God – Page 5 – dannypeck.net

Refreshed

Travel Day: 4

On Ground Day: 2

Every morning we’ve been waking up to Fabian. I’m usually conscious enough to hear Chet to say “Bryan?”, which means “Wake everyone up, Mr. Maestro.” Immediatley Fabian, in his awesome Ecuadorian accent starts repeating “Bryan? Bryan? Bryan?… Bryaaan? Bryyyyan? Bryan?”

This morning was no exception, and it continued when he burst into song. I’m not sure if I find it obnoxious or hillarious when he belts out “Buenos dias, Señor Jesus!” and “Acompantes, acompantes….” He’s like a human alarm clock. And considering there are no other morning people in the group (even Chet just shakes his head and walks outside) he takes a lot of grief for it, but just stands and stares at you for a while and then shrugs and continues singing.

As we were all brushing our teeth outside the church, our new home, Fabian walked next door to Dayuma‘s house. She has a covered area out front for storage and where her animals hang out, particularly a parrot. Fabian was putting his finger out, trying to get the bird to land on it. In a high-pitched parrot voice he would say “Hola amiga?” and the bird would flap its wings violently and go “SQWUAAAAAAAAK!” and try to bite the outstretched finger. This continued for twenty minutes. I kid you not.

We had devotion with Rey’s group and made it only about 4 minutes late. Pretty good for gringos, and amazing that the Ecuadorians started on time, even when the missionary in charge is Columbian. The kitchen crew took off while everyone was having coffee and some semblance of breakfast cake. We had breakfast set up and ready to go in no time. Roberto informed us that it was much easier for him and us and much less complicated for the kids if we just put spoons in the bowls rather than on the table. This really did make life much easier, just setting the places with cups and bringing the food over in a sort of assembly line. Meanwhile, Fabian was working on those benches from yesterday. Turns out that he and a couple others are putting some wood on the bottom to make a long flat surface to touch the ground on each leg, rather than a pointed end that digs into the ground. This will help stabilize them as well as keep our “remodeling” work from being undone.

One thing that I did not mention about yesterday and that I might have failed to mention today except for some events that will occur later in this story is what we do when the kids arrive. Dana was really excited for the kids last night and as they lined up outside and we had nothing to do until they were finished eating, she said “Let’s make a tunnel!” So all five gringos stood on one or the other side of the door, put our arms up and out for them to run underneath and smiled and yelled “Whooooooo!” as the children came in. The littlest ones were totally confused, but some of the older ones really liked it.

We had opened several cans of sardines but we didn’t see them in breakfast. Nicole said as we were eating that if we were having sardines for lunch, she was going to be packing in this stuff. The “stuff” in question was a crumbly, dried sort of brown something. There’s just not even any kind of breakfast I can compare it to. Even oatmeal is just too liquid-y even in its driest form to compare, and I had no clue what any of the ingredients were at the time, and only know one of them now. Fortunately, it was easy to clean up.

The cups got done first (which is something we learned to start doing the rest of the day) and then the spoons and finally the bowls and it just flew by, with not much to scrape or scrub or rinse off before actually washing them. We had plenty of time to make it over to the program, which was a story about Hudson Taylor in Spanish of which I at least caught the gist. As the kids went out to do devotion time in their age groups with counselors, we headed back to the kitchen, which feels like our base of operations now. Between not having worked our tails off for breakfast like we had with all previous meals and the fact that we were upbeat from Fabian’s singing and the parrot and had had a fairly happy morning, it was like we had settled into our place here.

Now that all the kids are here, it takes two shifts for them all to eat. About 90-115 (depending on what is being served) come in for the first batch. Then when they leave, we clean up and reset as fast as we can and let in the other 45-60 kids (depending) and then the gringos (the other eight) and then the kitchen crew (gringos, Ecuadorians, and Huaorani) and any other Huaorani who would like to eat. It’s really cool that they get to come because the extra food goes to good use and because the people in town are becoming very involved in what’s going on here, watching, helping, and coming to the program each session.

Lunch contained tuna, and we discovered in the course of setting it out that those sardines HAD been in our breakfast. Nicole was really happy to learn that. At least it was a painless way to consume them, not knowing. Ignorance is bliss.

And on the bliss front, it turned out that after we (the kitchen crew) sat down, we were D-O-N DONE. (I know how to spell, it’s a YouthWorld joke). Bryan, Chet, Sarah, Teddy and probably a couple others relieved us from lunch dishes. Dana had gotten a chance to talk to Chet about the extreme amount of exhaustion we had felt yesterday (and to think I was worried I wouldn’t be doing enough work on the kitchen crew) and they decided to step in for us. We went to take showers and have some desperately needed quiet time.

This afternoon was the first time in Toñamparé that I got to take a little bit of a nap, and to do my Quito Quest Intern devotional and read scripture and to just have some prayer time. It was really good to realize how much we have actually accomplished, despite feeling like we are trapped in one little area for the largest chunk of the day. We had talked on the way back how that was really sweet of them to step up for us (but how we were sure we looked exhausted) and by the time we walked back I felt really refreshed. Refreshed. I just want to put emphasis on that word because it would become a theme the rest of the day. For me, personally because I felt like the floaters and sports/generator crew that switched us out for lunch dishes were just an answer to prayer. I asked yesterday to be able to have the energy to just keep doing my job all week and to glorify God through it, and those guys definitely gave us the ability to do that, and to have the time to remember what we’re here for.

