A baptism service, a Super Bowl party, and the familiar routine
It’s been an eventful week. Last Sunday the church that Tommy and I attend---Calvary Baptist in the small village or quarter of Ndu called Njimntoh---had a baptism service. It lasted five hours, and, I’ll be honest, I felt drained and exhausted afterwards. But it was really moving and worshipful and encouraging as well. It started with a gathering at the church building. Then we processed along a dusty road to a small stream that church members had dammed up the day before, creating a murky, grayish pool. In the water were two crudely constructed archways made out of saplings. We found out once we got there on Sunday morning that the pastor, Benjamin Ndzi, stood in between those arches and those being baptized stepped into the pool through one and exited through the other.
There was a short sermon, some singing, and then seven people were baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Onlookers heading to market or just strolling along the main road gawked at us. The fon (=traditional ruler) of Ndu showed up with a noisy entourage and sat uphill from the pool on a patch of brownish grass to watch. We ended with a prayer dedicating these newly-baptized Christians to God and processed back to the church, singing loudly all the way and stirring up a cloud of dust.
Back at the church I got to preach the morning’s (second!) sermon. I preached from Romans 6:3-4 about the new life in Christ. I brought a plastic kitchen glove from our house to use as an illustration. “Without my hand inside of it, this glove cannot lift a finger,” I said. The church was packed---much more so than it usually is. People were standing outside listening through the windows, and my friend Tamfu Dieudonne even came to show his support for me as I preached, which was encouraging. “But when I put my hand in the glove,” I went on, “the glove comes to life. It can wave and wiggle its fingers and pick things up.” I tried to explain that baptism signifies the transformation that God works in spiritually dead people. He takes lifeless people and grants them a new kind of resurrection life in Christ. They die with Christ, are buried with him, and are raised to walk in “newness of life,” and they receive the indwelling Spirit (Romans 8).
Many, or most, of the Christians at this church are uneducated and illiterate village farmers. I wanted so badly to communicate with them, so I tried to speak in short sentences and use clear wording, hoping my friend Theodore who was translating my sermon into the local tribal dialect would be able to follow it for himself and make it accessible for those who have trouble following my English. I received some encouraging feedback afterwards. I’m glad I had the opportunity.
The next morning the three of us plus our friend Ally left for an overnight visit to the village of Mbingo, about four hours from CBTS and Ndu. We didn’t tell any of our students that we were going to watch the Super Bowl! Thom and Ellen Schotanus, some BGC missionaries who are involved in construction with Mbingo Baptist Hospital, administering a primary school, and planting a church, live there. They invited us to come since they have a satellite dish that’s able to receive ESPN from South Africa. It was quite a party. We projected the game onto their living room wall. Thom made sweet and sour meatball sandwiches. And we stayed the night in their guest bedrooms afterwards. Needless to say, Tommy was quite happy. It would have been a long car ride back to Ndu---longer and more uncomfortable than it already was, with four of us crammed into a van just a little bigger than a minivan (think Mystery Mobile from Scooby Doo) with eight or nine Cameroonians besides!---if the Colts had lost!!
Well, I think that’s about all for now.
I have two stories in closing, one of encouragement and one of discouragement.
I’ve been able to sponsor several students by paying this semester’s tuition fees for them, which gives me a lot of joy. Thanks to the support of friends and churches in the States, this is possible. One of the students I’m sponsoring is prayer partner. My weekly meetings with him continue to be really life-giving for me. Last week he asked me if I would be willing to guide him in his discipleship as a spiritual mentor, so I think our weekly times together will continue to focus on prayer but will also include more of a mentoring dimension, which I’m quite thrilled about. I gave him a copy of a C. J. Mahaney book today (Living the Cross Centered Life), and I hope it provides good fodder for discussion. I think it will be easily accessible to him and also encouraging and probably helpful to him in future ministry.
By contrast, my Intro to Missions course today was particularly discouraging. Here’s a snapshot of what it can be like to teach here. Last week I assigned a reading from Andrew Walls’ book The Missionary Movement in Christian History. I knew it would be difficult. Walls’ prose is technically excellent and, in my opinion, very graceful and also exciting to read, but for my students, it probably makes them feel the same way I felt trying to read Immanuel Kant for a philosophy class in college. So, I got to class today, and one of my best students was very obviously scowling. About five minutes into my lecture, he blurted out without raising his hand, “Sir, this man [referring to Walls] has no right to write like this. He’s so difficult we can’t understand him.” Then this student proceeded to put his head down on his folded arms and didn’t look up from his desk for the next half hour. Another one of my best students, near the top of the class, looked totally dejected and overwhelmed. I immediately got defensive, then I felt deflated and panicky about whether my students could understand future assignments I have planned, and then just discouraged about which direction I should go with the class, since my syllabus has them reading Walls for the next three weeks, and then after that a piece by Christopher J. H. Wright that will probably be equally discouraging. What to do? I have no idea. Welcome to my life.
