What does Sunday look like in another country?
Sundays in other countries can look very different. Climate, culture, dress, accommodations, food, travel, local interest - these all influence how a Sunday might play out. (Sunday might even happen on Saturday in some cultures!) The important things are always the same. What are they? They are worshipping God, sharing His love with people, and teaching His word as effectively as possible. Sometimes those things look really different by ministry, though.
People who visit from the States often tell us that they are surprised by our Sundays. They expect us to have the typical Sunday school, worship service, lunch, nap, evening service, supper, etc. To be honest, we were never like that even when we lived in the States. Sundays were busy then, too. Just for fun, I thought that I would share with you what my typical Sunday looks like, well, what it is supposed to look like.
What did Sunday look like when you first started?
Before I tell you how it is now, I would like to mention how it was in the beginning. We met at home, in our apartment, with just our kids. Back then, it was just my husband, our two baby boys, and I. It was during those early days that the Lord helped me mature enough to appreciate worship meetings being about Jesus, not about being busy nor about seeming impressive to someone who might see me. In the spirit of honesty, the messages were (ahem) less than uplifting since my husband and I were just barely speaking Icelandic. I had no idea what he was trying to say. Sometimes we just tried to translate and memorize one Bible verse. Those were sweet times.
What does Sunday look like now?
My mornings start a lot like yours, probably. Get up early, do some laundry and household stuff. Make supper in the Crock Pot that our son William sacrificially bought for me one Christmas. The kids fend for themselves for breakfast since they are older now. Then, I get to have my quiet time with the Lord.
Once I get to the church building, I start by making coffee for the morning service (about 5 pots), assemble soup to share for lunch, open church rooms and make sure heat is on, finalize any Sunday school prep for both languages, practice songs on piano one last time, then start greeting people as they arrive.
Our first service is an English Bible study attended by foreigners here whose mother tongue is neither Icelandic nor English. I am often in the nursery during this time. Then we have our English worship service. I stay long enough to play the piano then take the children out to teach.
As soon as the children go with their parents, we shift gears into Icelandic church. The first job is to make a "pick-up list" of people that we need to get on our 18-passenger bus. Next comes cleaning up the soup and revamping the coffee for Icelandic church. I leave the kitchen in the capable hands of our daughter Rosa.
While Patrick drives bus to get the first load of people, my next task is to get the welcome table set-up for the children who will be arriving.
Let me just pause here to say that during Icelandic service, we split up into groups. We have some very faithful helpers including our own teenagers and some young adults who have been saved in our ministry. We absolutely could not run this afternoon Icelandic ministry without them.
After greeting the second bus load, we go to a general assembly for singing and announcements. Then we split into groups. To keep this part simple, we have five groups consisting of adults, 6-8 grades, 3-5 grades, 1-2 grades, and pre-school/nursery. The groups rotate but all have a Bible lesson, a game time, a chance to "buy" things in our little motivational store with tickets they have earned, and a have snack.
As the last kids eat their snacks, I make the "take-home" list which is never the same as the pick up list unfortunately. Patrick takes that first load home while William and I play games with the others. As Patrick takes the second load home, I drive home those who live a little farther out.
We meet back at the church to tidy up and head home where we that supper waiting in the crock pot.
What happened last Sunday?
We had a "man down" Sunday this past week. Actually, it was a three-man down Sunday. Three people were sick who are integral to the operating of our Icelandic Sunday school. It went something like this.
Because one of the teachers got sick just after church started, we had to make a decision on the fly. These decisions generally never end well. Since it was the pre-school/nursery teacher that got sick at the last minute, everybody else shifted down to the grade below where they normally teach to combine the oldest children's group with the adults. Frankly, this threw everything into a tailspin. No one knew what they were supposed to teach.
We adjusted, though, like good soldiers. I got the little guys. Just as I was establishing authority with my little wigglers, the fire alarm went off. Of course. We filed all of the children out into the blessedly mild autumn weather. Mercifully, William had his (well, my) class following him in a single file line doing airplanes and hopping bunnies while making his way to the property border. We joined in. Soon the adults and older children wandered out. The men checked the building. Should I have found it frustrating that there was actually no fire? Probably not.
We filed back into the building. It was no small effort to get everyone settled back down. When we were finally into the story of Moses at the parting of the Red Sea, the Securitas guy showed up to inspect the building because of the fire alarm. Though I am thankful for his attention to detail by inspecting every single room, my lesson was over. We left the Red Sea walls filled with hungry sharks and curious whales all hovering around Moses and the Isrealites. Bjartmey, the teacher, can finish the story next week.
Of course, we had already announced that it was ice cream Sunday, no pun intended. Thankfully, the ice cream that we had was the kind on a stick instead of the kind that has to be scooped. The kids' sitting and eating their ice cream on a stick was the last bit of calm that I can remember.
Our regular order of rotation was completely out of spin. Every single class ended up at the little store at the same time. My little wigglers descended to chaotic play in hallway. Trying to reign in that chaos while also answering the volley of questions from the adults who were trying to step up and help and while trying to make that take home list, did not go well. But then it got worse. We waded semi-single file into the complete anarchy of the main auditorium. Yes, it looked liked one of those school cafeteria food-fight scenes in a movie.
I winged a take home list, not actually filling the van nor having the stops in the right order. The bus left. The rest of the sticky, hyper, little guys made their way to the play room. William ran a game while I made a better organized second list.
After getting the big blobs of stickiness off of the church floor, we may have looked a little haggard going home last Sunday.
Supper was delicious.
Sunday on the mission field can look very different or maybe not so very different. Either way, I love it.
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| Patrick and Vicki Weimer in Iceland since 1999 |