We went back for dinner and set up again. It was getting dark by the time Rey, Angel, and the rest let the kids out of the session, but fortunately the generator guys had string wiring and two light bulbs in the kitchen and had the generator going five minutes into the meal. The kid applauded when they cranked it up.

Dinner was rice, lentils and eggs with lemonade (though we found out that the water for the lemonade isn’t purified, and despite being heated, we’re trying to stay away from it. Back to the Nalgene bottles). When the kids were lining up outside, two of the Ecuadorians said “Let’s do the Ritual of the Rain!” Dana knew what this meant even before she was done translating that sentence for us, and all of us were laughing as we ran to make the tunnel. We thought the kids would think we were crazy gringos. The adults certainly do, but it is truly a sign of partnership that they join in with us in our idiocy. And apparently the kids like it. Besides that, we get to show our enthusiasm for our assigned job and for the kids that we’re truly here for, making them feel at peace and at home as they learn about God and have an amazing camp (EDIT: see Saturday, June 14th’s post about the “amazing” aspect of the camp that Rey’s group is putting on here).

It also turns out that they constructed a new table outside during the afternoon. We’d had one before, but it was small and short. This one was a little taller and a little longer, and the Huaorani who had made it had done so specifically for us to wash the dishes. If there was one thing they could do to show their appreciation for us beyond the “Ritual of the Rain,” that was it. I’m sure it sounds silly if you are reading this on a screen in North America, but that we were noticed and thought of cared for was really just touching, especially in light of knowing the usual sentiment toward gringos, “We love them, they bring money.” I’m seriously tearing up right now typing about a table.

At any rate, we now had dishes down the a science. Fabian (who was at this point about 80% finished with all those benches: this guy is a work-a-holic) made sure the spoons were cleaned and dried, aquiring the nickname “Spoon Boy.” It also turns out the Roberto has been boiling water and keeping the spoons in it for half and hour or so after every meal so that they really are sanitized. That made me feel much better about our ability to clean them, and I can handle cups and bowls. I’m sure I’ve eaten off worse at Boy Scout camps. The rest of us ripped right through the cups and then the bowls in record time, especially since we now had room to stack the dirty dishes outside and then pass them through two wash buckets and a rinse bucket and a “clean” bucket to take back inside as we had the table/working space for everyone to be involved at once and be out of the way of the diligent Huaorani women who cleaned the nastiest cooking bowls before we could even get to them.

We went to the program and I thought we would be getting to bed soon. But this is Flexador, right? I can’t honestly say I wasn’t grumpy going into this, wanting to have debrief and be D-O-N DONE. But we went outside in the dark and cranked up the generator for some makeshift light posts and played games. The kids did a South American style tug-of-war with inner tubes rather than rope. One from each team would grab the inner tube and hang on and the rest would hold on to the kid in front’s waist and pull. It’s really a lot more violent but also a lot more effective than our way. After several rounds of that they did the same thing grabbing the waist, but formed two “caterpillars” and tied a balloon to the waist of the last one in line. The first kid in line had to pop the balloon of the last person on the other team, and no one could let go of the person in front of them. Hilarious to watch.

Finally, it was an obstacle course. Each team had ten people line up behind an inner tube. The first kid would scramble through the tube, grab a broomstick and do ten fast-paced turns to get dizzy. Then they’d run and have to stop and put their face to a plate on the ground full of water, grab a piece of candy out of the middle with their teeth, and spit it to the side. Then they’d get up and run in a straight line to another plate covered with flour and grab another piece of candy with their teeth and spit it out, but now the flour would be all over their wet face. Finally, they’d run again to a soccer ball and have to kick it into a “goal,” two sticks, each held by a counselor. It was pretty wide, but dizzy and with flour in your eyes, even for kids who play just about no other sports butsoccer, it was a tough shot. When they finally made it, the second kid would scramble through the inner tube at the beginning and do the same process.

After all the different age groups had gone, rotating a set of two girl teams and a set of two guy teams against each other, the counselors went.

Then they decided it would be a good idea for the gringos to participate. So the six gringo guys went head-to-head with the six gringo girls. We had a huddle and it was unanimous: there was no way we were going to get beaten by girls. We flew through that thing, and I was last in line, which meant everyone else got to stand and yell “GO FASTER DANNY” as I spun around the broomstick and headed off toward the candy. Being the VERY LAST person through all the water and flour, it was disgusting and dirty, and I couldn’t find the candy, and had grit in my teeth for hours when I got done. But when I kicked that goal and the whistle blew, we were a full person ahead with Nicole still standing behind the inner tube.

