silly boy

Lock in

Friday night we had our second annual youth lock-in. I have to tell you the truth, I wasn't really looking forward to staying up all night with a bunch of teenagers. I am truly getting old. But I must tell you that God really blessed our time together. Our Auburn students came to help and invited their students, so we had 4 of our English students who came. Our night focused on who God is and how he reveals himself to us.

We watched Bruce Almighty and had several activities that centered around this movie:

• What would we do if we had the power of God?
• How did the movie accurately and inaccurately represent God?
• What does God look like/what is his character?

We also made prayer braclets to remind us that God is always close to us, and when we see our bracelets we can pray a prayer of commitment to God.

We had a really fun night. We spent time in the word, time in small groups in discussion, and of course lots of time playing and eating.

Praise God for such a wonderful night. Please continue to pray for our youth, especially for our the youth we are reaching out to through our English classes.

Our Language Progression

We are contiuing with our portuguese study. We meet with our teacher Léa for 2 hours, twice a week. We certainly speak tons better than when we got here. We can communicate, we can teach, we can understand people on the phone. But we still have lots to learn. Somedays I think I am never going to get this language down and other days I praise God for allowing me the ability to understand and to be understood. I pray for the gift of tongues often, because I am pretty certain I cannot learn this language all on my own.

Randy and I work very hard to speak portuguese to one another when we are around Brazilians. The other day when had our couples class over for lunch, I was in the kitchen with the girls doing the dishes and Randy came in. Sometimes, when I need to say something quick I will still speak to him in English, because basically it is just easier. So we were in the kitchen and Randy and I had a little mini-conversation about something in English. I then apologized to the ladies becasue I didn't want them to think we were talking about them.

"I'm sorry for speaking in English in front of you, sometimes it's just easier."

"That's okay," one of them said, "We just feel like we are in a movie."

Victory

Today I was reminded in my quiet time that God is our victory. Through him victory is assured. And in every situation, each step forward is also a victory. God is with us, he will go to battle for us, all we have to do is be still.