Saturday Post -- 21/11/15

With Asalia (a former nurse at FT) and her baby daughter. Her husband, Yasir,
took the picture. Santa Cruz now has a Papa John's!

Our aims and objectives for our sojourns to the city are pretty straightforward: eat nice food, catch a flick or two, stock up on the harder-to-find groceries, rest well and, most importantly coming from the goldfish bowl that is Trinidad...be anonymous.

Last weekend in Santa Cruz, we succeeded in all but the last criterion, making contact with no fewer than three groups of people over our four day stay. Yet by the end of the trip, we were delighted to have broken our rules a little; and in the process, we found true satisfaction.

The main driver of our visit, indeed, was the opportunity to get together with newborn Amanda's parents, who named her after the great woman herself and asked that we be godparents (if you missed out on that saga, here's all you need to know). On Sunday afternoon, we met with the couple -- Christian and Analía -- Amanda and their other children at a kid-friendly restaurant in town; it was my (Craig) first time meeting Christian, having only met Analía at the conclusion of proceedings back in October.

Analía (left) gatecrashes the Amanda convention.

Accepting the role of a godparent in this culture can be a little tricky, as some tend to see it in purely economic terms. Foreigners like ourselves, in particular, can be asked to be godparents, only to find that the only meaningful contact with the family is a phone call from the parents in the run-up to the child's birthday, asking to fund this year's party. Aside from the very brief contact we had with them last month, we really did not know this couple very well, and so, in a way, we were taking a risk by accepting their request. Yet, for all of the hijinks of our initial meeting, we had been really impressed by their maturity, and prayerfully accepted.

Sunday afternoon confirmed that we had made the right decision. Three hours flew by as we got to know each other better while the children happily submerged themselves in the neighbouring ball pool. I had an interesting conversation with Christian, who told me he'd been involved in an evangelical church some years ago during a crisis, but working on Sundays had gotten in the way of going back (as it happens, he started a new job this week that gives him Sundays off, and told me he is hoping to return to church with the family). 

At one point in our discussion, I felt particularly enabled to say something of use. Christian shared that a struggle he has is with unanswered prayer, particularly why there are seasons when prayers are answered, and others when it seems like it is not. And in the moment, I thought of what had led us to this point. We were having this conversation because Christian and Analía had asked us to be godparents; they had asked us to be godparents as a result of that traumatic situation that had brought us together last month; that situation last month had taken place because we want to adopt a child; we want to adopt a child because we are unable to have children naturally (see also: Tim Keller's indebtedness to Watergate). In other words, a whole lot of prayer had gone 'unanswered' to bring us to this moment where we were having such a good time getting to know each other better. Genesis 50:20 indeed. He seemed helped by that.

A few hours after our arrival on Saturday morning, we made the trip to one of the city's outlying suburbs to spend some time with Graham & Debbie Frith, a couple we had heard so much about, and had been meaning to get together with for some time (a mutual friend had pointed us in their direction). The Friths have been in Bolivia for a couple of decades now, firstly in Sucre, and now in Santa Cruz, having overseen the development of a tremendous ministry called 'El Alfarero' ('The Potter'), which is doing a great work among students and young people in both of these cities (we had the privilege of visiting their headquarters on Tuesday). Here is a link to the website. 

The visit proved to be of real help to us. Amanda and I had been feeling a slight sense of aimlessness and perhaps a lack of drive in our ministry of late. Despite only having just met us, the Friths -- as a couple with significantly more experience of living and serving here -- had no qualms about asking some searching questions about the way things were going for us. We left feeling challenged, but also with a greater sense of clarity as to the way ahead. In particular, we sensed that we had subtly fallen into a trap which we spend much of our own ministry warning others about: that of seeking to minister to others without first of all being 'fed' ourselves.

And in this respect, God also proved faithful. If I may go all Genesis 50:20 on you again, our usual lodgings in Santa Cruz -- a guesthouse on the campus of a seminary -- were, for the first time in memory, fully booked. We got in touch with a friend, who pointed us in the direction of another guesthouse, this time operated by a ministry called World Gospel Mission. And this guesthouse, unlike our usual haunt, had acres of garden space: ideal, then, for finding a quiet corner and allowing God to minister to us. And on a couple of mornings, we set aside a few hours to do precisely that.

All too often, we have arrived back in Trinidad after such excursions in survival mode, counting down the months till the next break. This time was different. We feel refreshed, re-focused and, most importantly, re-fastened to the Rock which cannot move.

And Spectre? Hmmm. A 006 out of ten at best.

Prayer

• Potentially a very big week, this, for the prospective adoption. On Monday, we're hoping to get a formal request in for fostering (as a precursor to adoption) and from our experience in September, an formal hearing could take place by the end of the week. Prayer much appreciated.
• The new men's and women's groups in the church got off to a solid start two weeks ago. Pray for the second pair of meetings tomorrow afternoon.
• Craig is preaching tomorrow on Philemon 1:8-16.

Remembering the persecuted on Thursday evening.

Praise

• Thursday night saw us mark Persecuted Church Month in the church with a prayer meeting held in the usual venue, but without chairs and in complete darkness, but for candles that people were told to bring. It proved to be a small but really powerful way of identifying with those around the word who have to be so clandestine when they meet together, and it helped us greatly in praying for them too.
• For a great break in Santa Cruz and for the various relationships forged and consolidated there. 

¡Que Dios les bendiga!

Craig & Amanda