Sunday, November 16, 2008 

Time Well Spent

This past week was a good one, God gave me some good opportunities to love people and share truth. A friend of mine called and invited me to spend the night at his house Wednesday night. I made it to his house around 5 that evening, and I had a great time hanging out with him and his 3 roommates. We sat around and talked, joked around, and I got to try to play the local version of the guitar.


I managed to pick out a Red Hot Chili Peppers song on it, but the guys hadn't heard of them.

Later that night, we had a great conversation about what I believe about God and heaven and what it takes to get there. I got to share my testimony, and I think they at least understood how different my life is thanks to God.

On a side note, after that good conversation we played a game called "21". I was expecting them to pull out cards, but instead we each wrote a number between 1 and 21 on our hands. Then we guessed numbers between 1 and 21, and if your number is called you're out (You can't guess your own number). The last person still in loses. It's not the most exciting game I've ever played...

The next morning I went with my friend to his class at university. It just so happened to be a philosophy class, and that day they just happened to be talking about the philosophy of religion. It was a really cool opportunity to share truth with a large group of people at once, it was neat how God stuck me in that class for that day.

10:00 AM | |

Sunday, November 09, 2008 

Life In The Slow(er) Lane

Last Sunday my last trip ended, and I arrived back into town. The last couple months have been busy, with one trip after another. It's been so busy I haven't had time to do what I really came to do here, which is love the people here and share with them. I'm not saying the last couple months have been bad, they've been great, but I missed my normal routine. Last week, I was finally able to get back into that.

Last week I was completely free, so I spent time with friends in my city. I got to meet with an old friend of mine, and we had a really good conversation talking about God and sin and hell. He actually explained parts of the gospel pretty clearly to me, which was really encouraging. I've been sharing with him for over a year now, maybe it's now sinking in.

I also met a new friend last week who invited me to a "culture house." I was excited, he said it's just a place where he and his friends get together and hang out and stuff. I told him I'd love to come, and we made plans. I asked another local friend about culture houses, and he told me 90% of them were Communist houses. Whoops. I still went, and to make a long story short, me and 12 other young single people sat around and talked about the cinema for an hour or so. Politics never came up. It was weird.

Aside from that, I went to a play with a guy. It was one of those post-modern plays, I didn't like it very much to be honest. I also found a friend that likes running, and we had some good conversations while running up hills. I've started running a lot again, there's a half-marathon in March I'd like to run. My friend wants to run in it as well, so I'm hoping for more good conversations while we train.

Last week was a good week. I finally got back to speaking the local language and hanging out with the local people like I wanted to. Tonight I'm watching the movie "Rudy" and tomorrow I'm heading back out to see where God leads me.

9:47 AM | |

 

Prayer Retreat Adventures

Last weekend me and my team headed to a hotel in another town in order to have a prayer retreat. It was a good time of praying together and just being together. And then I almost died. (Not really, but I did get in quite a pickle).


The resort hotel we stayed at



We were all sitting around at the beach (yeah, the hotel was on the beach) talking and joking around Saturday afternoon when I noticed a paddle boat sitting on the sand (the kind you paddle with your feet). I asked if anyone wanted to go for a spin in the sea with me, and a friend of mine said she wanted to. So, we pushed the boat into the sea and started paddling. We got a good distance away from shore when we realized the rudder didn't work.

We then spent the next hour trying unsuccessfully to paddle back to the shore. No matter how we worked the rudder or which direction we tried to go, the boat would always turn away from land, and we would end up further and further from the shore.

There was a rocky peninsula half a mile long jutting from the shore, and we slowly made our way to it, going in little circles. When we reached it I jumped off the boat onto the rocks and guided the boat (with my friend still in it) with my arm. I pushed the boat on ahead and scaled the rocks till I caught up with it again. Finally we reached some shallow water where I could stand.

After that I jumped in the water and guided the boat with my arms for the next 45 minutes around docks, fisherman (and fishing lines), and sea urchins as we headed back to where the rest of the group was.

After a long time of pulling my friend and the boat behind me we reached the shore to find a big group of people waiting for us. (The others had notified the hotel when they couldn't see us anymore). They weren't too happy about me taking the boat out for a spin, it turns out they had called out the Coast Guard and the military police to come look for us. After a few minutes of chewing me out, they let us go. Then they got a tractor and took the paddle boat away.

9:22 AM | |