Week 11: Giving Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving! And for some of you, Happy Black Friday. I can honestly say that I am thankful Black Friday isn't near as big of a deal here as it is in America. The only store here that has a Black Friday sale is ASDA, which is a part of the Wal-mart family.

This week has been full of our regular activities. We had our assemblies this week, where we were able to announce winners in a Christmas card contest we had. We asked the school if the children could make some Christmas cards themed around the Nativity scene for our Christmas flyer. We had three winners, and each one was thrilled to be named the winner, and even more ecstatic when they received a Christmas present from us.

Tot's and Toys play group was busy once again, with 13 children, and 10 adults. It is encouraging to see more and more consistency from people. This indicates that they are comfortable with the playgroup and with us.

Wednesday evening, we celebrated Thanksgiving. For the most part, our Thanksgiving dinner is similar to an English Christmas dinner. There were some exceptions, Green Bean Casserole, Lime Pear Delight (family recipe), and Sour Cream Apple Pie (another family recipe). All went over fairly well, and no one got sick from my cooking! It was a wonderful chance to spend time with them all, and share a bit of American culture. Afterwards, they asked for a quiz, so I created a quiz about America. Questions included what is the first state to join the union, the last state to join the union. What is the name of the US national anthem, and what sports did Michael Jordan play professionally. It was a hilarious time as there are things that they didn't know, and so their answers caused some laughter throughout the evening.

Thursday's explorer's club went well, we did a Thanksgiving craft with them, which I of course was thrilled about :) . Friday we went out with the school, and helped clean up some gardens and a little litter picking.

Friday night with the teens in Harby was good, I was the one in charge of the older ones, and we talked about what we are thankful for, and why we are thankful, and to whom are we thankful. The time was good to just talk about what I am thankful for, and why I am thankful for them. We organized what we are thankful for into: 5 people, 4 things, 3 things in nature, 2 places/activities, and 1 thing that God has done in our lives this past year.

I know this week's post is somewhat short, but things are about to get really busy with December arriving tomorrow. We have lots of this going on from now to Christmas, including attempting to visit every home on the estate to tell them about our Christmas events.

Week 10: Cathedrals, Churches, and the People Within

Time is really beginning to fly by! It is hard to believe that I am over 2/3 of the way through my internship here. In 35 days, I will (by God's grace and will), be on a plane somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean between Madrid, Spain and Chicago, Ill., USA.

I am late(ish) once again on writing this blog. This was another busy weekend.

This week I spent much of it at Andrew and Grace's. Daniel and Grace took three days off at the beginning of the week, and visited family in York and Ipswich. While at Andrew and Grace's, I went into Grantham and visited a relatively new Christian bookstore, looking for some Bible study materials. While I was happy to talk with the lady who owns the shop, I couldn't find anything that really jumped out at me as what I was looking for. Additionally, when I talked with her on the way out, I discovered she had a pet rat with her. Which she kept on her person. The rodent made several appearances from behind her ear, and even through her scarf and jacket. While I have never dealt with the bubonic plague, I'd prefer that to be one thing I do not experience on this earth.

Tuesday afternoon was spent at a nice old house on the north east side of Grantham called Belton House. The house is owned by the National Trust, sort of like the Historic Societies in America. The house has a large garden, orangery, boathouse, lake, maze of hedges, stable, and servant housing in addition to the house itself. While unable to get into the house, we did explore the landscape surrounding the house.

Lake and boathouse.

Looking through the back garden.

Belton House

Tuesday night was a long but glorious night as I was able to video chat with the MSU Baptist Student Union at their last meeting of the semester. It was wonderful to see some faces I haven't seen in a couple months, and although once the meeting began it was dark. I knew people were there, and were listening due to the noise, and some responses. Additionally, I received a few tweets, and some iMessages from people during that time. It is so very encouraging to be able to hear from people who you have been around for 4 years still care about you, and are genuinely interested in what you are doing.

MC came around Wednesday afternoon to discuss life and how things are going as a 5 day old Christian. It was great to just chat about the Christian life, learn some of the foundations to what we believe, and discuss what prayer is, and how on earth you go about praying by yourself.

