A Late Post About Last Weekend

On Saturday, Sinterklaas came to Alkmaar! He and his helper, Zwarte Piet (Black Pete) came in on a boat through the canals, and everybody in town went out to meet him - well, everybody except Heather; she was stuck at home with her injured ankle. The kids and I got some flags that they were passing out, and we waved them as he arrived. It was fun to see the kids all dressed up in Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet costumes, cheering as they arrived and hugging him as he walked through the crowds. Apparently, once he comes into town, you are supposed to leave your shoe next to the chimney or front door because he might ride by on his white horse at any time and leave a small present or some candy inside. Then, on December 5, he comes by and leaves a bigger present. Of course, the shoe tradition comes from when the shoes were wooden, so Kaylie and Keiric are going to decorate and set out the pair of demonstration shoes we picked up when we went with Heather's mom to watch how they make them. We are all enjoying taking part in the interesting traditions of this culture!

On Sunday, Kaylie and I rode our bikes to church as usual, but Heather and Keiric rode the bus to keep from aggravating her ankle more than necessary. She also did Sunday school for the little ones, around Keiric's age, and had a lot of fun speaking in two-year-old Dutch. In the service I was able to hear from our missionary leader here, Peter Hays, about his trip to India and the things God had taught him through the experience. As you may know, Christianity has recently grown rapidly in India. After experiencing almost no interest from the people over the past 50 years, in the last 5 months, they have seen over 5,000 decisions for Christ! So, Peter and a group of others went to see if there was something they were doing over there that could be effective in the European, and especially the Dutch, culture. He found some interesting things, like the fact that they send a Christian into a community, and for the first 3 months, their only job is to pray. They are actually given a schedule of prayer for the area and a list of 5 things to pray for. Another thing he found was that Christians in India are not passive. As soon as they become believers, the new Christians are expected to be baptized and start evangelism. In fact, one of the people in the group asked an Indian leader what he would say if he were told that there are Christians in other places who only go to church and read their Bibles on Sunday. First, the leader asked him to repeat the question, saying that he thought he must have misunderstood. Then, his response was, "I don't believe that is possible." It is amazing that something that has become a perfectly acceptable practice in places like Europe and America is unthinkable in countries like India and China. Could there be a connection between this and the way the Holy Spirit seems to be working in these countries?

After church we went to the house of some church members for lunch. It was our first invitation from anybody in the church for lunch , and, as Heather put it, "Now we've been accepted!" Their English was not that strong, and you know about our Dutch skills, but we had a great time getting to know them through a mixture of both languages. Two of their children are in the Youth Group, and the mother is leading the childrens' Kerstmas play that Kaylie is participating in, but this was the first time we had really gotten to talk to any of them, and it was fun.

On Sunday evening I was invited to talk to the Young Adult Group (which is similar to College and Career). They had invited me to talk to them about an idea I had brought up that we should start going into the cafes, bars, or wherever lost people hang out here, in order to build relationships and witness. They were excited about the idea, and are planning to go to a pool hall in Alkmaar for the first time on November 27. Of course, this is American Thanksgiving, and we are planning a dinner with some of our Dutch friends for that evening, so I can't go with them, but it was exciting to see their enthusiasm for reaching people with the Gospel. They also decided that we should start volunteering at The Mall, which apparently is a sort of afterschool hangout for kids put on by Youth For Christ where they play games with them and help them with their homework. We are going to be starting this on Tuesday. According to one of the leaders of the group, the "Dutch way" is to talk and talk and not actually do anything, so they were excited that concrete plans actually got made and that this group is ready to reach their city for the Lord.

Please pray for both of these outreach opportunities as well as for other outreach events going on in the church. God really seems to have been working through the message on Sunday to ignite a flame of evangelism in the church, and we are all excited to see the fires burn!

Also, please pray that the newspapers start displaying our advertisements for the English Christmas Service and the Polish Music Outreach. For some reason, though they normally put the advertisments in for free, it has not happened yet this year.