Forgotten Love

For the Youth Fellowship girls night at the church, I volunteered to bake pumpkin chocolate chip muffins. Because it's fall, and they're my favorite, and... enough said, right? 

The hitch came in though with canned pumpkin puree not being a thing here. Like... how am I supposed to make pumpkin muffins without pumpkin?! 

Randomly enough though Julie had been given a massive pumpkin just a couple weeks earlier. She doesn't even like pumpkin, so... what do you do with a pumpkin? 

Why, you cut it in half, gut it, bake it, skin it and puree it of course! And presto! Pumpkin muffins! Like no biggy.

Gutting it 

Baking those bad boys

Skinning it!

Pumpkin Puree!

Ta-da!! Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins! 

The real finished product

 Conclusion, why have I never made my own puree before? Never again am I buying the canned stuff! 

Not only were the muffins a success, the girl's night was too! 

The Live Hamster Wheel

The first image that pops into mind when people want to know how I'm settling here in Ballymena is that of a globe or a log. With someone running on top of it, because of perpetual motion they're able to stay atop. I however I am somewhere on the side, unable to ever quite get on top, because once the log is rolling, physics denies me the chance to ever get atop. 

Or the idea of a hamster wheel comes to mind. And with that the image of the human size hamster wheel at the City Museum in St. Louis, MO. I had the privilege of experiencing this wheel just weeks before I came to Ireland. It's a wooden circular structure that you stand up in. You have to kind of jump start it (literally jump to getting it rolling, then you just walk in a forward motion (or backwards if you're talented like that), going as fast as you want. It's the most bizarre feeling! You feel as though you are climbing up and up, and must surely be upside down by now. But when you finally come to a stop, you discover that you haven't actually gone anywhere! 

Somedays that's what life here feels like. 

Walking into the middle of a ministry is much like walking into the middle of a deep conversation. No matter how much I feel like I'm understanding here, there's alway something new that I have no idea about...

The Belfast City Mission, that I'm involved with on Thursday's, is much like a hamster wheel. Just as soon as I think I'm "getting it", something new happens. I actually love this aspect of Thursdays! A typical day involves me teaching English for about an hour and a half. Who the student is and if it's just one or two changes week to week. After that from 4-6, I'm in a different part of Belfast helping babysit school age kids so their moms can learn English.

In between these 2 ministries I have about 3 hours. The people that run this ministry know that I'm up there for the day, so they'll ask if I have plans for the afternoon. Since I don't, they will take me along with them to just have tea with one of their Saudi friends or I'll go along with someone to pick up a converted/undercover Muslim from the grocery store and go back to her house to have tea. Or, as was the case this week, there wasn't even an English class! Just a party with about 60 Somalians and food! So much amazing food. (Felt a bit like Thanksgiving!) So basically this week was helping with food prep from 10 in the morning, serving the food, and then cleaning up. About three o'clock I finally was able to leave. But not without first being volunteered to take 3 Somalians home. Thankfully they spoke enough English that they were able to direct me where to go! 

After I got them all dropped off and was feeling pretty good about myself, I suddenly remembered that I'm driving on the other side of the road in a "big" city. A city where they drive really close together and park even closer together. I found myself on a two-way street, but due to the parking on both sides of the road, it's really a one-way street.  All of a sudden, there's a rather loud clatter from my left side. It took a moment for me to register that that clatter was me hitting something (confession time!). Looking out the left side of my car, I realized my left mirror was gone! (Dying of embarrassment right about now!) All I wanted to do was cry or laugh, or... hamster wheel moment. I realized how exhausted I am - not only have I spent the morning trying to learn and understand Somalian culture, but I'm learning it through the Irish's eyes as I'm still trying to learn the Irish culture. 

After this exciting moment, I continued my afternoon with babysitting. 

Babysitting entails usually 2 adults (once there was 3!) and about 8 children from about the age of 13 all the way down. 5 are siblings, 2 are cousins to the 5 and the 8th is probably somehow related as well. The last month with these kids has been crazy town! One week I get to play football for 2 hours with the boys or another week is spent just doing math homework with a 9-year-old for well over an hour. The next week was just playing/consoling a baby while 8 children ran around completely and totally out of control! And mean while, somewhere in the building there's an English class going on. After all this, you're left asking "what's the point of it?" The point of all this crazy town is teaching the mom English so that we can share the Gospel with them! And if that means we have 2 hours of.... But their moms learn about Jesus, then it's worth it! I've heard so many stories about the Muslims just asking why we (the Christians) are being so nice to them.... They're noticing, they're thinking about it. 