I hope to post some pictures from last Sunday’s baptism service in the next couple of days.
The peace of Christ to you,
Wes
There was a short sermon, some singing, and then seven people were baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Onlookers heading to market or just strolling along the main road gawked at us. The fon (=traditional ruler) of Ndu showed up with a noisy entourage and sat uphill from the pool on a patch of brownish grass to watch. We ended with a prayer dedicating these newly-baptized Christians to God and processed back to the church, singing loudly all the way and stirring up a cloud of dust.
Back at the church I got to preach the morning’s (second!) sermon. I preached from Romans 6:3-4 about the new life in Christ. I brought a plastic kitchen glove from our house to use as an illustration. “Without my hand inside of it, this glove cannot lift a finger,” I said. The church was packed---much more so than it usually is. People were standing outside listening through the windows, and my friend Tamfu Dieudonne even came to show his support for me as I preached, which was encouraging. “But when I put my hand in the glove,” I went on, “the glove comes to life. It can wave and wiggle its fingers and pick things up.” I tried to explain that baptism signifies the transformation that God works in spiritually dead people. He takes lifeless people and grants them a new kind of resurrection life in Christ. They die with Christ, are buried with him, and are raised to walk in “newness of life,” and they receive the indwelling Spirit (Romans 8).
Many, or most, of the Christians at this church are uneducated and illiterate village farmers. I wanted so badly to communicate with them, so I tried to speak in short sentences and use clear wording, hoping my friend Theodore who was translating my sermon into the local tribal dialect would be able to follow it for himself and make it accessible for those who have trouble following my English. I received some encouraging feedback afterwards. I’m glad I had the opportunity.
The next morning the three of us plus our friend Ally left for an overnight visit to the village of Mbingo, about four hours from CBTS and Ndu. We didn’t tell any of our students that we were going to watch the Super Bowl! Thom and Ellen Schotanus, some BGC missionaries who are involved in construction with Mbingo Baptist Hospital, administering a primary school, and planting a church, live there. They invited us to come since they have a satellite dish that’s able to receive ESPN from South Africa. It was quite a party. We projected the game onto their living room wall. Thom made sweet and sour meatball sandwiches. And we stayed the night in their guest bedrooms afterwards. Needless to say, Tommy was quite happy. It would have been a long car ride back to Ndu---longer and more uncomfortable than it already was, with four of us crammed into a van just a little bigger than a minivan (think Mystery Mobile from Scooby Doo) with eight or nine Cameroonians besides!---if the Colts had lost!!
Well, I think that’s about all for now.
I have two stories in closing, one of encouragement and one of discouragement.
I’ve been able to sponsor several students by paying this semester’s tuition fees for them, which gives me a lot of joy. Thanks to the support of friends and churches in the States, this is possible. One of the students I’m sponsoring is prayer partner. My weekly meetings with him continue to be really life-giving for me. Last week he asked me if I would be willing to guide him in his discipleship as a spiritual mentor, so I think our weekly times together will continue to focus on prayer but will also include more of a mentoring dimension, which I’m quite thrilled about. I gave him a copy of a C. J. Mahaney book today (Living the Cross Centered Life), and I hope it provides good fodder for discussion. I think it will be easily accessible to him and also encouraging and probably helpful to him in future ministry.
By contrast, my Intro to Missions course today was particularly discouraging. Here’s a snapshot of what it can be like to teach here. Last week I assigned a reading from Andrew Walls’ book The Missionary Movement in Christian History. I knew it would be difficult. Walls’ prose is technically excellent and, in my opinion, very graceful and also exciting to read, but for my students, it probably makes them feel the same way I felt trying to read Immanuel Kant for a philosophy class in college. So, I got to class today, and one of my best students was very obviously scowling. About five minutes into my lecture, he blurted out without raising his hand, “Sir, this man [referring to Walls] has no right to write like this. He’s so difficult we can’t understand him.” Then this student proceeded to put his head down on his folded arms and didn’t look up from his desk for the next half hour. Another one of my best students, near the top of the class, looked totally dejected and overwhelmed. I immediately got defensive, then I felt deflated and panicky about whether my students could understand future assignments I have planned, and then just discouraged about which direction I should go with the class, since my syllabus has them reading Walls for the next three weeks, and then after that a piece by Christopher J. H. Wright that will probably be equally discouraging. What to do? I have no idea. Welcome to my life.
I hope to post some pictures from last Sunday’s baptism service in the next couple of days.
The peace of Christ to you,
Wes
posted by Charlie, Tommy, and Wesley | 2:18 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home