Archive for the 'thoughts' Category

All Set for Summer

Published by Matt on June 19, 2007 in news, summer and thoughts. 1 Comment

Well, we in Italy are coming up on one of the strangest seasons of all in the country: Summer. In case you didn’t know, most Italians are appalled when they hear about American vacation for the first time. To them, the US is a country full of workaholics and Italy is much more sensible. Italian vacations and holidays include the following:

  • 10 to 20 state holidays a year.

  • the ponte or “bridge” between a holiday and the closest weekend if said holiday does not fall on a monday or friday.

  • the week around easter.

  • the week or two around christmas

  • ferragosto, the two week span in August that is more exciting than Christmas to some Italians. Though officially about two weeks, this effectively includes the entire month of August, and perhaps some of July, too.

Weekends are out too once the weather turns nice in May. (There’s one family who attends the church that hasn’t been here in about a month because they have been at their mountain cabin most of the time.) And all in all it’s a bit silly–and a bit frustrating–as suddenly everyone who was very dedicatedly coming to bible studies or meetings from January to May suddenly turns into a flake.

Still, it has its perks, as we will be able to have much more time with the youth. They all about disappeared mid-May to be very studious only to show up again this last week, as say, about 100% of the evaluation of students in the Italian school system is final exams which are notoriously difficult (blech!). Because they are all done and don’t have anything to do until September, we will have fun with them.

Really, summer has the potential to be great, as everyone has a lot more free time. The biggest hurdle is to convince people that the church is worth spending time with. For various reasons, be it family, a lack of normal work hours (the normal work week is 36-40 hours, but free days aren’t necessarily Saturdays), or culture in general, we have trouble as a church having a sense of community.

The church has a hard time creating a more effective community because most people within it don’t see the point of it. Effectively, while the Sunday morning service is big enough to fill our small meeting space, the attendance of activites outside of the worship service is made up of a dedicated few.

Hopefully this summer will prove more fruitful. With the youth we are trying to provide a more welcoming environment for them to make their own.

So, we hope that summer is off to a great start back in the States, and we ask that you pray for us and the church here, especially for help in being a Christian body in more than just the abstract!

Your Average Sunday

Published by Matt on March 1, 2007 in thoughts. 0 Comments

We’ve been in Vicenza for about six weeks now, and even though we feel settled in, everything is still very fresh and new to our eyes. It is easy to love the group of Christians here: Despite all they have been through, they still have a heart for God and have happily supported us and actively tried to find ways to use us and whatever skills we have to grow God’s kingdom. All we’ve had to do most of the time is just to say “yes!” and go wtih the moment. Although we do have plans and ideas for what to do with this year, it has been an immense blessing to immediately get up to speed and start going. It has helped us get to know the church more quickly and given us a better idea of where we can best help out.

Anyways, the biggest thing to happen to me this past week was that I gave the Sunday morning sermon for the first time in my life. I have never really preached on Sunday before now, let alone in Italian. Moreover, public speaking has never been my strong point. Honestly, I can’t remember a time before this past year when imagining me speaking in front of a crowd didn’t send my stomach off to do cartwheels. Well, however I feel hasn’t changed what I’ve been called to do, which has been to lead Bible studies and give talks over the past year. God has grown me into the role of being able to do this task, and for that I’m incredibly thankful. It’s really neat to be able to look back on the past year and see myself changed–regardless of the significance of that change. Despite inexperience, lack of understanding, or just plain fear, God can and does grow a person into doing that which was previously impossible. So, this has been a steady process. It’s not like it was a big jump to do this (though I still had jitters) as I’ve done the same sort of thing in a more informal setting, but actially preaching on Sunday felt like some sort of threshold to be crossed, and now I’m over.

The meaning behind the title of this post and the real point of why I’m writing it isn’t some conquering of the weekly Sunday morning address, however. Instead, it’s this: After our weekend was all over and done, I couldn’t help but feeling at peace and content. Our schedule is the most busy with weekend events:

  • Saturday: Evening Bible Study
  • Sunday:
    • Italian worship
    • Bible class
    • Ghanaian worship
    • Afternoon Youth Group Meeting
  • Monday: Evening Women’s Bible Study

The peace that both Lauren and I felt was the awareness that God is actively making us into what we need to be to serve Him here, and that he won’t disappoint us. So that’s what an average Sunday is all about.

So It’s Spring!!!

Published by Lauren on April 5, 2006 in thoughts. 3 Comments

SO this is spring in Italy. I forgot how beautiful it can be…. and the irises aren’t even blooming yet! I can’t wait for that it is wonderful to me that my favorite flower just happens to be THE flower of Florence. The trees are all timidly letting their leaves out and a soft green is everywhere.

Last weekend we finished digging in the garden between parties (there was a April Fool’s part for our students on Friday… did you know that for April Fool’s in Italy you put paper fish on peoples backs?…and then a baby shower at our house on Saturday night…Phoebe is 1 month old…and Natilynn is 3 months old…So many babies there are 2 more coming in the summer). It was wonderful to dig… the ground is very nice indeed and the worms are absolutely ginormous! the dirt squishing in my toes was the most gushy and fantastic feeling… though it did make my feet kind of cold. I just don’t know what to say I guess right now…. I’m just excited by how God made the world, watching seeds grow and everyday seeing them become larger and more fully what they are. Frederico the son of one of my students wants to have a garden too so I think he is going to come over to help and I hope some of the seedlings are ready in time for him to plant them. I’ve been thinking that there really is nothing more human than wanting to make or grow things…like baskets or letters or dinner or sweets or friends or babies or music. I think that might be part of God that we actually got when he made us in his own image.

full, full, full…. life is very full right now, two new students this week and I am just now also full of the idea that I will be on the beach in Albania for 3 weeks this summer and that means bathing suits. Which really does seem less than the point (which it is since it will be at a summer camp where there aren’t even showers… but somehow I still care a little)). We just found out that the summer camp will be studying Empty Baskets a book about spiritual worship through stewardship, which I haven’t read but have now ordered… hope it gets here in the mail soon. Anyway… very full but it always seems to me that when my life is fullest I still get lots of time to come up with other things I would like to do.

Students today… 2 the twins … Salvatore and Donato… if they aren’t late getting here because of soccer practice…they are eleven right now and in prima media which of course means they are completely booked like any self respecting eleven year old right now. Soccer practice and French lessons and then the English tutor (that’s me!) feel kind of sorry for them so we mostly play games since I figure they are learning grammar in school so they really just need to practice using what they learned with me. It’s cool though because the Mom is completely mystified by our presence (the Bible School … a group of ragazzi that think it is important enough to go across and ocean to teach people about the Bible). Ok enough for now should go eat something I think….. Rosa is in Puglia right now so have to fend for ourselves…which doesn’t mean we don’t eat well…just more often really … and not delicous Pugliese food!

Something New

Published by Matt on February 2, 2006 in prayer and thoughts. 1 Comment

OK, well. so much for blogs. This one is having a restart, cause I did something stupid. Sorry if you missed the last few entries. Well, we’re busy here. Grammar classes are about to start, which I think will end up being very rewarding for us english teachers and our students. I know it will let us affect more people at once, as will as give us more time to spend with students we can talk to!

We love it here, especially now since the weather has given us a temporary taste of Spring.

We have something big to share, and which is this: We have decided as a team to pray that God would bring at least 30 people to him during the remainder of our time. We know that it is not a matter of boldness on our part, but a matter of willing to let go and let God work however he wants to. Cool thing: A few days we decided this, we were informed that there was to be a baptism at the Florence Church, and so have had a new brother with us for the last few weeks.