What happens when the power goes out?

So what happens when the power goes out in Shutka, a very large gypsy village on the outskirts of Skopje, Macedonia?

We have church.

This last Sunday night, November 23rd, due to whatever circumstances, the power was shut off to the gypsy village called Shutka. This village is where the church that I've been spending so much of my time is at. They hold their service on Sunday nights. If the power being off wasn't going to be bad enough, the caretaker of the church campus had unfortunately locked the church keys in his trailer and his key wasn't openning the door to the trailer.

There was a chill on the air and everything was dark except for the few houses that had enough money to have a generator or the shops that had candles lit. A few of the men and youth from the church had made their way for service any way. When we arrived, I was already planning on sharing my first translated sermon which I found out about maybe 2 hours earlier, but I had no idea what we would end up doing, especially if we couldn't get into the padlocked church building.

Well, to keep it short, we cut the lock, got inside and started a fire. We used cell phones to lite our way around the room. (This is exactly why I'm a proud member of the Facebook group that claims to use their cell phones to see in the dark!) Once the fire was going and actually making a dent in the chilly room, we circled some chairs around the stove and started worshipping.

I love the worship at this church. I've been to a lot of musically gifted churches. My home churches are not to be excluded, but I've had the privilege of being amongst some musically gifted South African churches and have been able to worship a-capella (without accompanying music like guitars or piano) and intensely enjoyed myself, but this took the cake. About 7 of us in all, we started to sing a few familiar songs, a-capella, in Macedonian. The most thrilling part was that younger boys were enthusiastically leading the singing over the older men that were there. Most of the time, boys and girls don't come to the service as a larger children's service is held on Saturdays, but they were there. Not only were the boys leading out boldly and enthusiastically, but they also insisted on singing a couple of songs in Roma as well. Even though I don't understand the language, I know they're far more passionate about singing in that language than in Macedonian.

As an English speaker, I think we take for granted being able to sing such a multitude of widely known songs in our own language for the purpose of praising our God, but for these Roma (gypsy) boys, they don't exactly have nor have had access to such a wealth of worship music. Any way, the worship in their heart language was very exciting for me to be a participant in.

After the worship, it was my turn. It was quite a different preaching experience and I'm still not really sure how I did, but as I prepared the message, one I was already very familiar with, God kept reassuring me that as long as I speak the message from his Word and not from my own view of how things are going, then it will be okay and it will work for any culture. I used my cell phone to read the passage I was sharing from and occasionally to check my notes, and as working with a translator for the first time tends to be, it was a little rough. Let's just say it didn't come out like my typical 3 point sermon, but it did come out fairly well. Oh, and the translator was my boss if the other things didn't present enough of a challenge. I kept waiting, for no other reason but lack of confidence in this new experience, for him to correct me on something and tell me it wasn't relevant to them or something of that nature. He didn't and I kept going without any interruptions. This to say, I don't consider the constant pausing for translation an interruption as, of course, it is completely necessary.

This experience was rich for me. I know sometimes these things are overglorified and fuel the stereotypes that many people have about missions and roughing it ministry experiences. But this is the situation that I and my colleagues are in and have been called into. Sure there are business type ministries here, and all different types of specified ministries in all different types of fields, but I've been put into this type of ministry in this type of field and it's a blessing on every side, even with the random challenges that may come up. It was and is very rewarding and an experience I don't believe I'll soon forget.

On another note, I have some updated pictures up on my Picasa site for those that are interested. You can find them at http://picasaweb.google.com/CRparky.

Expect a newsletter soon if you're on my mailing list, if not, it'll be posted here as well so don't worry.

Until next time...