Thank God it's Friday

Phew – thank God it’s Friday! Last Friday I finished up full-time Spanish school (going to class every day) and this week has been my first week with a schedule consistent with the rest of the team. A few updates on activities… last Saturday I went to a water park in Tarimoro, Guanajuato for our first catch up with our single guys community group. It was a lot of fun and I got to play with my camera’s waterproofness a bit which was cool!

Phil, Lalo, Charlio, Pepe and Olmo

We are planning to start running a drama production every few weeks at our church for kids and I happen to be one of the actors (also in Spanish!). One of the ladies at our church works as a drama teacher and met Arturo who is an actor and drama student through her work. Arturo is helping us out with the drama production by acting and providing drama coaching for all of us. On Sunday night several of us went along to a production of Mamma Mia (in Spanish!) in which Arturo was acting. It was a lot of fun seeing the production prepared by students doing a drama intensive. They prepared the whole thing in only 8 days, but it was very professional! I was a little confused as first because the main character changed actresses a couple of times (to allow everyone to be involved and to accommodate different voice ranges I found out later!) but apart from that I understood what was going on. The songs are quite funny when they are sung in Spanish because they are a bit of a mix between English and Spanish e.g. money, money, money, un poco mas dinero…

Then to an update on my work here… This week has been great! We have been working as a team in the church office during the day and have spent a lot of time this week seeking God for the way forward, planning and dreaming. It’s been so fantastic to have all the team together going through this process and seeing the opportunities for the future.

Our conversations this week have centred around our vision and mission for the team here and indeed those of the church. Our church’s vision is “to guide people to a growing relationship with Jesus Christ”. Our team’s goal in our interaction with the uni students group is to make disciples and train and equip leaders. I love it when I have the opportunity to share my life with others, to support and serve them and to see them grow and develop their God-given potential. We are looking at how we can best equip the young people to have an intimate relationship with God, to have close relationships with their own community and to have a fantastic influence outside their community.

This week I’ve also been able to wrestle with some of my doubts and reservations about our approach to mission and ministry and have spent some time chatting with Martin, our pastor and team leader, which has been super-helpful. We ARE on the same page, and are both dreaming of a missional church that is distinctively Mexican and introduces people to Jesus in a way that is relevant to the culture around us. It’s been a time of growth for me as I’ve had to work through the issues of contextualisation (putting the message in terms that make sense in a different culture – same message, different presentation), being missional (and for me that means crossing multiple cultural boundaries (Australia/Australian Christian/Mexican Christian/Mexican/Mexican young people) because we are seeing in this post-Christendom era that presenting the good news of Jesus means being missional and crossing cultural boundaries even in your “own” culture), receiving and sharing vision and much more. All that training, Perspectives and reading I've been doing is coming in handy.

So yes, watch this space… lots is happening and I can’t wait to see what lies ahead! God is definitely working and with God, life’s an adventure!