January - February Updates
Classes have been in full swing now for over a month this semester. Alan and I have 18 regular students who come at least once a week (a few want to come more than once a week and we're cool with that). :) From week to week it varies because we have a lot of students who come "sometimes" meaning when they have time. So in total, I think we have about 30 contacts who have been students at one time or another. The ones who don't have time to come anymore, we still try to see and visit every once in a while. So, our student schedule/visiting people keeps us pretty busy. We learned recently that we have to schedule one day off a week where we don't do any classes because we started to get really tired. It's gotten a lot better since we started doing that.
We have four students who are doing a Bible study with Stephano after our English classes. We also have several students who have been asking some really tough/thought-provoking questions. Several of our lessons end up turning into a topical Bible study over some question that they asked about. If any of you are wondering, we typically start reading the book of Luke with our new students and then move onto the book of Acts once we've finished Luke. But, of course, when they ask questions we'll have studies/conversation in English about that. Because many of our students are traditionally Catholic they come in right away and ask us what some of the differences are. They don't beat around the bush, they want to know what "we" teach about infant baptism, praying to saints and mother mary, etc etc. Of course, Alan and I are always quick to tell them that it doesn't matter what "we" teach but what the Bible teaches...so then we'll do a Bible study based on the questions they asked about. Most of these types of conversations actually happen in Italian, since many of our students are basic level English. They usually even ask these questions in Italian. So, if you were to walk by our classroom it wouldn't be very unusual to hear Italian and English mixed a lot, and maybe about half the lesson in Italian because they want to understand the answers to their questions more than they want to practice English in that particular instance. It's really amazing, and it's a challenge for us, but God has definitely equipped us with enough Italian to be able to do this on a basic level.
A common belief that we've seen among many of our students (and is apparently a teaching of the Catholic church) is that it doesn't really matter what you do/believe because God is love and He is merficul and in the end is going to save us all. So, after several of our Bible studies, our students themselves will point out the many differences they see between what the Bible teaches and the Catholic church/other religions teach, but then they'll say that it probably isn't that important because God will save us all in the end. So, Alan and I have been doing a lot of studying so that we can be prepared for these kind of conversations, but ultimately we ask that you all continue to pray for our students - that their hearts and eyes will open to the truth that there is only one way to God - Jesus, and that, unfortunately, God isn't going to just save us all in the end no matter what we believed. Also, we'd appreciate prayers for wisdom in how to approach these types of Bible Studies.
So that's a little glimpse of what some of our classes look like. We've also started a youth group meeting here at our house. For now, it's once a month, but it might possibly change to twice a month next month so that we can split up the younger kids and the older kids. There's a pretty big age gap between them, and it looks like it might be better to have separate meetings. We had the first one and all the kids enjoyed it. We had a total of eight youth come. They have asked us several times if we can do it every week. We had a small devotional that Alan led (with the help of one of the older teens). They were good participants, and I think it's going to be a great oppotunity for the older and the younger ones to learn small leadership roles. After the study, we had pizza and chocolate chip cookies. I made 5 dozen and there were 3 cookies left at the end of the night (whoops! You're welcome parents!). Then we played games until their parents arrived. The next one is this coming weekend.
As many of you probably have already seen all over Alan's facebook - we are trying to raise money for a car. We are 60% of the way there. For those of you who have already donated, thank you so much! We really appreciate your support. Sometimes we feel a little isolated (from home) here and it's such an emotional and spiritual boost/support to hear from you all in cards, emails, etc. We are amazed at everyone's generosity and of course we pray God blesses you all in many ways as you all have blessed us. Luke 6:38
If you haven't heard about us trying to raise money for the car, here is the link so you can read more about it.
http://www.gofundme.com/6bgiw4
On a cultural note, February 5th was the festival for Saint Agata - Catania's patron saint. Apparently, it is the third largest religious festival in the world, and I believe it. The main streets downtown were blocked for days before and after. Fireworks went off almost every night for a week, although there were two main firework shows on the 3rd and 5th. Alan and I missed both of them because the schedule was that it could happen anywhere between 6pm to 3am. We saw crowds and crowds of people in the main piazzas, many people carried large golden statues around the city the whole week, we saw devotees dressed in white tunics and black hats all over the city, and a parade. They apparently marched the bones of Agata around the city, but Alan and I didn't see any of these events either. It was chaos so we opted to avoid those areas of town. Apparently pick-pocketing is really bad during this time too. So, I don't have any pictures to share with you all. Maybe, we'll take some next year.
