Rebecca's blog - Thursday, July 29, 2010

I'm here by myself in the hotel room because I've been sick almost all week -- not being able to entirely shake the stomach bug that hit me late Monday night. It's not fun being sick; but it's really not fun being sick in another country - especially one without "western toilets." If you like the "squatty potty," as Mary calls it, more power to ya. I like my toilets a couple of feet off the ground. Along with that, just in case you haven't heard, in China there are no traffic rules, nor is there any ice or Dr. Pepper. All the women are thin and absolutely beautiful. (I'd be rail thin, too, if I had to choose from duck neck or chicken feet.) And every Chinese man smokes. All of them.

I could talk for days about the food; but after being sick off something I ate earlier in the week, I found a glorious oasis tonight in the form of a KFC. I haven't darkened the door of a KFC in years, but I did just now. Yes, I ate the chicken. No regrets.

In spite of this week's challenges, I sit by my hotel window looking at the heavy traffic five floors down and just marvel at the differences between our world and this. So many differences, yet the world seems so much smaller now that I've been here. The women we've gotten to know this week in school are far more amazing than I figured. I'm starting to understand now why Dan & Sarah really love this city and the people of Chengdu. Our new Chinese teacher friends really look up to us, listen to us, and shared some pretty cool things with us. During today's "open forum," we gave them a chance to just talk about anything to practice their English, and a chance to ask any questions of us that they wanted. The first question in our small group (the small group I've been in all week is with most advanced English speakers, those that are already conversational) was that they wanted to know more about our God that we've talked about all week. We knew ahead of time that we couldn't make this our agenda, necessarily, but that if asked, we should share openly whatever we wanted. Robert told the whole story, from creation up until the Holy Spirit living in us today. They listened, asked some questions, seeds were planted. Nothing very dramatic there, but we had an opportunity and got to share about our faith. The consensus in our debriefing time is that they probably asked us only to be polite - as if they knew we wanted to share that. It's funny - before this trip, I didn't really believe there were many "unreached people" in the world. After all, everyone has access to a Bible. There are missionaries all over the place. There are churches in every town. How can one not know? What I now think is that, just like these women we met, there are many, many people in the world who see Christianity as just a great story or perhaps a religion for Americans. Just because one shares the gospel message with another, doesn't mean they will get it. They may never get it. Or it may take years, as we witnessed earlier in the week. One of the teachers I've grown to really like is Lily. Lily is in her 5th year of teaching, she's engaged to be married, she's a university graduate. And she knew a Christian once. He was a teacher of hers. She still keeps in touch with him by email. He, no doubt, plants seeds with her on a very regular basis. But isn't that funny that this very smart, big-city women knows "a Christian." Perhaps now she'll claim to know a few, after meeting us. I think that's the purpose for my trip here - to get that global perspective on things that I've been so far off base with. Seeds are being planted. We have far more freedom here with what we can do and say than you probably realize. His work will be done in His time. Thanks for praying. - Rebecca