Saturday Post -- 01/09/12

The Intermediate English class: certifiably talented.

No doubt about it, missionary work is far from straightforward. Actually, I’d go as far as to argue that if all is running smoothly at one’s mission station, then there’s probably something wrong. Because, ultimately, ours is a field which deals in that most inconsistent of commodities: human lives. We minister to a vast patchwork of needs, failures and hurts. It sure can be a messy business.

Throw a place like Trinidad into the mix, where in any given day technology will break down, institutions will shut down and people will let you down, and you can see why, for us, such a concept as a ‘typical day’ doesn’t really exist. I have surely at least once referred on this webpage to George Verwer’s warning not to become involved in missions work if one is not prepared to have one’s heart broken – this is a regular, sometimes daily, occurrence for us. We bear our fair share of burdens – and are honoured to minister to broken souls.

Nonetheless, one of the great pleasures of the English class this year has undoubtedly been the opportunity to work alongside a mature, responsible and largely independent group of people, with ages ranging from 12 to 52. While Amanda and I strive to create a warm, fun learning environment, there’s no question that the homework demands in the first few lessons have a way of separating the wheat from the chaff. What remained was a core group of a dozen or so students who came regularly to class (consistency of commitment is, in itself, a rare quality in Bolivia), learned to speak a language, heard the truth about the Christian faith, and, in the process, developed into not only fine students, but great friends.

On Wednesday evening, then, we rounded off the year with a dinner in one of Trinidad’s fabled steak restaurants, where everyone received their final certificates. However, the prevailing mood was not so much ‘adios’ as ‘chau’, as we investigated how to keep up English practice together – my hope is that we’ll be able to meet as a group once a week to converse in the language, using news articles, songs and other stimuli.

Meanwhile, the more chaotic side of our ministry was very much in evidence yesterday in the outlying village of Maná, where we staged the first ‘off-campus’ community class this year. Eagle-eyed readers may remember that last year we decamped to this village for a few weeks, however, we’re hoping to run the class every Friday until Christmas. A similar curriculum – of Bible teaching and literacy development – to the one at the Wednesday class will be taught, though part-time education worker Elizabeth, volunteer teacher Porfidia, and I will have to revise our execution a little over the coming week. In the end, 30 kids turned up, but the first of these arrived some 30 minutes after the scheduled start-time and we were well into the second-half of the afternoon’s teaching when the final kids made their appearance. Compared to sleepy Maná, the Trinidad mentality is positively New York-esque, and we will have to adjust accordingly.

Porfidia teaches the kids with Elizabeth (in black) looking on.

However, we all had a lot of fun reaching out to a whole new set of children. Which brings us neatly to Amanda’s major activity of the week: preparing name-tags for the children who’ll be coming to a new kids’ club the Sports department of FT are launching next week. But how, pray tell, do we even know the names of the kids? Because, wonderfully, a local school has allowed us to take two whole year-groups out of class for two hours each Tuesday for their ‘R.E.’ time. But there won’t be much time for ‘chalk-and-talk’ as the programme includes singing, team games and interactive Bible lessons. Our friend and fellow missionary KC Rivero is spearheading the operation and Amanda was only too happy to get involved this week as she eased her way back into work.

Must dash, for reasons outlined in the prayer points, below. Token house construction-progress picture to finish.

Prayer

• For the kids’ club, starting next Tuesday. Pray for all the FT workers who will be involved and for preparation of the children’s hearts to hear the Good News.
• For wisdom and discernment as we seek to refine our approach to working with the Maná kids.

Praise

• Give thanks for a great year with the Intermediate English group, and pray for the Basic class, starting on the 18^th of September.
• We’ve been thrilled upon returning from our stint in Santa Cruz to have seen the youth group so rejuvenated by a programme of activities inspired by the recent Olympic Games. A fair few new faces were in evidence last weekend. Give thanks for that and pray for our watersports activity this morning out at the local lake resort.

¡Que Dios les bendiga!

Craig & Amanda

P.S. Next weekend I’m rendezvousing in La Paz with my good friend Dan Wynne, who arrives next Saturday for a fortnight’s trekking in Bolivia and Peru. Indeed, I’ll be accompanying him for a few days to the Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt-lake and just about the last major tourist attraction in this country I haven’t yet experienced. I hope to share some striking photography in a couple of weeks’ time (I'm not showing off -- it's not hard to take great pictures when this is your canvas) – in the meantime, hopefully I can convince Amanda to put in a shift next Saturday. TTFN.