Teaching in Poptún

Since we are presently waiting on the door to reopen in Santa Rita, we wanted to get more involved in the Kekchi church plant in Poptún. By the way, the roof is on the Bible study building now: proof we are not giving up!

Last Sunday we asked pastor Mateo how we could help. He was excited about advertising a childrens' program, he thought that would be a great way for the church to grow. All they had up to this point was an adult service. So we headed down there this past Sunday to kick off a kids' class. There are some teenagers who already attend, who would probably make great teachers, so we are looking at this with the idea of training someone to take our place soon.

We had 12 come for the first week (not counting a cute little pair of twins)! It was like being in a different country compared to where we have worked in the past.

When I passed out the scissors, instead of hearing "No, give me the red one, no... I want blue", I heard "thank you". I had almost forgotten how to say "you're welcome".

When I set the bags of crayons on the table, instead of dumping them all out grabbing a wad and guarding it with their life, they each chose one crayon and when they were finished with that one they put it back in the bag and took out another one.

No one ducked under the table when someone walked passed so they wouldn't be seen with us.

No one dug through my diaper bag and ate the boys' snacks or tossed out all of their toys.

I only had to explain things one time.

It was like we were in a polite parallel universe... weird, but at the same time completely delightful.

I'm not sure what caused this, but there was something about the environment that they grew up in that made them different.

Pastor Mateo did advertise about the kids' class. The lady in the back, Gloria, came for the first time just to bring her son (he is in the white shirt). He can hear, but he cannot speak. He was so sweet. They both seemed to have a good time.

We had so much fun! I cannot wait till next week!

CRAZY ITEM OF THE DAY:

That morning Jonah didn't want any breakfast, but we thought is was just because we woke him up so early. We arrived in Poptún before everyone else to get setup. We sat for a while talking with pastor Mateo, he was holding Jonah. With no warning at all, Jonah starts vomiting all over him. I was so embarrassed and felt SO bad. Nothing like puking on the pastor... our first week too. He was very nice about it, but you know he smelled vomit for the rest of the day.