Hot chocolate thoughts.

It has been a while since I have posted, but things south of the equator are still going well. This weekend will mark being in South America for one month, and Tuesday will mark three weeks living in Recuay. You would think this might be the part where I say something like, “Time is flying by, I can’t believe I have already been here a month!”, but that statement is not true. Honestly the last three weeks here in Recuay have gone by at an incredibly slow pace. We are just now beginning to see things pick up. It has taken quite a while to fall into a routine here, but I think we are beginning to find one.

Things are always subject to change, but this is what we are finding ourselves busy doing. We are teaching English and Bible five days a week. We teach at a school in town, called Javier, every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. Over the next several weeks we will rotate each day we go seeing first through sixth graders.  We visit two classes each day for twenty-five minutes each. (Ex. Tuesday: 1^st grade A and 1^st grade B, Wednesday: 2^nd grade A and 2^nd grade B, etc) This means that we will only get to see each class at Javier five to six times the whole twelve weeks we are here. We are also teaching in a town twenty minutes away, called Utcuyacu, every Monday and Thursday. This school is very small and Becca and I each have our own class for an hour each day. Becca teaches a class of about six first and second graders and I teach a class of about eleven third through sixth graders. In addition to our daily teaching schedule we cross the river, behind our house, every Tuesday afternoon to visit and have bible study with a couple families in the town of Ocunan.  Also on Friday afternoons we travel back to Utcuyacu to spend time with the families of the community doing bible study and playing with the children.

When reading this you might think this is a packed full schedule, however, we have come to realize that it is really not that packed. Even with lunch every day at Humberta’s, trips to the market and internet café, walking several miles every place we go, and doing random daily tasks like cooking and washing clothes by hand we still seem to have a lot of time on our hands. A lot of time to do things such as read, journal, memorize scripture, think, talk, drink hot chocolate, and play the occasional Spanish card game. *Hints the reason for the title “Hot chocolate thoughts”. 

Hot chocolate has quickly become one of our favorite things here in Recuay.  There are many reasons for this. One is that on a cold night as we huddle in the kitchen after dinner hot chocolate is one thing that keeps us warm. Two the way you make hot chocolate here is extremely fun, and very tasty. (They use this special chocolate bar that is very rich and full of spices like cinnamon and nutmeg. Melted in sugar water with evaporated milk, you just cannot go wrong.) Three sitting around the kitchen table drinking hot chocolate brings lots of great conversation, Spanish card games, and lessons from the Lord.

A recent lesson the Lord has been teaching me through many cups of hot chocolate and many intent looks into His perfect law is concerning all this free/down time we have had the last couple of weeks.  I few days ago I found myself using the word “bored” a lot, like several times a day. This was all due to the fact that I spend hours a day reading and journaling and just sitting around. This lack of a schedule was becoming monotonous and I found myself not knowing what to do with all this extra time. A few days after I made this discovery about the word “bored”. It dawned on me that this word and feeling is totally not from the Lord. I have become convinced that at the beginning of time when the Lord created and ordained everything in creation the word “bored” was not on his mind. So instead of sitting around thinking about how bored I am and what things I have not done since being here in South America I began to think and recount what I have been able to do.

-I have been able to spend more time in the Word listening to the Lord’s voice than I ever have.

-I have been able to catch-up and continue my goal of reading the Bible through this year.

-I have begun another season of memorizing a significant amount of scripture.

-I have spent time reading books and listening to sermons by people who are wiser than me.

-I have greatly increased the vitality my prayer life.

-I have learned apart from TV, internet, friends, and family, to rely on the Lord in every circumstance.

- I have learned to be content in this new place, for this new season, trusting the Lord’s plan is bigger than my eyes can see.

So I am counting these past few weeks of “boredom” as a gift from the Lord. A free gift He did not have to give me, but one He chose to give me solely out of His grace and love for me. These moments have been a great opportunity to dive into God’s Word and discover great and marvelous things about Him. Despite the work and ministry I have the opportunity to do here in Recuay over the next three months I am looking forward to taking every moment, the Lord gives me, captive. Being transformed by the renewing my mind, so that I will be able to discern what God’s good, pleasing, and perfect will is.