Dear Friends,
The month of November is one of my favorite months in our ministry, even though it’s probably one of the busiest! November is our mission’s emphasis month. Every Sunday of the month, an assigned country is represented by one of our bus routes. This year, the four countries we represented were South Sudan, Afghanistan, Paraguay, and Poland. I think that this year in particular, many of us were impacted by how blessed we are to be able to worship freely, especially after the presentations of South Sudan and Afghanistan.
I have also been stretched over the past two months. Around the middle of October, I asked who would be directing the Christmas play. I had helped a little bit last year and wanted to make sure everyone started working on the music for it. Well, never ask about something that you aren’t willing to help with, because by the time I walked away from that conversation, I was in charge. I picked the play, translated the play, assigned the music, played the music, directed the actors, painted backdrops, made props, and sewed 33 costumes along with teaching my regular classes. Thankfully, my eigth and ninth graders really stepped up and helped me keep my head on straight. All in all, they did a fantastic job, and I was so proud for them for all their hard work. We had over 500 people there the night for the program, most of whom had never heard the gospel before. I was grateful that we were able to share the true meaning of Christmas with so many people.
Right before things became extremely busy with Christmas play preparations, we had two days off. I decided to burn the limbs and leaves that had been piling up in my yard. I also had a pile of junk in the corner of the yard that my landlord had left there for me to “sort” through. As I was burning everything and cleaning out the corner, I lifted up a piece of meal roofing, and a scorpion came running out. By now, I’m used to the occasional scorpion. I just kill them and move on. But this one was larger than my hand! I’ve never seen such a large scorpion! I went running to get something to smash him with (because I wasn’t about to step on him!!), but when I came back five seconds later, he was gone. I cautiously finished cleaning up my yard, but I never found him again. He completely disappeared. I try not to think about where he’ll show up next time.
Please pray for our ministry here. Right before everyone left for Christmas break, several things happened that are causing a lot of stress. First of all, a few really powerful people are trying to take away the property the church has been on for the past 20 years. Another group has also approached the school, claiming that there are legal issues. Three of our teachers are also finishing their contracts this year. Please pray for all of us as we begin 2020 with these challenges.
Ericka Wright