And we were disgusting. I’m hoping Chet will have some pictures I can insert here of us covered in flour and mud. And all we had was our Nalgene bottles (we were out of both water in our cooler and buckets from which we could pump without going up to the “shower” again) with which we could get our faces and hair clean. For those of us with facial hair (though fortunately I shaved before we left Adam and Sarah’s so it wasn’t too bad) this was an exceptionally fun experience. But the kids cheered us on and thought we were awesome. For those of us who are in the kitchen all day and only get to see the kids when they eat, it really made us feel a part of the camp and beginning to have a relationship with them. I think it also raised us a few notches in Rey’s crew’s eyes, because in their experience gringos can be high and mighty and certainly wouldn’t deign to do a children’s obstacle course when they could be headed back to the church to sleep. (PS- if I didn’t relay this already, the church is very much like the buildings we were in before, in that it is open and has the fence for window/walls above chest level so you can see out and so we could tie our mosquito nets in the same manner. That has no bearing on what I’m writing, I just don’t want to give the wrong impression when I say “sleeping in the church”).

We did head back after that, but the whole town was heading to bed too. It was probably about 10:30 by this time, and for people who are used to rising and setting with the sun, that was a loooong day (sunset is around sixish and there was a lot of activity between then and the end of the games).

Teddy and Nicole led debrief, and as it turns out, they used the “one word” debrief that Sarah and I intentionally saved for someone else. Not that we can’t do the same one again, but I feel like we like being creative, and it’s a good way to practice different methods before we do them with our teams. I won’t get into my word, because I feel like I can get my message across without it. The one that has stuck with me (other than Chet’s being “Tortilla”) was Sarah’s: Refreshed. She’d felt spiritually refreshed working with the kids and holding a baby for a large chunk of the day, and getting to be a nurse for a while, and listening to God realizing a new Call in her life. I was really glad that we split up into parejas to talk about our words and pray once we’d all shared our word and whoever wanted to had gotten a chance to explain their related feelings. And I was really glad that it was my pareja who had said something that resonated with me so much, especially on a day that I had spent so much time with God and really really felt like I had found a place among my friends in the kitchen crew and in the camp with the kids as a whole.

Praying with Sarah was also a really great experience, just because of getting to know each other, and being able to talk out our fears and frustrations and joys and lessons learned. She also prayed for something that will stick with me for a long time (cryptic key word for my own memory when I read this later= tickle).

Chet finally let us break into the junk food tonight. We had Chips Ahoy and Oreos as we debriefed and prayed and had a brief meeting afterward about the plans for tomorrow with Rey and for ourselves, who would be doing and leading what (Lane and Danielle will be taking debrief tomorrow and we’ll have another devo session at 6:30 for which we plan to be fully on time).

Six o’clock will come early, but as much as it has been another truly long day, I feel truly Refreshed, and I feel that the team does as a whole as well.

What a View

Block 1 Travel Day: 2

Block 1 On Ground Day: 0

5:15 Wake-up call. That was not nearly enough sleep. I woke up to Bryan telling us the time, and then I really woke up to Teddy shouting at him from the bunk above me “Bryan, why do you have to be so CHIPPER?!” We don’t have many morning people in this group.

At 6ish the bus rolled in. It was a private bus for Reynaldo’s group and ours, which is really nice. No stopping like the public bus every time someone waves it down, lots of space underneath and in the racks and just for seats. Plus the Ecuadorians really like the front of the bus and the gringos really like the back, so we all sat together (which in retrospect was really worthless because all we did was sleep).

Incidentally, Reynaldo is a Columbian missionary who does camps like this all the time. His ministry is who is really putting on the VBS this week and we’re just doing backup, extra manpower, maybe some skits and songs. We don’t really know.

We hit Atahuno pretty early and hung out at the outdoor gymnasium of the local school. Turns out that having 13 Gringos and a bunch of strange South Americans show up is an excuse to not have class all day. Some of the kids had only seen white people once or twice before, so we were quite the attraction. We played basketball with the kids and had some breakfast in the bleachers, untoasted bread with jelly and orange juice. Surprisingly good, actually.

Everyone got a bit of quiet time while we waited for the planes. I totally forgot to explain this in yesterday’s post, but our original plan to fly from MAF in Shell was nixed because of lack of fuel. All the aircraft fuel is tied up in customs, and they literally have enough fuel to get us in, but potentially not out. We’ve prayed a lot about fuel. We could be potentially walking out of the jungle, which would take a Huaorani 10 hours non-stop or a Gringo 2 days. We really don’t want to do that and then have teams come in immediately after. So it was a little bit tense “quiet” time, and not that quiet at that as there were several games, including the lively gringos and Fabian vs. tons of kids basketball competition going on.

At some point one of the kids noticed the guitar. A guitar case is one of those things that is hard to disguise under a Christmas tree, so it certainly sticks out of small backpacks and gas tanks piled up in a gym. Sarah told them it was mine and manged to get me to play. It was actually pretty fun. They asked me if I knew any Christmas songs, which I don’t out of my head (on guitar, anyway) so I just played Relient K in English and they didn’t have a clue what I was saying anyway. I did decide to brave “Eres Todopoderoso” in front of them about half-way through the ad-hoc concert. That whole gym exploded into song.

(Notice the shirt I’m wearing in the picture below. If you’re viewing this on facebook, you’ll have to go to my site to see it.)

