Adventures in Mexico

My Mexican Adventure

Friday, September 22, 2006

Church and our new church "family"

[clockwise from top-right: me inside the church, the outside of the church, elena and diana cooking at the church fellowship dinner, with david/diana/david jr at their hamburger shop, sunday school kids performing in church, david cooking, me and marshmallow-girl, more church ladies, ansen/david/luis]

Basically 99% of the churches here are Catholic... (k la, that's an exaggeration...) and the Protestant churches are....well... SPANISH. So for Ansen's first 2 weeks here, he attended a Spanish church with a guy from school who whispered some translation to him. Thank God, He works in amazing ways and on the very day I arrived in MTY, we met the answer to our prayers-Alfonso.

On the day I arrived(a Sunday), we went to El Pollo Loco (the crazy chicken) for lunch. Whilst there, we saw a Mexican man and teenage boy eating with an ang moh couple at the table next to ours. We heard snippets of their conversation and kinda figured they were talking about church stuff. Ansen approached them to ask if they knew of a English-speaking church.. and the rest, as they say, is history.

The couple was Jannie and Ray- representatives from a church in Texas and they were in Mty to check up on the church they'd planted. Alfonso, the man, is a leader in that church and also.. a prof in Tec. Their service was held in Spanish- but Alfonso did an English translation during the service for J and R... and also to brush up on his english. They invited us for service the following Sunday and Alfonso even volunteered to drive us there! (The teenage boy was Louis- Alfonso's nephew.)

The following Sunday, Ansen, Venessa(HK gal) and I went for service. Wow, was so touched by the warmth and love there. Everyone welcomed us with open arms and there were kisses and hugs all around. :) Their church looks pretty shabby from the outside, but is actually quite comfortable inside. Many of their congregation travel very far distances just to get to this particular church and the clincher..... their service is THREE HOURS LONG. They start the service with some songs and prayer, then the children have Sunday school whilst the adults have Bible Study (more informal, by the leaders)... the children then return... more songs..more prayer...communion and tithes... then... the SERMON! (by the pastor)...more songs...and lastly, announcments.

The second week, the Church had a fellowship dinner. It's held once a month and the various families take turns hosting it. :) Good food, good sermon and fellowship... nothing more we could ask for. It was also our first experience having a home-cooked MExican meal. yum. Ansen was enjoying himself so much... till one of the ladies discovered his Spanish couldnt make it. so she sat him down and forced him to speak spanish to her. haha.

The week after that was Jannie and Ray's last week in mty... so David and his family invited them over for dinner.. and us being the new "guests" were invited along as well! The dinner was not held at their house... it was at somewhere better- his hamburger joint! David and Diana(his wife) started selling burgers by the roadside SIXTEEN years ago. Through the years, they'd established their clientele and expanded various times. :) you can just imagine how yummy their food is. Specially made bread with freshly grilled meat patties, avocado and vege...(we're lucky their stall is SO far away from our place... 'else we're gonna come home three times our size!)

So anyway, that's been our church experience so far... every week we're blessed by their love and inspired by their pure and simple faith. :) Hopefully, we'll get used to the 3-hour services soon!

posted by debz @ 3:27 PM

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