Satisfied

When I think of the word ‘satisfied’ I think about the many ways we use it. I am a satisfied customer. I am satisfied with the work. Or in Spanish, estoy satisfecha, to describe that I’m full and don’t want any more food. When I think of this past week of ministry with the Faith E-Free team from Wisconsin, I think of the adjectives happy, pleased, content . . . satisfied. The adjective ‘tired’ comes to mind too, but mainly I am satisfied.
It was an interesting change to go from working with youth teams to working with a team of adults, but I will confess that overall I enjoyed the adult team more. Maybe that is because any ministry we would do with an adult team fits better into where we are as a missionary team at this point in the Tarma ministry than a team of youth. The 6 days of ministry included cooking classes, basketball seminars, workshops on Administration and Finance, English classes, visitations, a painting project and workday as well as a final event. Our goal was to use this team of professionals to reach out to the professionals of Tarma, and in some ways, announce our presence. In the process of all our activities we got to know 3 English teachers from a public all-boys school in town that we had not had the opportunity to meet before. As a result, Meredith and I will be doing our Christmas Bible studies with them in English. We also met and have begun to coordinate with two social workers that work for the city who are dedicated to the graduating seniors of poor and broken families, to teach them values, finances, good decision-making skills and the belief that they can rise above their situation and circumstance. Because of the team and these events we are now able to coordinate with these social workers to give values classes and teach on the love and forgiveness of Christ in the schools of Tarma.
As the week went on I was able to spend time with and get to know individuals on the team and I was encouraged by their willingness to help and serve where we needed them to serve. They were very gracious with me as I learned how to lead in this context, and they were patient with me as I made mistakes. We worked hard together and by our final event we had made several new contacts and reinforced some old ones. It will be interesting to see how many new Bible studies will be started as a result of this team.
As I enter into my final two months of ministry and life in Tarma I hope that “satisfied” will be an adjective that I can use often. We haven’t seen an overwhelming amount of fruit yet in the ministry, and I’m almost certain that I will leave Peru and not know the full impact of my presence and time in Tarma until years later, yet I hope and pray that regardless of visible fruit, I will leave this country, this job and this season of life, satisfied.