Danny playing in Atahuno

When the planes weren’t there by mid-day, we mosied on over to the restaurant down the street. Apparently 14 people is an extreme amount to be cooking for, and the owner/chef let us know that in no uncertain terms, and how he wished we had warned him at 8 or 9 in the morning. We told him we were fine waiting and letting the meals come out plate by plate. Fortunately for ease of ordering, there was only one thing on the menu.

The first plane did show up about then, and some of the girls stayed at the restaurant to calm the nerves of the frantically grilling businessman while the rest of us moved our luggage, equipment and bodies to the airstrip (which is basically a long, semi-flat line or dirt rather than grass just ten or twenty steps off the road).

We sat around on the runway for what seemed like a long time, getting on boots and bug spray and sunscreen but suddenly we were moving and with Nicole up front, Sarah next to me and Teddy and Chet in the back, we were all in the plane and taking off. For the third time in about three weeks I can say that was the smallest plane I’ve ever ridden in.

A discussion yesterday had involved the new people group that was just discovered, a tribe in the Brazillian jungle that had never had contact with the outside world. Chet said that they estimate around 100 tribes have still never been contacted by other human beings. How unfathomable I thought that was in 2008 with airplanes and satellites and mass-communication having been around for so long. But as we flew over endless trees, I thought how perfectly sensible that there are still so many undiscovered people. Just this little patch of the world that takes 10 minutes to fly over is unbelievable. Trees as far as you can see. I just marveled at God and His Creation. How I can’t even comprehend it, and what a small part and yet what a special part I get to play in His plan, particularly this week. Who else gets to see this?

I thought that the coming and going of planes would be pretty normal for the Huaorani, so even though I was told that they would all run out and greet the plane, I was a little bit surprised that they did. I would learn as the other planes came in that the adults were there because they knew how important it was to help get a plane unloaded and back in the air as fast as possible. The kids were there to see the Gringos. It’s always hard for me to talk to people the first time I go to a new place in Ecuador. Even saying “hola” seems strange when I know that I won’t be able to strike up a conversation with them in Spanish, much less in Wao. But we waded through the kids and the mud (SO glad I had my boots on- was not expecting it to be muddy to the point of being stuck in it every four steps) and unloaded everything.

As the other planes came in Chet took us through the town up to “the river,” which is actually a part of a stream that’s been directed under the stilts of a house and up four feet through pipes to come down with a little bit of pressure in enough of a waterfall to have a small shower under and continue flowing in a stream back to the real river after passing through the town. We filled up the two buckets that had made it in on flight 1 and took them back to the guys’ porch to filter.

I somehow expected the water to seem more clean when we got through. The $1000 water filter is pretty tough (and not a joke to work. I’ll be buff after a week of pumping water through this thing) but the river water still has just a hint of yellow to it and a few floaters. After looking at the water that Lane was pumping for a while, I finally decided that it didn’t look to far removed from our drinking water at home. I’m sure this is cleaner than the Pasquotank. Qualms removed.

Setting up house was pretty simple too. The classrooms that we’ll be staying in (at least until the children arrive tomorrow night or maybe Thursday morning) are single-room wooden buildings with a porch. Instead of windows or solid walls on the front and back, the wood comes up to maybe chest level and then there is basically chain-link fence from there up to above a foot below the ceiling. Air flows through and it’s basically like being under cover rather than being inside. But in jungle weather that’s exactly what is needed, and I was able to recognize that instantly whereas last year I’m sure I would have been very skeptical about this situation. And it was great to run the line for the mosquito nets. We tied up to the fence on the front, ran the line across the room and tied it off on the other fence, and viola: mosquito nets could now be tied in place along the line.

By the time everyone was fully in and unpacked and set up and a few more buckets of water had been gotten and pumped, through the filter, there was just enough time for the girls, then the guys to troop up to the “shower” where we’d gotten water earlier. I’m going to be really tired of being cold and washing my hair with soap. After that it was dark and way past time for dinner. We trooped across the muddy field to what was designated the kitchen. It’s a building very similar to where we are staying except that it has a fire-pit style cooking area outside and is not on stilts. It has a totally uneven dirt floor and the benches along the two tables that span the length of the building have dug holes into the floor so they sit at angles between those and the bumps. It’s very hard to keep 15 people on one bench without it falling around. The trick seems to be leaning it up forward against the tables, which are slightly more stable.

We ate in just about total darkness with a few candles. We had bowls of rice and lentils with chicken in some sort of sauce, along with a sort of tea or juice that tasted like lemon drops (Chet says it was more than likely a grass that they boil rather than actual lemons). Surprisingly good and definitely filling.

After that it was debrief. Matt and Angela were the pareja of the day and led debrief under the covered area in the middle of the town in the dark. We talked mostly about changing plans and not knowing if we would even make it in, God’s faithfulness throughout our travels, and what we want the next week to hold, despite still not knowing exactly what we’ll be doing. Angela make a wonderful word-picture for us about the basket we saw in the Nate Saint house yesterday and how she’d been praying to just be that basket for the Huaorani, that link between God and the people we are here to serve. It made me think of a Caedmon’s Call song about missions. One of the lines says “We put the walls up, but Jesus keeps them standing. He doesn’t need us, but he lets us put our hands in.”

