Chapter 4: Sunday with the Deaf Ministry

Each Sunday during our stay we will visit the ministry of one of the ABWE missionaries here in Santiago. This Sunday took a little longer to get to our destination due to a marathon being run by 10,000 people. On the way we passed blocks and blocks of artistic graffitti, and while driving through a market, we passed a few Chilean "huasos" (cowboy).

So we ended up at a school in the city that is borrowed on Sundays by a pastor and his helpers who minister to the deaf. They have a family fun time on Saturday evenings and then Sunday they meet for prayer, for lessons in Castellano/sign language, and for a worship service.

The deaf in Chile have not been well educated up to now, and these folk are unable to read and write for the most part. Part of Sunday morning's time is taken up with a session when Lori Brock and Veronica teach words in Castellano and in sign language (which, in case you did not know, is not the same as American sign language).

This whole experience opened our eyes up to things we had never thought of before. For one, during prayer time, you all have to keep your eyes open so that you can "hear" each other. And yes, they do still sing a lot of worship songs, with signs and with sounds if they can make them. Some of the songs they change the words for so that they are applicable to their congregation. For instance, instead of "raising our voice to heaven," the song reads "raising our hands to heaven." Instead of God "hearing our prayers," He "sees our prayers."

We thoroughly enjoyed the time with these new friends. While naturally we could not communicate with them much at all, we were able to see and share their joy. We also will be remembering them in prayer for a long time to come.

I had the personal pleasure, too, of being able to translate for my cohorts, which was a great challenge and satisfaction. Chilean Spanish is different in vocabulary and sound to that of Costa Rica, but the pastor Mauricio spoke clearly and with emotion--which I tried to duplicate to some degree. OH, and the neat thing about translating this day--usually when you translate during a service, you feel bad about talking while someone else is talking and it can be quite distracting. However, in this case, the congregation was not bothered in the least. I could be as loud and as excited as I wanted to be.

Afterwards, the pastor had me say a few words, which he translated, and I had the honor of closing in prayer.

For lunch we went to a Chinese restaurant with Lori, the pastor, and the assistant Christian.

Oh, and btw, in the marathon that morning, one of the ABWE missionaries Doug Admundsen ran, and he achieved his best time to date; I believe it was 4:45.