Ministry Experiences

The last post, I gave an update on our progress with Spanish. That's the boring part for me. What have we been using our Spanish for is the exciting part.

It is amazing to witness first hand the growth in this city. Bible knowledge is abundant here. Not just general knowledge, but important bible teachings are understood by many. This is because people enjoy reading the Watchtower magazine so much here. Since so few have access to the internet, reading material is actually read here! The people recognize the points brought out in our magazines are from the bible. Everyday, we pass by people as they read the Watchtower. Not only that, people regularly come up to us asking for the latest magazines. This is how I started one of my bible studies.

One young man named Felix literally stopped me in the street and asked me for the magazines. He seemed even more interested then normal so I offered him a study. He gladly accepted. Let me tell you, I have never had such an eager student. We study nearly every day. Sometimes twice a day! That's right, one morning after our study, I asked him when he could study next, and he said that afternoon! He plans on attending the memorial and hopefully he will start coming to the Kingdom Hall soon. He has had a bad experience in the past with another religion so this has made him a bit apprehensive. But he said he likes that he can make his own decision and is not pressured by us.

Felix asks lots of questions too!

Bree is studying with a woman who had studied in the past, but lost contact with her study conductor. They study every week and she plans on attending the memorial as well.

Bree with one of her studies

When we first started in the ministry here, we could barely understand any thing the householders would tell us. But now, it really is encouraging when we can understand our bibles students expressions of faith.

Speaking of the memorial, it is only 8 days away. We are expecting a massive crowd. The location is at a school in a very central part of our territory. It will be a special night for our congregation as we will be splitting in May. This type of change is quite common here with the growth, but sad none the less.

The last I heard, there were 30 congregations in the city. The population is about 150,000. I have heard from various brothers that the ratio of publishers to population is about 1 to 50. But there is still much work to be done. The rate of those getting baptized here is still growing. Not to mention the preaching that can be done in the rural areas!

On Sunday, our congregation made a special trip to a rural area to preach and invite people to the Memorial. We all pitched in the pay for the bus rental and it felt like a school field trip! Even our dear older ones in the congregation went! Sister Thelma, who needs assistance walking went with us. She was sweating a lot as we walked quite a bit through difficult terrain and I asked her if she was ok. She smiled and said she was fine!

Sister Thelma not letting anything slow her down!

We have seen just in our few months here a number of bible students make progress in the congregation. Several have become publishers recently and will be baptized soon. Because the growth is so much here, many in the congregation are unbaptized publishers making progress. Therefore, much training and assistance can be given to these ones.

Beginning the rural preaching day

New Kingdom Halls need to be built as well. We just received news that a new hall will be built in a few weeks and another one possibly in a few months here in our neighborhood. Each Kingdom Hall in the city currently is home to 3-5 congregations!

Our friend Yoshto from Japan is serving with this group that does not yet have a hall to meet in.

Well, we can't write all that is being done, but hopefully this gives you a better idea of what's going on here!

Language Update

With only a short time left here in Nicaragua, I wanted to provide an update to everyone. In this post, I will share our progress with learning Spanish. In the next, I will relate some field service experiences.

At this point, we have passed the five month mark of being here. When we were first deciding how long to come for, many told us that six months was a good amount of time to learn the language. So, do we know Spanish?

Well, by no means are we fluent and we obviously can't communicate nearly as well as we can in English, but we are able to understand and speak enough Spanish to get by. At times, we both felt frustrated and like we may never reach our goal of learning Spanish a sufficient amount. But like others had told us, the six month time frame to learn a language has proven to be right.

While living in a Spanish speaking country is a huge help, I've learned that you cannot learn Spanish merely by osmosis. You must put forth effort to learn to language. But not as much effort as you may think! I recommend studying a new concept and some new words every day. Then use those new things when you practice speaking with others. Listen to people speaking or audio recordings. Reading the language in printed form is essential as well. And finally, do not be shy. If you want to learn, you must put your self out there! Bree and I are both thankful to Sam for helping us. I playfully compare him to the spell checker on Microsoft Word when you make a mistake and a little squiggly red line appears. That was Sam for us here! We had good times laughing at our continued mistakes.

A common thing some would say to us back home was, "My brain can't learn another language!" I am always disappointed one someone says that for several reasons. Probably, they have never really attempted to learn a new language before! You have shut the door before even trying! Second, Jehovah God created our brains. Our brain is capable of so much even in our imperfect state. Third, that statement could discourage others from attempting to learn. Maybe they are having apprehensions about diving into learning a language. While living here, we have meet many from varied ages and backgrounds who have learned a new language. We only need to show love, have a willing spirit and Jehovah's powerful holy spirit will do the rest.

It is bittersweet right now, because we know that if we were staying here longer, our Spanish would continue to develop. Therefore, we are trying to make the most of our time left and are determined to keep learning when we return home!