I know I’m not the most important part of our team, and certainly not a necessity to God in getting his plans accomplished this week in Toñamparé and the hearts of the Huaorani kids that will be here for the camp. But I pray that I can be useful.

EDIT: We finished debrief and Sarah and I, who will be the pareja in charge for tomorrow got to talk about jobs for each of us. Chet told us that six need to be in the kitchen, four need to be on sports, and the rest can be floaters, with a translator in each group and each one consisting of roughly even numbers of males and females. We designated Matt, Angela, Nicole and Bryan on sports, which left Sarah, Teddy, Danielle, Lane, Necia and myself on kitchen, leaving Chet, Dana, Fabian and Jerry as floaters. I’m writing this at a later time because of how much that changed over just a few hours the next morning and how initially disappointed I was because I felt that kitchen is just a “filler” role and I wouldn’t get to do any useful work for the Kingdom. How wrong I would be.

Ups and Downs and Answered Prayer

Block 1 Travel Day: 1

Block 1 On Ground Day: -1

I began my devotion tonight unsure of what would happen or what I even wanted to happen for this whole trip. Because of weather, we don’t know how many planes are going to make it in, or if any will. If not, it will be missions projects in Shell for the week. And although even now nothing is set in stone, we have a plan that we’re confident in. It’s not the way I would have worked it out, but the fact that it works out at all shows God’s hand and timing.

I’ve been saying how excited I am to go to the jungle and the Hauorani ever since we heard that was what we’d be doing for Block 1. But for the last couple of days I’ve been really unsure, and though I didn’t admit it in the conversation we had about who might/might not get to go, I haven’t been sure I really wanted to, particularly today. I don’t have a reason. I’ve been on enough camping trips that it can’t be for fear of my own comfort. I know we’re running a bible study with another group of missionaries so it’s not out of any irrational fear of what used to be the most violent tribe in the world. And I have no clue exactly what I’ll be doing with each of my teams all summer, so it’s not out of frustration of not having a plan. I just don’t know what it is.

But as I began writing my journal and praying tonight, I asked God to let me know if my fears were from me or something else. The second those words formed in my mind Chet called us out to the outer room of the Guesthouse where we’re staying to meet with everyone. He, Dana and Bryan had worked up the flights based on our weights. They managed to keep each set of parejas together and keep the flights balanced and still allow us our 25 lbs of luggage. Bryan/Dana and Lane/Danielle are flight 3, which may or may not go. Fabian, Jerry/Necia and Matt/Angela are flight 2, which will more than likely go. Chet, Teddy/Nicole and me/Sarah are flight 1, which will definitely go. If there’s anything that could confirm that God wanted me to be where we’re being sent, it’s that I’m one of only ~35% of us who know for sure we’re going. It doesn’t stop my brain from going a million miles an hour thinking about the rest of this trip, but it does give me a comfort I couldn’t have imagined a few hours ago.

So let’s back up.

We started the day early with breakfast at Katie and Chet’s house after a quick stop to snag our stuff at Matt and Marlo’s. There were leftover cinnamon rolls and lots of other great stuff. We also packed sandwiches and such for the bus ride because there wouldn’t be any stops. Couple of last minute details and pictures and suddenly we were on the road in the Williams’ and the Jensons’ cars and then on the bus.

The trip to Shell was much less eventful and much less time-consuming than my last one. The roads have been repaired to an amazing extent such that it only takes the three hours even by public bus now. Which is not to say they are perfect, but even I got to rest some despite all the tunnels. If you didn’t know this, I don’t like tunnels. And to make matters worse, I was sitting next to the guy who is afraid of the dark (who shall remain nameless). It was a lot easier to ignore even the loooooooooong tunnels under huge mountains simply because I could stare at the television at the front of the bus. But even that was playing some terrible Armageddon-type miniseries that must have flopped in the U.S. and had been dubbed into Spanish. But it was better than thinking about tunnels. Needless to say there was some devo time spent on the bus.

Just like the last time I pulled into Shell and the HCJB Guesthouse, it was raining. But unlike last time (they were unexpectedly full and we had to stay, much to our pleasure, at Hostal Germany) we actually got in. The guesthouse is actually really nice, and although Hostal Germany is beautiful and has fantastic breakfast, the guesthouse it at least dry.

We took a short tour of the MAF facility with Ron Grant, the guy who keeps everything except the airplanes functional there (which is a lot of stuff). Chet even got him to take us over to the Nate Saint house, which is directly across the street from MAF and next to the Nate Saint School, which is next to the HCJB Guesthouse.

It was like walking into History. There was a model of the plane they flew to Palm Beach on the counter, lots of pictures, and the actual basket in which the five missionaries lowered gifts to the Huaorani and received the first contact back. Unbelievable. To know this place was home to the very people who cleared the way for us to even be here is just indescribable. The house itself is in pretty bad shape, which is the only reason it’s not used anymore (it used to house 20-30 passing missionaries all the time) and why not a lot of people get tours. In fact, our team went by it last year, but that was all.

It made me think just how much we were really following in the footsteps of all the people we watched in the documentary the other night, and to think that we are 10 hosts who will be bringing 17 teams of short-term missionaries all over Ecuador just really made us feel connected to those families, and really appreciate their sacrifice.

