The Willem

Rolling Along

// October 1st, 2009 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

This week has certainly been a roller coaster. I’ve had my first huge language block this week and it drove me absolutely batty.

Tuesday night we opened up the youth center (La Fusion) and had a pretty good turnout. There were a few troublesome boys (namely Carlos Chavez, whom I would ask all of you to keep in prayer) but I was simply assigned to them the entire night, which worked out great.

The real kink in our schedules this week has been the presence of a bunch of missionaries throughout the house. We have future Engage Site Directors staying with us, doing ministry with us, and talking with us to figure out how to tweak their own sites to be more beneficial, efficient, and successful. Most of their sites will be opening up in 2011 and include Paris, the Dominican Republic, Greece, and Nicagragua (I think). They have been an absolute blast and I’m very grateful to have met them and will be keeping them in prayers.

A little background to explain: I’ve been a grammar nazi as long as I can remember. I was the guy who you knew would correct your paper for real if you handed it to him, rather than simply glossing over it and telling you it was good. Honestly, papers usually aren’t very good. They need a lot of work and it’s so hard to find someone who can tell you so without making you cry. I’ve been that guy.

This is why I’ve almost broken into tears on more than one occasion this week. In Spanish, there are two past tense conjugations. One is called the preterit and the other is called the imperfect. They are entirely different conjugations and their uses are only slightly different. Often, a sentence will appear to fit into one category, but because the verb is irregular you have to use the other category.

Everyone told me this was the hard part. I didn’t care. I thought that since my English grammar was great, my Spanish grammar would be easy. It isn’t. In class earlier this week, I got 0 out of 20 correct on an exercise. Zero. That’s the same as none. I was infuriated. I was angry at myself, angry at Spanish, angry at God for creating the language and the whole Tower of Babel incident, and I got angry with anyone who tried to comfort me (namely Brittany. Gabi would have, but Gabi and I react the same when we’re upset, so she knew to simply be near me without saying anything or touching me. Brittany did the exact opposite and I treated her very poorly, for which I later apologized).

Later in the day, we had to talk about bars and alcohol for the entire period for our conversation class. This did not help my mood.

For the afternoon, I coaxed Gabi, Justin, and pretty much anyone who would listen to help me out with this stuff. Justin and Jen pointed me to StudySpanish which was extremely helpful. There are free quizzes and lessons and it was very easy to use. Gabi never got the chance to help me that night, but she and I walked to class this morning (before my exam) and she explained a few little rules I’d totally missed. I also asked for prayer this morning for the exam after our devotions, and it worked. I ended up getting a 93 on my exam and I feel relatively comfortable at this point.

We just had our practice for El Colli and now we’re getting ready for our various Thursday ministries. I’ll be heading to our men’s bible study and then off to play soccer with the kids from our youth center. It should be a fun night.

Hives, Hygiene, and Harassment

// September 23rd, 2009 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

I have hives. To be more accurate, I am a hive. It comes and goes, but for the last three days I’ve had repeated attacks of hives over my entire torso, my scalp, my arms, my waist, and my upper legs and *ahem* rear. It’s been very uncomfortable and very itchy, and it’s made concentrating on my ministry and homework and sleep all very difficult, leading to grumpiness in me as well. I’ve only ever once had hives and that was from a certain type of Christmas tree, so I have no idea what is bringing this on. All I know is that I’m praying against it and I’m taking Benadryl when I can afford to be groggy.

Hygiene might be the one thing I miss the most from home. I miss not sweating just from walking 5 minutes. I miss not being sticky every moment of every day (the stickiness is from my excess sweat, not the non-existent humidity). I miss being able to sleep through an entire night without being assaulted by legions of mosquitoes. I miss being able to wear clothes more than once before washing them. I miss being able to wash my hair once a week instead of once a day. I miss being able to occasionally go to bed without taking a shower (the dust covers you here). I miss being able to use tap-water to brush my teeth, rinse my toothbrush, and rinse the excess toothpaste out of my mouth. Honestly, I miss my cushy American lifestyle, and I’m still living in a nearly American style here. I’m not living in conditions anywhere near what the people we serve live in their entire lives, yet I’m complaining for the world to see. Help me pray through this, please.

We’re all harassing each other non-stop. I’m certainly no saint, and if I’m going to be honest I must admit that I may be the worst culprit on this one. I’m constantly throwing jabs and barbs and making fun of everyone and pointing out their flaws and whatnot, and it has to stop. This is no way to build trust and togetherness and an effective ministry team. I’m feeling genuinely repentant right now, so we’ll see if our interactions change. I know mine will, but I hope and pray that my changed heart will lead to a questioning team around me. I want to be the example of how to live supportively with a team, rather than an example of how to tear one down.

That’s all for tonight. I’m going to try to get some homework done here at the cafe.

Boot Camp Day 3. Wednesday

// September 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Holy Random Batman!, I just started writing and..., Life, Uncategorized

Wednesday felt weird. Maybe it’s because we slept until a reasonable hour. The whole day is kind of a blur at this point, but I know Carolyn led devotions and brought a level of reverence for God we hadn’t heard yet. I was moved by what she shared.

Most of our day was spent staring at the front of the living room while we were flooded with information on Mexican culture, respect, and talking with Pastor Daniel, who heads one of our partner churches. He gave us many many insights on both the Mexican cultural heritage and on today’s customs and practices. He also filled us in on a lot of little things worth remembering, like hand gestures, slang phrases, and celebrities. We should be a lot more culturally relevant because of his time spent with us.

Much of the day was also spent studying the history of the church, particularly Catholicism and the path to Mexico’s present-day picture. Today, between 75-95% of Mexicans will identify themselves as Catholics. Much like in the United States, many of those who affiliate themselves with a church do not necessarily practice the beliefs or even attend services. We also got the opportunity to speak on Skype with a highly-respected theologian who grew up in a Protestant church, but converted to Catholicism. He gave us many insights into true Catholic dogmas, practices, and the original and present-day reasoning behind some of their traditions. He also was happy to answer the peppering of questions we threw at him, occasionally regretfully admitting that some of the Catholic traditions were very poorly understood in specific churches. However, that isn’t the point. We were trying to have a conversation on unity and working as one body for one Christ and for one purpose, so we each brought faults to the table. He told us the history of the Catholic church in Mexico and explained why it was so strong here. Additionally, we gained some insight as to the challenges we would face as white, American, pentecostal missionaries. We have a lot of work to do and it’s going to be way harder than we thought, but worth every drop of blood, drop of sweat, and tear.