Wednesdays...

(Two posts in one day!)

Wednesdays are becoming one of my favorite days of the week because on Wednesday nights here they have something similar to "small groups" back home. One family each week volunteers to host the church meeting in their home. Then on Wednesdays at 6:00, everyone who can make it meets there and we enjoy about an hour of worship time together. The number of people who can squeeze into a small living area is always impressive. And after the worship time, the host family usually provides some kind of refreshments. Sometimes it's coffee and cookies, sometimes it's more substantial. Here's a picture of last Wednesday night's meeting in the home of Gloria and Teresa. (Teresa is the mother of Ulysses for those of you who have been here.) After I took this picture, about 12 more people arrived--at least 8 of them squeezed into the living room and more stood outside.

One of the things that is difficult about these services is that the people who live outside of the municipal area sometimes have a hard time getting to them. It gets dark just before 7:00 now and most people want to be home soon after that. For those who walk an hour into town or ride a bus at least part of the way into town, this means they usually cannot come to the evening meetings. (The last bus runs around 5:30 I think.) For this reason, about once a month they try to host the meetings in someone's home who lives out in the rurual areas so that those families can participate. Tonight is such an evening. Our host tonight is Marina Landaverde, one of the sweet sisters here. She tries to make it to as many church events as she can but the location of her home prevents a lot of them.

So tonight's plan is that those who can go will meet at the church building at 3:00 and we will all go together. Jose believes that Marvin has transportation arranged for us to get all the way to her house in vans but it is possible that at least some of the group will have to ride a public bus partway and then walk the rest of the way. Those in the vans will be packed in tightly. :) It's sure to be a wonderful evening.

We are hosting one of the Wednesday nights here in our new home in September and are looking forward to that. We'll let you know what the capacity of our living room is after that. :)