The girls on my team have finally gotten an apartment, it is a very nice place on the 11th floor of the building that the Loures church is in, this in one of the churches that we will be working with the most. Language is in full swing. This is frustrating for me at times because I still can't understand spoken language very well, although I am encouraged that I am recognizing a lot more words when they are written down. Please pray that language will not be a discouragement for me and that I will have the persistence to keep studying.
I will share two stories with you that happened this week, which are the freshest in my mind as I write this.
The other day, us girls were getting ready to leave our apartment and we went to unlock the door, which you have to lock and unlock with a key from the inside as well as the out. We tried and tried and the key would not budge. I tried oiling the lock and still nothing. Finally we called Otto, who was waiting downstairs for us. He came up and tried to unlock it from the outside, but no luck. So we then proceeded to take the locks off the door (these are not our typical Canadian dead bolt, there are about five locks on the door, including metal bars and three dead bolts, all locked by the same key in the same hole). In the end we had to pry off the lock box, which took quite the effort and then finally we were released from our "prison". Otto then got a new lock and fixed it all up for us, it was quite the adventure though.
The next story is about the youth/young adults night that same evening. It was a very good night, youth here starts at about 4pm and goes until midnight or later. We started at the park, playing soccer and volley-ball and then went back to the church. Once at the church the girls went across the street to the grocery store to buy food to make for supper, then we all came back, made supper and ate together. After that the guys all clean up, no questions asked, although there is a lot of good natured teasing that comes with that. Then we all hang out, playing games, listening to music and talking. At the park other people from the area often come to play sports with us but then they leave right away after. This time we invited one of them to join us at the church after, and he came. This was such an encouragement to me to see a new face join us and I pray that we will see this happen more and more. It was a very cool night to see how the young adults here function together. I have been loving my time in Portugal but I truly was starting to feel at home with the people of the church after that night.
We had to "break down our door" to get out of our apartment, but later that night God continued to help us break down walls to build relationships with the people around us. The people here are becoming my friends and I am very excited to continue to get to know them in the next several months. This is truly a journey of faith that I am on, trusting that God is using us in the small things, including playing volleyball and making supper with the youth. Thank you all for you prayers and keeping up with my blog. God bless!
Our Door and Fort Knox like locks!
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