Thursday morning I ventured back into Grantham (rat-free this time), and visited St. Wulfram's Cathedral. It is quite a large cathedral considering the town. The spire was completed in the 13th century, and standing at 282 feet, and some odd inches, it was purportedly the tallest structure in England upon completion.

St. Wulfram's Cathedral.
Church of England.

Friday was another busy day of cleaning, mentoring, Bible study with teens in Harby, and then video chat with two fantastic brothers, Aaron and Isaac. I have missed them both terribly since we returned to the U.S. after my first visit to Grantham back in May. It was good to see them and share with them personally what has been going on as they know some of the people I work with personally.

Saturday I visited Melton Mowbray and was able to walk around during the Saturday market. Thankfully the market was on because Melton isn't exactly a throbbing metropolis. The square where the market was held is pleasant, but small. I also visited St. Mary's Church which was very nice and interesting as the steeple had a clock on it, but the staircase to the clock was on the edge of the steeple, so you could tell where the staircase was quite clearly.

Sunday was a very busy day, as I went to three services. We had a nice group at the Earlesfield Community Church again this week. However afterwards, Lois was being baptised (when in England, spell like the English) in Nottingham, so we raced back there to join and celebrate with her.

Lois, and one of the pastors, Pete!

All in all, a good week, with another busy week ahead. Things are going to be quite busy for the next 3-4 weeks, I will try to post weekly, but I'm making no promises for this stretch!

Week 9: New Sights and New Brothers

This week has been a little longer thanks to a very busy and exciting weekend. My apologies for being later than normal with this update.

Even the front half of the week was busy, from belting Christmas carols through the toilet block while cleaning (and serenading others unintentionally) to leading the Bible study, Monday and Tuesday were jam packed. On Tuesdays we try and visit people on the estate, we did not make that goal as we had a couple of projects we needed to do at Andrew's and at the community centre. An older Welsh man joins us every Tuesday, so he and I worked at the community centre sorting good chairs and tables from the rubbish ones. He is a pleasure to be around and talk with.

Thursday through the weekend were full of activity as well. From another adventure in finding a craft to do with the kids, to spiritual talks which has since lead to spiritual growth and commitment (yay!). God is working here, and the joy I have in knowing He has allowed me to be in this work is incredible. In the midst of that we watched the latest Thor in the cinema. Thor was quite good, and was filmed in England (everyone likes London). Also, popcorn at the cinema here is slightly cheaper (although there is a significant need for melted butter over here).

London Skyline from the London Eye. Note St. Paul's just right of center

Saturday, as a team we took the train down to London! With vouchers from Tesco (a grocery store over here), we got onto the London Eye at a discounted price. We explored more of London, including 10 Downing Street (the British version of The White House, where the PM lives), Trafalgar Square, The Royal Mall up to Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park AND Harrod's.

Charis was being silly, hence my looking down.
The London Eye. 

Elizabeth Tower in foreground.
Westminster Abbey in background.

Trafalgar Square and Nelson's Column.

The National Gallery.

Harrod's. Poshest place in the world.

I had always thought of Harrod's as just the British version of Macy's Department Store in New York City. It's not. From the outside I thought it was very festive for Christmas. Then I got inside. The place is posh. By posh, I mean Victoria Beckham posh (She was Posh Spice of the Spice Girls). I do not think you can get any more posh than someone who's nickname is Posh.  The place was ridiculous. While strolling along, we found a watch that was worth £11500. Yes, you read that right. Eleven thousand five hundred pounds. Currently, that is $18,532.14. FOR A WATCH. I paid less than half of that for my current car in America. We also saw one for £88000. But really, at that point I was still in sticker shock from the first watch, and anything beyond that was incomprehensible. Part of our reason for visiting Harrod's was to find the toilets, or as the uber-posh call it, the washroom. We needed this because we had a 3 year old and a 9 month old who desperately needed a nappy change. We had a look around near where the washroom is located (the basement), so we looked around the wine cellar and the cigar room. Cigars are at least £41 PER CIGAR. A pipe is would fleece the lining of my jeans at £300. The price of a simple bottle of Coke would quench your thirst without even purchasing the drink. It costs over 4 quid(pound, to be proper), so the next time you go to a restaurant and you have sticker shock at a $3.00 drink, just remember a single bottle of Coke would be more like $7.00 in Harrod's.