Thank you all for your support and prayers. It helps in ways that you'll probably never know. I will try to update again soon!
We have four students who are doing a Bible study with Stephano after our English classes. We also have several students who have been asking some really tough/thought-provoking questions. Several of our lessons end up turning into a topical Bible study over some question that they asked about. If any of you are wondering, we typically start reading the book of Luke with our new students and then move onto the book of Acts once we've finished Luke. But, of course, when they ask questions we'll have studies/conversation in English about that. Because many of our students are traditionally Catholic they come in right away and ask us what some of the differences are. They don't beat around the bush, they want to know what "we" teach about infant baptism, praying to saints and mother mary, etc etc. Of course, Alan and I are always quick to tell them that it doesn't matter what "we" teach but what the Bible teaches...so then we'll do a Bible study based on the questions they asked about. Most of these types of conversations actually happen in Italian, since many of our students are basic level English. They usually even ask these questions in Italian. So, if you were to walk by our classroom it wouldn't be very unusual to hear Italian and English mixed a lot, and maybe about half the lesson in Italian because they want to understand the answers to their questions more than they want to practice English in that particular instance. It's really amazing, and it's a challenge for us, but God has definitely equipped us with enough Italian to be able to do this on a basic level.
A common belief that we've seen among many of our students (and is apparently a teaching of the Catholic church) is that it doesn't really matter what you do/believe because God is love and He is merficul and in the end is going to save us all. So, after several of our Bible studies, our students themselves will point out the many differences they see between what the Bible teaches and the Catholic church/other religions teach, but then they'll say that it probably isn't that important because God will save us all in the end. So, Alan and I have been doing a lot of studying so that we can be prepared for these kind of conversations, but ultimately we ask that you all continue to pray for our students - that their hearts and eyes will open to the truth that there is only one way to God - Jesus, and that, unfortunately, God isn't going to just save us all in the end no matter what we believed. Also, we'd appreciate prayers for wisdom in how to approach these types of Bible Studies.
So that's a little glimpse of what some of our classes look like. We've also started a youth group meeting here at our house. For now, it's once a month, but it might possibly change to twice a month next month so that we can split up the younger kids and the older kids. There's a pretty big age gap between them, and it looks like it might be better to have separate meetings. We had the first one and all the kids enjoyed it. We had a total of eight youth come. They have asked us several times if we can do it every week. We had a small devotional that Alan led (with the help of one of the older teens). They were good participants, and I think it's going to be a great oppotunity for the older and the younger ones to learn small leadership roles. After the study, we had pizza and chocolate chip cookies. I made 5 dozen and there were 3 cookies left at the end of the night (whoops! You're welcome parents!). Then we played games until their parents arrived. The next one is this coming weekend.
As many of you probably have already seen all over Alan's facebook - we are trying to raise money for a car. We are 60% of the way there. For those of you who have already donated, thank you so much! We really appreciate your support. Sometimes we feel a little isolated (from home) here and it's such an emotional and spiritual boost/support to hear from you all in cards, emails, etc. We are amazed at everyone's generosity and of course we pray God blesses you all in many ways as you all have blessed us. Luke 6:38
If you haven't heard about us trying to raise money for the car, here is the link so you can read more about it.
http://www.gofundme.com/6bgiw4
On a cultural note, February 5th was the festival for Saint Agata - Catania's patron saint. Apparently, it is the third largest religious festival in the world, and I believe it. The main streets downtown were blocked for days before and after. Fireworks went off almost every night for a week, although there were two main firework shows on the 3rd and 5th. Alan and I missed both of them because the schedule was that it could happen anywhere between 6pm to 3am. We saw crowds and crowds of people in the main piazzas, many people carried large golden statues around the city the whole week, we saw devotees dressed in white tunics and black hats all over the city, and a parade. They apparently marched the bones of Agata around the city, but Alan and I didn't see any of these events either. It was chaos so we opted to avoid those areas of town. Apparently pick-pocketing is really bad during this time too. So, I don't have any pictures to share with you all. Maybe, we'll take some next year.
Thank you all for your support and prayers. It helps in ways that you'll probably never know. I will try to update again soon!
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