We have been on the road for most of the past two months so it has been a while since we wrote a blog post. Back in January I (Sarah) flew back down to the Center for Pioneer Church Planting to take one of the week long classes. This one was taught by veteran missionaries Vern and Carla Sterk. Although I really wanted to take some of the classes I was a little apprehensive to leave Jemimah for a whole week. I was also a little hesitant about the travel cost to attend this class. After the first day however I realized it was worth it!
The Sterks served in southern Mexico as church planters doing the same kind of work that we hope to do. God really blessed their efforts and today there are many thriving churches in the area they served. God also blessed their family and their children are doing well and serving the Lord. It was very encouraging to hear their thoughts on raising children while serving as missionaries. They shared their thoughts and experiences on church planting cross-culturally humbly and honestly. I learned so much from this class.
One exercise that the Sterks had the students do was to make a song from verses of scripture. That day they talked about the importance of music and how worship songs should be in the style of the normal music for the culture. We listened to a number of soundtracks of very different music styles from various tribes. Vern also had translated a song from the tribe they had served among and showed how although we could understand the words the tune was very unnatural to us and hard to sing.
I am grateful that I had the opportunity to be in that class. And Jemimah did great!
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