Big Ben is such a pleasure to listen to.
Parliament is just to the right of Elizabeth Tower here.

Buckingham Palace.

After that eventful trip to London, which was truly quite enjoyable, I went online to book my train ticket back to London for when I leave in December. I booked the latest train that night from Grantham. Big Mistake. This train would be leaving around 10:30 at night. Arriving at midnight. Beautiful, that would give me 3 hours to get to Heathrow from King's Cross. No biggie right? Wrong. As it will be a Sunday night, and apparently London officials do not think that anyone would care to travel at midnight from the BIGGEST TRAIN STATION IN THE UK to the BIGGEST AIRPORT IN THE UK, for an international flight that leaves at dawn (which is fairly common). The Underground quits running at 11:30. Thankfully we caught this last night. Otherwise, I would have been stuck in Central London with all my luggage needing to get to Heathrow, and really the only option that I could rely on then would be a taxi. Which could be the most expensive mode of transportation invented by mankind.









Well, we avoided that big obstacle by moving my train, where the change of my reservation only cost 5/6 of the price of the ticket itself. Sigh. Live and learn. Do not ever expect the biggest underground system of trains to run at midnight on a Sunday night.

Hyde Park and The Serpentine. These swans are property of Queen Elizabeth II herself. As are all the swans in England.

Week 8: Conversations, Both Individual and Corporate

One more week in the books. Another week of spending time with crazy, wonderful English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, and Northern Irish people. They are truly incredible people.

This week was a calmer week in terms of activities. With Andrew and Grace out of town early in the week, Daniel and I spent the week building bunk beds, putting up new mattresses, and taking apart the old ones. After two days using a screwdriver, I felt like I was developing rheumatoid arthritis in my right hand. There are still some red spots on my hand from the screwdriver, nearly a week later.

This week, I began reading through the Psalms. I had been reading a Proverb a day since July, and so I felt like I needed to change things up a bit. So I started reading the Psalms. We as a team found out that one of our church members reads a Psalm every night. I thought it might be the perfect opportunity to further engage and encourage them in Christ. Since we would both be reading the Psalms, we could share ones that stuck out to us in the week. Later I found out they do not read the Psalms in any order, however, I still feel that I can encourage them through my reading of it also. This will also encourage me and push me to not simply read the text, but to study it, mull it over in my mind. I've heard people use the illustration of a cow chewing its cud as what we should do as Christians with the Word of God. We should read it and take it in, then a little while later, bring it back up into our minds, and think on it some more.

Throughout this week, I have been preparing for today. Today was marked on our calendars here as the day that I would preach at the church on the estate. For those of you who don't know, I never preached before in my entire life. While my training in university has made me comfortable with talking in front of people. This was a whole new animal to try and wrangle. My experience with public speaking has been with sub-10 minute speeches. The majority were under 3 minutes, and about the weather. This one was expected to be 15+ minutes. Thankfully, God has placed an illustration on my heart for children early in my time here. This illustration was to describe what it means to be a Christian. I was able to in a way, use the illustration through the text I was given. For those who are curious, the text was Luke 18:9-14. This passages talks about the Pharisee and the tax collector. I focused on how they approached God, and how we should approach God. Well, today was the day. I preached. With the church being made up of mostly non-Christians, specifically, non-Christians with loads of children, there were plenty of distractions. Yet, I was surprised and blessed by how closely some paid attention to the sermon. I know that my voice isn't the most exciting of voices to listen to, and the fact that they listened and paid attention for 15+ minutes (I have no idea how long I preached) is solely something to give the praise and glory to God for. I pray that as they paid attention, that God spoke to them, that they would see for themselves that they can do all they want to look like a Christian to the world (like the Pharisee), but that will not make a lick of difference when they come before the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

This weekend I also had the opportunity to speak about Christ and Christianity to a Swedish girl who is working for a local family. She brought the children to a bonfire night we had in Harby. The children come regularly to our Bible study on Friday nights for the youth of Harby. Although she isn't a Christian, or even interested in Christianity, she and I were able to discuss religion, our thoughts on it, and also through our discussion we talked about holidays, in Sweden, England and America. I was able to tell a little bit about why we celebrate Christmas, and Easter. I pray something sticks with her, and that she would start to ask questions, to herself, as well as to the family she works for, who are also Christian.

