The Liquid Missionary

It’s often been said that missionaries need to be flexible. But ever since we arrived here on Roatán, I have been of the opinion that we need to be more than flexible – we need to be liquid. We’ve always been taught to make plans and that is good advice but, around here, it’s rare for things to work out as planned. This past week was one example after another of people planning and God ordaining.

As I said in the last post, my attempt to fix our audio dropouts kind of blew up in my face. The problem is still not fixed – only patched. I have one more idea to try. I plan to give that a shot on Monday, but it doesn’t look very promising. The support people I’ve talked with have not exactly inspired my confidence in their understanding of either the issues or the radios themselves.

The neighbor I mentioned last week did not show up for our Bible study on Tuesday evening. We had decided to meet in the reception area of the radio station. I waited for him for about 40 minutes and came back home. He told me the next day that he was in town on his bicycle and had a flat tire. Yesterday I was going to take him out for a burger for supper so we could talk. As we were about to leave, he said, he would sure like a burger, but there was something he needed more. He still doesn’t have a paying job and needed toothpaste, razor, and that sort of stuff. So I walked with him to the store and bought that for him and that way we still got a chance to talk. Mostly we talked about neutral topics, just getting to know each other.

As a matter of fact, yesterday seemed like one adaptation after another. We scheduled a going away lunch party for the Hendersons. Because of our broadcast schedule it had to wait till about 1:30. (That’s arrival time at the restaurant, not the time we would actually eat.) Well, there’s no way I can eat breakfast at 5:00 and wait till 2:00 or 2:30 to have lunch, so I had a light lunch at 11:00 before Request and Dedication, planning on having a second light lunch with the gang in West End. They chose the Thai restaurant and I am not fond of that food at all, but the others all love it. Since I would not be very hungry, I sure didn’t want to be a stick-in-the-mud. So, while they looked at the menus and made their orders, I hiked on down to Rocket Burger for some “health food.” Half way through cooking my burger their stove ran out of gas and no one there had had the foresight to fill the spare gas tank beforehand. So, I got my money back and ordered a chocolate shake figuring that would hold me till supper, which was by now less than four hours away. “Sorry, we don’t have any chocolate,” came the rather embarrassed reply. So I got a vanilla and went back to rejoin Mildred and the others. The others seemed to feel badly for me, but I was honestly happy with my shake. I prefer chocolate, but that was a good vanilla shake. Other than that little bump in the road, we all had a great time – especially the Silseths and us as we enjoyed watching the Hendersons open their going away presents.

Next week will be another week of adaptation, but I think it will be fun too. The Hendersons are nearly done packing, so the four of them plan to move in with us on Monday while we get their container loaded up. Please pray that the container would get here on time and be a good, leak-free container. Also pray for safety as we tote all their stuff down the many steps from their house to the nearest place the container can rest. Peter and Frederick both have not-so-good backs and Peter’s knees are not the best either. I guess my only complaint is that I’m getting a little old.

So, as you can see, it’s one adjustment after another around here. Life is sort of like that everywhere, but it seems to be a lot more frequent in developing countries. But one thing did go as planned this week, just not as soon as planned. Since we moved the transmitter to Dixon Hill our electrical load has changed here. We have three phases and, since the mission houses, children’s home, and another house are all on the same two legs in a single phase panel, I have not been able to get everything balanced. It was so far out of balance that it was not good for the generator. We figured that if I put those buildings on a three-phase panel we could get it balanced. I did that yesterday morning and it worked out just great.

Now, to go see if I can modify our new whole house water filter so we don’t have to keep a bucket under it. It would be a little easier if the brand new shut off valves shut off all the way. Then maybe we can go try again to get a burger.