After that we hiked over a suspended bridge over a gigantic valley. Bryan didn’t tell us that the door on the other end was locked and that we were just walking the bridge for fun. I don’t really have any problem with heights, so it was a little bit funny to jump and make the whole thing shake and terrify the girls. Oh well, I guess nobody ever fully grows up. Nobody crazy enough to spend their summer in South America anyway.

We were all starving and starting cooking spaghetti right away when we got back to the Guesthouse. Good old American (sorta) meal full of noodles and beef, two things we won’t be seeing until next Monday at least. After that was a little bit of devotion time and a semi-debrief just talking about how we would debrief a team that had done nothing but travel all day. And that brings us full circle back to the beginning of this post. Ups and downs today. But it ended with me being content with God’s plan for me, no matter what this next week holds.

Falling into Place

One of the most amazing things about my time in Ecuador last year and about our team in general was how God just made things fall into place. We used that phrase, “fall into place” about six million times each day.

Tonight, we packed up for our trip to the jungle and went to Matt and Marlo’s for dinner and to weigh all our stuff (and selves). We ended the evening with prayer requests and a group prayer session about the upcoming week. We prayed about bats and bugs and other fears. We prayed that we will be able to “choose joy” (those are El Refugio words that just hit me this exact second as a way to sum that up) each day when we wake up and that it would be a contagious sign of God’s love. We prayed that our nerves would be calmed, and that we would be able to bring needed gifts and talents, even if we have no idea what we are doing. And by the way, for a group of people who came here with intentionally to be leaders, we feel like we have no idea what we are doing.

So when I came back to the DeVries homestead this evening (it’s turning back into their home as opposed to ours as we pack everything up) I found several e-mails in response to a letter I sent out this afternoon. (I love communication!) Julie sent me the scripture from tomorrow’s devotional, Galatians 3:26-39: Jesus said,”Now I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. If you have love for one another, then everyone will know that you are my disciples.”

It’s written as a command, but I find it a scripture of reassurance as I look at what we are headed into and next to our prayers this evening. It just makes me realize what’s important. We feel like we need to know what we are doing and do our jobs and facilitate a camp. And we’re really focused. Out of the 12 interns/Maestros, all 12 were J’s and 11 were E’s on our Myers-Briggs test. But we’re here as missionaries, here to grow in our understanding of God and in our relationships with his people, and to share His love.

And guess what. The prayer from the Upper Room? Dear God, help us to see the world through your eyes. May we be receptive to your leading for our direction. In Jesus’ name. Amen. Can a devotion fall more “into place”? I need to be receptive to His reminder that our goal is to LOVE and to SHOW IT, and I’ll be seeing a whole new world all week long.

We, as interns, have been reading a couple books this summer. One of them is Credo by Ray Pritchard. He writes about the way that God makes himself painfully obvious, to the point that we must be aware of Him, as Romans 1:20 says, we are “without excuse.” I would be without excuse if I did not recognize that one, and I pray that I will be able to keep that in mind through plane rides and bug bites and 150 children. As we said in Cape Charles, that scripture is my “Yay God.”

EDIT: Literally the same second I published this, I got another e-mail from Heather. I quote (without permission) “Don’t hold back… Share the Well my friend!” For those of you who have any clue what I’m talking about… V8!

The Living City

It’s strange waking up early every morning. No matter how early or how late I go to bed, I’m up at 7:30. That doesn’t mean I’m not a lot happier with coffee. But I am at least mostly ready to roll. Each day the sun comes over the volcano (and into our window) sometime about 6:45. It’s like God just instantly cranking up a natural dimmer switch and saying “Here’s a new day, use it!”

Quito is completely alive by the time I’m moving. I think what usually makes me aware that it’s morning first, even before the light and the honking cars (this country uses horns like no other) is the planes coming and going. Maybe 747s make a different noise than C-130s, but I’m surprised I’m not used to that over my head all the time.

At any rate, it’s like being part of an organism with all kinds of functioning parts. There are twice as many people in Atlanta as there are here, but the way the city is stretched out, you just can’t look at it and fathom a bigger place. There are people moving everywhere, walking, driving, biking, piling into pickup trucks like a bunch of gringos (yeah we do).

There is activity outside as people go to work and school. They walk their dogs, they sell food and phone cards and everything else imaginable on the street. Guards or policía can be found at most corners. There are just always people around.

There is activity inside the house as well. Someone is making coffee while until about 8:15 there are constantly two showers going. Adam is heading off for Alliance and the rest are preparing for QQ training and morning worship and Mr. Bagel (mmmm).

Everyone has something to do. The interns, the staff, the people around us in Quito. Those planes flying over are bringing people like us in and out of the country. The guards in the neighborhood are keeping us safe. The street vendors are keeping those around them fed and supplied and making their living. It’s like 1 Corinthians 13 about the Body of Christ. Each of us is different, each of us has a job to do, and every one is important.

That was actually the scripture for Cameron’s morning worship yesterday. And I can’t think about that verse without thinking of Mason’s exercise where we literally pick body parts that other people in discussion group seem to be. Although I feel like something vestigial many days (an appendix, perhaps, or the left pinky toenail) I know that God has a unique plan for me. That ought to be really evident today as we find out our parejas.

