The other day my dad kindly informed me that if I ever stood for politics I’d need to renounce my Malaysian citizenship. This, of course, occurred in the context of the dual citizenship debacle that has kept Australia entertained for the last few months. Now I’m not sure how to feel about the fact that my father thinks a political career is a real possibility … Continue reading Going for glocal
Over the weekend, I came to the realisation that even though I know the Bible well, I am unable to communicate it well. There’s a combination of factors at play here, I’m not sure which is the most influential: I don’t talk enough about what I am reading, what the Holy Spirit is teaching me in my personal reading; I’ve now been out of regular … Continue reading too much of a good thing, not enough of the right thing?
In two months living in Loja, I’ve had the chance to “tour” the various evangelical churches here. A number of things have caught my interest: There are quite a lot of them! Twenty churches is a big number for an extremely Catholic city of only 120 000 -odd people. Praise and worship is generally livelier across the board. P+W teams are largely made up of … Continue reading Observations about church
So it’s been a little strange coming to terms with the fact that I am in my last few days living in Gonzanamá. Truly, I’ve been really happy here. In the days after the decision to move was made, I had a lot of peace about it. When telling people here I was going to leave, I’d say “Me da mucha pena irme” (it’s a … Continue reading last days, cold feet
So I was chatting with my friend O today. He said he feels God is calling me to stay and minister in Ecuador, specifically in his church. My first reaction was to laugh and say of course you think that’s what God wants! His response was that beyond the personal he honestly thinks I should stay. I told him I’d think and pray about it, … Continue reading Feelin’ filosófica
Culture clash? Thankfully, I haven’t really experienced culture clash as such. I think having travelled before has helped me adapt to any new situations so that I don’t “feel” cultural differences so markedly. That said, there are certain differences that are mildly inconvenient! The culture here is much more sexual, even from a young age. One example is the tradition of electing reinas (beauty queens), … Continue reading Clash or conform?
[Click here for Part 1] Another three issues relating to Christian testimony have come up in the last couple of weeks. Firstly, that old issue about drinking alcohol again. I asked R and G (two guys from church) their thoughts and they both agreed with the comments I’d heard about people testing you to see if you’re really any different. G is my generation and … Continue reading Testimony (Part 2) – Current challenges
On Thursday, I spent all afternoon with D helping him with a speech he has to do for class. It’s a free choice -type activity, so he wanted to talk about the Bible. He is so enthusiastic about the Word, everyone at school knows that he is an “evangelical”, and he’s not ashamed at all. I think it’s fantastic he is using every opportunity to … Continue reading Testimony – good, better, best?
I can hardly believe it’s already been four months, or one whole third of my mission trip. Though I’m feeling very much settled in Gonzanamá, a number of things have been running through my mind particularly in this last month. 1. Europe. For some reason – possibly random items coming up on my Facebook feed or Christmas approaching, and also comparing this experience with my … Continue reading Reflections on four months on the the field
⎯suansita⎯ 