Nightly Meetings

After a disappointing informal meeting Friday night, we were all very excited to have our first “real” meeting Sabbath night. After church on Sabbath we spent the afternoon going around throughout the village to invite people again to the meetings. Mashabo has about 300 villagers, we were expecting about 20-30 people every night, and maybe 15 or so kids.

The sun set, and we brought school benches out onto the field in front of the primary school, set up a pulpit on the stage, set up the generator and spliced the wires for lights, and got together to organize our program. It was decided that the kids would meet in the little upstairs ‘community center’ building, and we would split up, half with the kids, and half in the main meeting. There were 8 of us now, and we said a quick prayer asking for God’s blessing on our meeting that night.

To say that the meeting went well would be a severe understatement. We had about 40 people there and about 30 kids, the meeting flowed smoothly for the most part, and I had a blast with all the little kids. Something I have learned about the Amerindian people is that they are reserved and usually quiet around outsiders. As I led song service that first night, I had the hardest time getting any response our of anyone no matter how hard I tried. Even the kids were very quiet at first, but that slowly changed as the meetings went on, and by the end of the week they sang so loud that we were told that we were being a disturbance to the main meeting.

The next night went well also, we had about 45 adults and the same number of kids. Then Monday morning came, and 4 people from the group had to leave, two were students and had to resume classes, and the other two staff needed to be at the school as well. The four of us who remained were a little worried about how we would be able to do everything ourselves, but we resolved to do our bests. It was my night to preach, and somehow we would have to make do with two of us doing everything at the main meetings, and the other two doing everything with the kids.

We were in for a pleasant surprise that night, just a little over an hour before the evening meeting was to start, we saw two students from the school walking up the little trail shouldering backpacks and covered in sweat from the 5 mile walk. Needless to say, we were incredibly excited to see them, and very thankful for reinforcements and help. After that night, every afternoon two or three students would walk the 5 miles to Mashabo to help with the evening meetings, and then about 5:30 the next morning would walk the 5 miles back to the school in time for breakfast and classes. The students had a wonderful experience coming to help out, all of them wanted to come back again, and we were so grateful for the help!

As the nights passed by, we saw more and more people coming out each night. Every night we would bring more and more of the benches in the school out, and they were always filled before the night was over. Finally, by the end of the week we were using all the school benches, some of the smaller desks that could double as benches, and there still were people sitting on the ground. The last night of the meetings we had over 80 kids, and nearly 100 adults there. The theme of the message was heaven, and at the end Andre made an appeal and nearly half the audience came forward.

After coming from the United States, where we are happy when we have 10 people who aren't church members coming to an evangelistic series, seeing the turn out was amazing to me. Just to see the deep hunger these people have to learn more about God opened my eyes. What they lack is leadership and encouragement, the desire is there they just need direction.

What more can be said? I have never been part of a team coordinating an evangelistic series, much less planned everything in less than two weeks. But when God designs a project, He is more than able to bring it through to completion no matter how limited time or resources may be. These meetings taught me like never before to trust God in everything. Everyone who was involved received a blessing themselves, and it was obvious by the end of the week that the entire village was inspired by the nightly meetings as well.

To God be the glory!