Each of us interns are different, with different gifts and strengths and abilities and perspectives. I pray that we’ll be able to mold those all together to compliment each other and be great leaders this summer and great hosts for our teams. Please pray for us all as we finish our (formal part of) training today and prepare for the jungle. Just three days, I can’t believe it.

El Refugio

Today we did training at El Refugio, a camp/division of Youth World outside the city. It’s a beautiful place where they do nature adventures and high/low ropes courses and leadership/teambuilding training. Fantastic!

We started out with some general teambuilding games, the kind of stuff you do at camp. We totally managed to cheat. I think at this point all the Interns have got it figured out that nobody cares who wins. Which is a good thing because we tend to end all our training games by everyone breaking every rule rather than someone winning. We did come up with a strategy they’d never seen to get out of a “burning building” with 15 people. It involved jump-roping. Both the game and our strategy.

Then we did the zip line.

Danny, Jerry and Matt in harnesses

Wow. I tagged along with Colin on the NHS band trip to King’s Dominion last week. We did the Drop Zone, the thing that just shoots you straight down from a gazillion feet in the air. You have so much more protection in that thing than a zip line. And for some reason I was so much less terrified on the zip line. And I was unanimously voted as having the most graceful landing.

Jerry getting his harness on

Jerry on the zip line
After lunch (Ecuadorian goodness) all the Interns and Maestros and most of the QQ Staff went through our personality tests and talked about them and ourselves and got to know each other a lot better. I wasn’t looking forward to it, but it was a ton of fun. Apparently I’m exactly the same person as Sara DeVries on paper. High five. It was really amazing some of the deep stuff, the trust issues, and the strengths and weaknesses that we talked about all afternoon considering that for the most part we’ve only known each other for a few days.

We finished off the main part of training with conflict resolution. Another thing I was not looking forward to, but got a lot out of and was actually kinda fun. I realized a lot about myself (I think we all did) and how to look at conflict from a Biblical perspective and to learn and grow from it. And it went along really well after having just done the personality conversation and led nicely into our quiet time this afternoon. We did about an hour of solo time around El Refugio, and I went up the mountain again, a little past the zip line start point to catch up on my intern devo and journal. (insert Minnesota accent) That place is sooooooooo gooooooorgeous. (end accent)

The night ended with a hot dog/cuy/s’mores roast. Rachel, the Australlian intern at El Refugio gave us directions. Dario translated. (Both were in English. It was hillarious).

Overall, bombarded with information again. And tomorrow is Team-Leading training and a visit to Carmen Bajo, one of the ministry sites, and where Jenny and Tory will be site hosts all summer. I’ve learned a lot today, about myself, about the other interns, about working together, about trust and forgiveness, and about the very nature of God and letting him be “mi Refugio.” We’re going to be so ready by the time Block 1 and 2 roll around.

Lacking a "Linebacker"

First off, this will make a lot more sense if you’ve seen the “Evangelism Linebacker” video. YouTube address (dispite my loathing of YouTube for a multitude of reasons all stemming from their liberal interpretation of handling copyrights) is below. For posterity (you know, if my dream ever comes true and there is a Constitutional Ammendment to ban YouTube) just search for “Evangelism Linebacker” and I’m sure you’ll find it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvYFvhx1dcY

Blog entry proper:

I’ve not been the most patient person lately. I want everything to fall into place for Ecuador this summer. I want my International Teams fund raising account to hurry up and catch up with the count in my head. I want to be done with work and exams already so I can go to the beach, or maybe Vermont. I can count twenty pleasant things I’m eagerly anticipating and fifty more unpleasant ones I’d like to be over with.

But as much as I want work to be done with, I’ll feel like there’s so much I would rather be doing myself than delegating when I drive by Albemarle Music. And I’ll miss everybody there. Well, not John. (Just kidding, John. I know you account for 80% of my readership by yourself). And much as I want to be in Ecuador, I’ll miss Adan, Bayron, Brittany, Damaris, Eddie, Eric, Jesus, Joe, Luis, Melany, Vanessa, Aaron, Bart, Ben, Carrie, Cynthia, Derrick, Jason, Kos, Susie, Tina, Wade and everyone else that make my “day off” a learning experience and a joy.

I think I forget until each Tuesday that I can still grow in Elizabeth City, despite feeling like I have accomplished what I set out to do when I came back here. I forget to take Qui-Gon Jinn’s advice and focus on the “here and now,” though (being a good Methodist) I’d call it Prevenient Grace rather than the Living Force.

The other six days of the week, I think I need a “Patience Linebacker.”

“Boo-ya, baby! Concrete tastes the same in both hemispheres! Don’t be so anxious, I’ll blow you up anywhere!”

Life Lessons for the day:

“What can we do to show God we love Him more?” -Toni
“Pray once a day and twice on Sundays!” -Cynthia

“[In God’s time] everything falls in place.” -Julie (incidentally, my fund raising is finally where it is supposed to be, thanks to Grace alone)

[unspoken implication that guys should not have long fingernails] -Wade

Avoiding the Whale

Have you ever been asked to do something on very short notice? That was me tonight. Toni called me at about 5:35, giving me roughly an hour to come up with what she requested: a devotion and music for the worship at Benjamin House at 7:00.

