It's certainly overdue to talk a bit about my crazy experiences in Morely during my 10-Day Outreach.
Overall, it was an amazing experience. Stressfull, yes. Very changelling--I feel like I've learned so much (frequently through mistakes). But very fun. So much laughter and good times getting to know the people on my team better. A time I really had to depend on God for strength. Some highlights:
-My host family was THE BOMB. Heather and Neale (and Damorice the hamster, who was really part of their family). There was always lots of food (crisps, fruit, toast--they were the kind of people who always have really good english jams in their fridge). They had tons of books (but they acknowledged in typical english irony that they merely had "one or two"). In addition to making my way through Ezekiel (which I love) I spent my nights reading Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas...and a really good collection of T.S.Eliot poetry (Ash Wednesday etc. is my favorite). They were really nice and chill...and, Heather being a minister, were able to offer good practical suggestions for us.
-Bible Exhibitions in primary schools. We spent most of our mornings putting on exhibition where we told the story of the Bible while acting out some of the key characters. I was asked after the first day to be the narrator for the whole thing after just playing Abraham the day before. That was great. Challenging and new, but I loved teaching the kids and talking about Jesus. My favorite part was telling the story of the tower of babel where I'd ask the kids what languages they new. (British children take foreign languages in school). And then I'd act out how it went down: Pourquoi tu ne peut pas me comprendre. On construit un grand tour?! Where do we put the bricks? Donde esta la puerta? I think I enjoyed doing this more than the kids, but one mustn't always judge comedy based on audience reaction.
-We ran kid's clubs as an after school program in a school, where we presented the gospel over the course of a week. That was really great. I spent most of the time entertaining the kids while they were queuing up to have a go on the bouncing castle. We had a nice family service to close the week, and I taught the kids about the apostle Thomas and what it means to believe in Jesus.
-We went to the morely town hall and were introduced to the governor (wearing full garb--gold necklace and robes). He was very, very proud. but we took great pictures with him, and pretending we were judges and jury in the courthouse. the worst part was when i was asked to thank him formerly on behalf of my outreach team. As Mark Twain would say, we shall draw the curtain of charity over the rest of the scene.
-Pensioners lunch. We had great fun (and lots of awkward silences) meeting elderly yorkshire people at the coffee mornings and the luncheon we held. Nice to talk to people about God and the relationship he wants with us, and the needs we have that only he can meet and be received warmly and talk about deeper issues with adults.
-YZup. A youth group. We did have a powerful time of testimony sharing and a cool video, but my role for the evening was teaching them how to line dance. In my spontaneous texas accent that I didn't know I had (and was actually really hard to stop using) It's so fun to fulfill every stereotype.
-SAS. Another youth group evening. We discussed what it means to love God with all our mind. Part of the discussion included a guy from morely talking about his experiences on stage. There is a wrong way to take what i'm going to now say, but it's surprising how well certain techniques of method acting actually apply to those of following Jesus. I should write a book.
-The Food. Yorkshire pudding....so beautiful. Moist and succulent even...and somehow toasty. And custard. loads of it. but i've already described it all. Some very nice Earl Grey tea also. I went to Nandos again. Which is a well-brilliant Portuguese chicken restaurant. spicy and tender chicken...filling my tummy and giving me heartburn. life is good.
-Two worship services we lead. One centered on the Hope we have in Christ. The other on Christ's sacrificial Love (it being Lent). I shared a bit of my walk with God in the latter service. And we introduced the song Sing to Jesus which my church played hecka last year. (i try to use the word hecka as much as i can to keep some of my northern californian spirit).
Maybe I'll think of more things to talk about later....that's all for now.