel, and the predicament this person now finds him/herself in is a completely avoidable one. And the result is potential disaster, on many levels, for the family.

It makes for a sobering reminder this Christmas of the challenges we are faced with as missionaries. Nevertheless, as I mentioned in the newsletter, when we realise that Christ chose to step into such a messed-up world, it gives us an even greater appreciation of his love for us, and what he gave up that very first Christmas.

We will be celebrating that very sacrifice this afternoon at 4pm, when as a church we will gather for our Christmas Eve celebration. Over the past month, the youth group and the kids’ Christmas holiday club have been working on various songs and dances to present, in between the newly-learnt Christmas carols, readings, and reflections on ‘Immanuel’ by fellow missionary Kenny Holt. There are probably around 100 young people involved in total, which makes for great outreach potential, especially if they are accompanied by their families and friends. This year, we’re laying on extra transport so that more such guests, many of whom live outside of town, may be able to join them and hear the Christmas message. Please pray that many would take advantage of the improved access!

We are both heavily involved in the running of that service and will be on our feet most of the day, so the relaxation of Christmas Day will be particularly welcome. This year’s festivities will be a little smaller than last year’s block party, with just the three missionary families sharing the meal, which will include a monster-turkey which is of such high quality that Amanda had to go all the way to Cochabamba to get it (well, alright, she was there anyway), and is so substantial that it was part of her checked baggage on the way home!

I shan’t witter on, as our readers doubtless have a long list of last-minute touches they need to make to their own meal. Needless to say, have a wonderful, Christ-centred Christmas, and enjoy the time off work – you (probably) earned it!

Prayer

• For that family who are now in dire straits. Pray particularly that as a church we can provide adequate support to them. They are a well-known family and this avoidable predicament is one that many around them run the risk of walking themselves into all the time. Pray that lessons would be learned.
• For today’s outreach event at the church, that those who come would be left in no doubt as to what Christmas is really all about.

Praise

• For a great time yesterday afternoon with our FT colleagues as we celebrated Christmas and reflected on the past year, with the aid of some prime (though tough – my jaws are still aching!) Bolivian steak.
• For the gift of God’s son at Christmas and, in spite of everything, the great pleasure it is to share him with others all year round.

¡Feliz Navidad!

Craig & Amanda