I know there are not any pictures in this week's update. However, I plan on having loads of pictures tomorrow, as this coming Saturday, we are going to London as a team! There is also plan to go on the London Eye. If that is the case, there will be LOADS of pictures.

Week 7: The Return To Routine

Hiya!

This week has been a much calmer week here, the children are back at school, and so our regular routine of working in the schools, visiting and having Bible study is back. Little Charis started nursery today, and is loving it. So is Grace, as that gives her three hours of relative quiet in the house every weekday.

One last update on last week, at church Sunday we had a family service, where the kids stay in during the whole service. We advertised it at the holiday club, we had 63 people at church on Sunday! Praise God! Many were kids (naturally), but we got the parents also. We had parents of kids we have been praying for and watching for a while now. What a blessing to see God bring people to hear His Gospel.

Picture doesn't do it full justice.

Tuesday, we had a meeting with someone in Newark, so after the meeting, we explored Newark. For those who came with me in May, the team from PRCC went to Newark one day, and their leader bought a bunch of stuff at an antique shop. We went into that antique shop just to look around. I'm not sure I could have found enough small things to fill a extra suitcase, but then I don't have the eye for that kind of thing.

Miniature roulette table.
I wonder if James Bond practiced his gambling skills with one of these...

We walked around the remnants of Newark Castle. Built in the 12th century, it became a royal castle under Henry VIII, but during the English Civil War, the castle sided with the Royalists and King Charles. They lost in the Battle of Newark and Parliament promptly ordered the castle be demolished. The only thing left is the castle wall facing the river, because that was the hardest part to get to. Many of the good stones used to build the castle were looted by the townspeople for their own homes.

River view of Newark Castle.

From inside the castle.

For lunch, we ate a "chippy," this chippy came well recommended by a mailman on the street. He was right though, it was quite delicious. I had a double cheeseburger and chips. Sidenote: all mail in the UK is sent via RoyalMail, so the mailman is in the service of the Queen. This means that when you put your letter in the post, it immediately belongs to the Queen until it reaches your intended recipient.

Delicious. Bring it, Mickey D's.
"I'm lovin' it."

Newark has the closest Starbucks to Grantham, so naturally we stopped there also, and the closest Marks and Spencers. We picked up more Percy Pigs there.

The Salted Caramel Mocha. Pretty good!

Thursday was Halloween, and while some people here do go all out for the holiday, we really didn't do anything. It was nice, I am also with the Howson's, and their house is a good distance from the road, or anyone else, so it makes for a quiet Halloween.

Friday night was Harby Bonfire Night. They had a huge bonfire, and some fireworks. This is their celebration of Guy Fawkes Day. If you have ever seen "V For Vendetta," you know who Guy Fawkes is. He had a plot to blow up Parliament because he didn't like what they were doing. His plot was exposed and he was executed, but the people in England still celebrate him. "Remember, remember the fifth of November." Mostly, it is an excuse to burn stuff. Bonfire night is the only time where you can legally burn anything in a bonfire or any outdoor fire.

The fireworks!

This thing was pretty big.

The ticket.

Today I had the pleasure of going to my first football match. Football here means soccer to everyone in America. I went to the Nottingham Forest v. Blackpool match. Lois is a big supporter of Nottingham Forest. We had solid seats, and it was a very good match, and fairly clean through much of the game. It was a draw, 0-0, at the 90th minute. The referee added 4 minutes to the game because of stoppages. Blackpool then scored in those four minutes. Blackpool won 1-0. While we were all disappointed that Forest didn't win, it was a hard fought match, and the Forest goalie was named Man of the Match. The topic of football reminds me of two things on my bucket list for being in England. One, was to go to a football match, check. The second is to find a premier league to support. Forest is in the championship league, so I can cheer for them, but it doesn't fill my bucket list. The reason why I say premier league is because in America, no one really even knows of the other leagues beneath the premier league.

The stadium.

The sky was gorgeous.