In the Mission Field

Today was our free day when we do some site seeing and shopping.  In the morning we went to the Salt Cathedral.  About an hour outside of Bogota is a mountain that is made primarily of salt.  It is either the largest salt deposit in the world, or one of the largest.  Down in the tunnels they have build a large cathedral in the salt caverns.  And as you walk down the tunnels to the cathedral there are many stops were various carvings have been made in the salt rock to illustrate the various stages of Christ´s crucifixion and resurrection.  It is beautiful to see.

We had lunch at a restaurant back in Bogota and I let my translator pick for me something “Colombian”.  Well she picked a disk called Bandeja Paisa - a combination of ground beef, sausage, fried egg, rice, beans and a corn bread.  It was good, but far more than I could eat.  The sausage had some different coloring so I asked my translator what was in the sausage.  She said it would better to wait until after I finished eating.  Bad sign!  Well the sausage - called Rellena - had ground beef, rice and some seasoning in it.  Seemed innocent enough.  But then I found out that the casing of the sausage was made from the large intestine of the cow.  At that point I would have really preferred the fish eyes again or the chicken feet.

I mentioned my translator - I haven´t really talked about them much.  None of the four Americans on my team speak Spanish so therefore in order to talk with people we need translators.  We had five during the week.  Three are young ladies from Cali - Maria Paula, Catica and Juliana. Maria Paula was my primary translator, although the others translated for me at times as well.  We also had two translators from Bogota - Nancy and Jose.  While it may seem like it would be hard to use a translator, the reverse is actually the case for me.  First when what you say is being translated it gives you time to think about what you will say next.  Second, in sharing the gospel with a translator all week you develop a bond that is hard to describe, but can be very deep.  I have many dear friends in Colombia that I have worked with as translators.  Maria Paula is also working with children in her church and in other parts of Colombia.  So it was also great to work with a translator with the same love of kids as me. We taught each other much during the week.  The translators don´t get paid for the week, and since few Colombians get vacation, this can be a great sacrifice for them.  Some, like Catica and Juliana, are college students on break.  Thinking in two languages all week can be very draining as well.

During the week we went to our mission sites by van, and as is usually the case, during the week we shared the gospel with t he van driver.  Wednesday night after dinner Maria Paula shared the gospel with Hugo and he prayed to receive the Lord.  But I had noticed that Maria Paula spent a long time sharing with him, and then at lunch Thursday the two of them sat away from the rest of us and talked a long time.  Today I asked what they were talking about and she said that Hugo had some very difficult issues in his life.  In the past year his wife had left him and took their daughter to Cali. He lost his job and then his home.  So he had been living in the streets with no family and no job.  Driving the van for e3 during this week was a blessing for him because he would be able to rent a room and eat.  But he had no other job prospects.  Hugo was distrustful of women and God because of what he had been through.  But as he watched us work together as a team of Americans and Colombians, and as Maria Paula shared with him, he came to the point where he accepted the Lord as Savior.  But he still has many issues to deal with.  We put Hugo in contact with a local church to see how they could help him.

Friday night we had the victory service to celebrate what God had done during the week.  Each of the villages we worked in sent a bus load of people to the service and it was a great time of music and fellowship.  The group that came from Porvenir included many of the new believers.  Stefania came as well, which was a blessing for the team to see her again.  I mentioned in an earlier email that Stefania was not going to school because her family could not send her.  In Colombia even the public schools have a tuition.  What many poor families do is have the children go to school through 5th grade so they could learn to read, but then don´t continue school after 5th grade because the family can´t afford it.  Well Maria Paula and I decided we wanted to help her go back to school.  We looked into the cost and it is about $100 a year for tuition, uniform and books. A huge cost for them, but frankly the cost of a dinner out for a couple in the states.  We all chipped in so that we could pay the tuition cost. We gave the money to the pastor of the church and the church will pay the cost directly to the school.  Stefania will only know that the church is helping her.  The next school year starts in January and Stefania will be thrilled when she finds out she is going.  Also, the money being paid through the church not only helps Stefania, but is a great exposure of the church to the city.  As I mentioned in an earlier email Stefania is a very smart young lady who wants to learn so much, and each of the American team members had fallen in love with her.  We were thrilled to be able to help her.

While our primary focus on the campaigns is meeting the spiritual needs of the people we talk to, we also see tremendous physical needs - home, health, finances, etc.  Hugo´s needs were such that getting into a church was the fist step, but we really could not help that much with his physical needs.  But for Stefania we were able to met one of her physical needs, and even better do that through the local church.  On these campaigns there are far more physical needs that we see than we can possibly help with.  We need to rely on the local church and God´s hand in meeting these needs.

We leave early in the morning for the flight home.  It will be great to see my family again, but I will miss Porvenir and the kids there.  It would be great to go back in the future to see them all again, as well as how the church has grown.  But who knows what God´s plans will be for my future and Porvenir.  But I am confident that we will see many of those people in heaven one day.

The week has gone really fast and I will send my last update tomorrow.

God bless
Rich