Benjamin House is an incredible place. It is a group home for adults with various mental disabilities (seriously, click that link and check it out). It is a very beautiful facility full of warm, welcoming people with the love of Christ in their hearts.

I’m really not sure what I was expecting. I mostly just put my expectations aside (while I stressed about my message) and took it all in as it came. And although I was expecting excitement (Kevin, Mason, Toni and everyone else who has ever done anything over there has always talked about the love and energy they pour into worship), I was still totally amazed at the absolute enthusiasm that everyone shared.

I talked about Jonah. I’m sure everyone could tell it was a hastily-constructed devotion. But I learned something today, both through and about the written Word, and through speaking about it. The last verse in Jonah chapter 1 says that God “…provided a great fish to swallow Jonah.” The whale didn’t eat Jonah because the dude was unlucky, or at all because of it’s own free will (I guess only we get that). God provided it for Jonah- Jonah, who was only out in the sea in the first place to avoid God.

I’d never caught that single word before. In fact, I looked in three different translations of the Bible for one that would highlight that very provision a little less (my original planned message was going to go in a bit different direction that what I ended up). But each one, despite other differences, used the same exact phrase: “God provided.”

So there I was at First Baptist Church and Toni asks my via phone from Fayetteville to lead worship on short notice. I didn’t know it, but I was learning from Jonah already. And then, there I was giving a message an hour and a half later pretty much out of my head, and thinking “no way” could I have come up with this alone.” Oh- and I even asked Adam his favorite Old Testament story, hoping he’d give me something easier to work with than what was already circling around in my brain (Jonah). But guess which stubborn, seafaring Hebrew and eponymous, 4-chapter, single-story book he said? (If that didn’t narrow it down enough, the book, story and man in question are Jonah).

Once I’d squeezed all I could from Big Daddy J (as he was known to his homies in Galilee), Adam and I broke out the guitars and Toni’s Beach Retreat/Benjamin House songbook. I would have played all night if they’d kept calling them out. Nobody cared when we screwed up the chords, or the words, or the melody, or the harmony, or any of the other ways one music major and another ex-music major managed to massacre the music. The eight or nine that live there, plus Sam and Billy truly made a joyful noise. This tiny chapel was louder and had more hands in the air than I’ve heard and seen at most hundreds-members sanctuaries packed to the rafters on a Sunday morning.

When we finally played/sang/worshiped with “Sanctuary” and no one immediately shouted another number, I closed is prayer. Something I mentioned and lifted up to God was our desire to show the world that we are Christians (like the song says) by our love. And the people and Benjamin House certainly showed us. with their love for each other and for 3 total strangers they welcomed with open arms and hearts, and the love for Christ shown through those same acts and through genuine enthusiasm for worship and for Christ.

After Benjamin himself dismissed us from Chapel, he, Bart, and a couple others showed us their rooms, and we got a general tour of the place. We talked about football and wrestling and cars like we were all old buddies. We even got a hip-hop dance lesson.

I’ve been thinking since going to Ecuador last summer about the marginalized people of society. The poor, the homeless. The handicapped of all shapes and sizes go on that list too. I wonder if everyone could see the love, life and energy at Benjamin House if they would think differently about those who are different than them. We tend to ignore people who don’t measure up to us in status or wealth or intelligence of ability. Hut I have been trying to look at peoples’ faith and friendship and simple existence as human being and children of God and not judge them at all.

Jonah was the scripture of the night, but if there were books of the Bible of Bart or Benjamin, they would be my favorite. Because the hero of all three is God.

Get out of my tire, Satan

So I’m driving home from COA this afternoon after a long process of trying to do a good deed for my brother. Turning off Road Street¹ onto Ehringhaus Street I hear and feel a pop-KA-thunk. No seriously. That’s what it did. Pop-KA-thunk.

I made it back to Riverwind (having already decided my tire was going flat) before I gave up denying I couldn’t make it all the way home.

After a slightly stressful process² of getting the tire changed and driving over to Merchant’s Tire and waiting for a new tire (BIG slash, had to be replaced), the guy there just grins at us at the register and says “We had an issue with your car.” Sounded scary. But he was grinning. The “issue” was what they pulled out of my tire. Nobody there had ever seen anything this size puncture and STAY IN a tire before.

See image below. And yes, that is a breakpad.³

Although it didn’t screw up my day too terribly, the whole process did make me miss both La Casa at Christ Episcopal and the youth praise band that Adam and I are helping start and lead at First Baptist. Dissapointing. I miss my “chillins”. But I did learn a great deal of patience and acceptance out of this deal. And if I have to walk to La Casa next week I will.

¹For those of you not from Elizabeth City, yes, someone actually named a road “Road Street”. That’s just how we do in “No’f Ca-liiina”.

²I say “slightly” stressful because I just decided to be calm about it. Besides finally realizing “Eh, what can you do?”… if there is a non-terrible time to get a flat tire, it’s on your day off and in a safe, non-busy, familiar place.

³No, it was not mine. I asked, and I went over to Jerry at NAPA and he pulled out a set of ’96 Maxima break pads which were not the same.