I had this story all written out yesterday, and had written some prayer requests, but like the classic blonde that I am, I didn't save my changes before closing, and it was gone. So before I could rewrite this, I actually had to go back to Belfast to do more of the same babysitting. Which was a first time for me to do it on a Friday. Honest moment. I was not excited about it. At all. Just tired from all of Thursday's happenings and not ready to face crazy Somalian children again. But the guy that teaches the English class, Luke, was't sure anyone was coming to babysit.... So, I told him I'd come, so he'd have a "for sure" sitter. 

My prayer requests that I had typed out before I left, that no one saw, that were never "officially" prayed, were that I would learn how to balance ministry in Belfast with my ministry in Ballymena and Ballykeel, and find time for myself, without feeling guilty. And also that I would learn the Somalian children's names, because only being able to retain 1 name out of 9 is just not a good thing. And that I would figure out how to bring some structure and control. 

Yesterday (Friday) felt like such a break through! Personally, just seeing God answer some un"prayed" prayers. I felt, for the first time ever, that I actually had the kids' respect! (I'd never realized how important that was until I had it!) So yesterday was controlled craziness. I had literally 5 girls hanging on me for almost 2 hours, there was so much love happening it was incredible! And I was remembering their names! I'm not really sure how to explain it, but the crazy town had turned a corner of crazy out of disrespect to crazy out of respect. Does any of that make sense? Or am I just rambling?


In conclusion, yesterday was golden and God does answer the desires of our hearts (in case you, like me, forget that)! 

Learning What it Means to Live the Gospel

So there Marty and I were yesterday, in Belfast, just drinking tea and talking with a lady from New England called Elizabeth. Waiting for Stanley to come. Stanley, along with a man called Willie, run a ministry for Somalian refugees, (teaching them English). Eventually Stanley turns up, with two Somalian women. We're still just chatting, drinking our tea, very laid back, comfortable. Conversation turns to me and Elizabeth (who is one of the English teachers) asks if I have any experience teaching English. Thinking of Japan, I say "yes". Elizabeth then asks if I'm certified to teach English. No! (But I do have experience, that counts for something, right?) Elizabeth then says - in true New England style - "Well you have to be certified to to teach English!". Well... this just got awkward! Stanley quickly jumped in with the plan that I can just "assist" - conversation. Brilliant! (Mind you, this ministry is running on a shoe string budget and very few volunteers). 

A few minutes later I hear Elizabeth holler from a back room, "Jes! Your first student is here!" Wait, what? I have a student? That means I'm teaching? 

Sure enough, my first day and I already have a student! One-on-one, beginner, ABC's and very basic conversation. 

Afterwards talking to Luke, a volunteer that teaches beginner classes, he found out I was going to be there every Thursday - he got excited. Apparently there's another guy that comes on Tuesday (the English classes are Tuesday and Thursday), but they were in need of someone for Thursday. So, I'll be doing basic English in a one-on-one setting, (sometimes there might be 2)! The girl I'm going to be teaching is very quiet, reserved-shy. She's 24, and has 4 children. Talking to Willie afterwards she had to flee the country, but her children are still there. When Marty and I asked how that worked/why that was - Willie went on to explain very probably what had happened. It's no wonder that girl is quiet and reserved! 

Willie then went on to talk about the Muslim refugee's. So many of them are from such rural areas that they have never had the chance to hear the gospel. There are people who have simply denied Christ and there are people who have never even heard of Him. Those are the people that it's still our responsibility to "go" as Jesus commanded  and take the Good News to. That can be done just through teaching an English class - being relational, talking about Jesus. Not through preaching, just comfortable conversation as your being a friend to someone in a foreign land. 

I keep thinking about what Willie said, he's so passionate about showing the love of Christ to Muslim refugees! The timing on this, well, really and truly, God's timing is just amazing! I've been doing a Bible study on Monday nights with the church. This week we studied the Prodigal Sons, in Luke 15. There were 2 different types of people Jesus told this parable to; the sinners & tax collectors and the Pharisee's - the younger brothers and the older brothers. Tim Keller, in his sermon "The Two Prodigal Sons" makes a rather brilliant observation "The way you know that you are communicating and living the same gospel message as Jesus is that 'younger brothers' are more attracted to you than 'elder brothers'". You see, Jesus was always surrounded by the "younger brothers". If the church is made up of mostly "older brothers" we need to be able to accept the embrace the Father gives us when He pleads for us to join Him in the feast. To be free to run in from the field and welcome the younger brother home! To love and welcome the hard-to-love's. To know the Fathers love for us is such a way that we are free to love the "younger brother's". I'll confess I don't have a natural heart to see Muslims reached. I am the older brother. Praise God though, I'm still a work in progress! 

All this to say, I am very excited about getting to be a part of this ministry in Belfast, about getting to be part of something bigger than myself, and seeing what God is going to do in this next year.