My grandma

On Wednesday I drove to Butte, two hours away, picked up my grandma, who lives there, and went to her church. It was only about -20 degrees Fahrenheit out. Her church is small, especially on a Wednesday night, especially on a bitterly cold Wednesday night, but there was quite a large group of children, as well as a goodly number of teenagers.

Speaking to the children was delightful. They wiggled and asked questions and answered them. My questions to them involved making them think about God creating their minds and their interests and having a plan for their lives. Their questions to me were my age and whether I was married or dating. Ah, children.

After ten or fifteen minutes with them, I went on to the youth group. I was most nervous about that, since I have never identified well with teenagers, not even, or especially, when I was a teenager. But it turned out to be my favorite segment of the night. They were responsive and interested, and I think I made one girl cry. I do not consider that a bad thing, because I was speaking encouragement to them about who God made them to be.

Finally I spoke to the adults for half an hour or so. There were only about eight of them, including my grandmother and my aunt, but they were kind and encouraging, and I think I encouraged them as well. My grandmother, who went to each group with me, said later she enjoyed hearing how I adjusted what was basically the same message to each age group and situation. I’ve always been a fairly good contextualizer (once I wrote a missions paper about applying the Gospel to Vulcans and Klingons…but that’s another story).

The next afternoon, after spending the night at my grandma’s house, I was off to Dillon, about an hour south of Butte. It was such a beautiful drive that I wished it was longer. Dillon is a startlingly lovely little town with a startlingly grand campus of the University of Montana in it, and two of my friends from Trinity Bible College, Jason and Cindy Axt, are the Chi Alpha leaders there. (Chi Alpha is the Assemblies of God’s U.S. college missions arm.)

Jason and Cindy kindly let me stay at their house from Thursday to Sunday. Being missionaries themselves, they understand the difficulties of having to spend money on hotels while trying to fundraise. They have three children nine and under who are all rather adorable, and my stay with them ended up being unbelievably relaxing and low-key. That’s another thing about missionaries. They also understand how important it is to be able to relax between the whirlwind of speaking engagements.

On Thursday night I spoke at their Chi Alpha group, to fifteen or so college students, and on Friday, between hanging out with Jason and Cindy and their kids, exploring the town, reading, and writing in my journal and my latest Shakespearean science fiction book, I had a lovely meeting with the local Assembly of God pastor. We talked about missions, of course, and education, and Europe, and made a plan for me to come back in March to his church, but we also had a grand time talking about British television, because when two fans of “Sherlock” and other British mysteries get together, such subjects can’t be repressed.

Between Thursday and Sunday, it snowed about two feet, and oh how I wish I had brought my camera, because it was so lovely and Dillon was so lovely, and I’d love to show you pictures of it. In lieu of that, however, here’s a lovely picture I took about three years ago of snow in Missoula. On bicycles.

On Sunday we drove to Sheridan, about half an hour away, where the Axts go to church, and I spoke there for about half an hour. It was a marvelous church, quite small but very welcoming and encouraging. People came up and talked to me afterward and were terribly delightful and kind. I was even asked for advice and my expert opinion as regards missions in Europe and such things, which was a bit disconcerting. I’m The Missionary now. Weird.

All in all, it was most charming. My next marathon is the last weekend of this month.

It was in Anaconda, Montana, a long, narrow town with which I have quite a few pleasant associations. My aunt and uncle used to live there, and they were always marvelous to visit. The AG church is pastored by a man who knows my grandparents and a dozen or so of my relatives, because he used to pastor my grandparents’ church and had all kinds of stories about my grandfather’s absurdities, because my grandfather was delightfully absurd. I also used to live in a house this pastor used to live in, which is just randomer and randomer.

It was a little church in a little town, and I love little churches in little towns. I grew up with them, and they feel so familiar and comfortable to go into. It being a Wednesday night just after the holidays, there were only ten or fifteen people there, but really, for my first service, that was a perfect number. I like small groups. They’re cozy. Also the ten or fifteen people who come to a Wednesday night missions service just after the holidays are going to be the ten or fifteen people who are the backbone of the church.

Missions table: international teacups, Greek study books, and Greek translation journal

I set up a little table, and it was beautiful. Until I had my multicultural teas back in November, I wasn’t sure what I would do for a missions table at services, because I’ve never been to Belgium, so I haven’t accumulated any neat Belgian things, and also I’m not really going to Belgium, as Belgium. I’m going to a multicultural setting. But the teas made me realize that I have loads of lovely items that represent a multitude of cultures: teapots and teacups. Also since I’m going as a Greek professor, I can use the large number of Greek study texts I own, including the beautiful leather journals of my own translations. I used a sari as a tablecloth, set out my most international teapots and foreign teacups, and neatly arranged a few books on it, and it was as representative of me and my ministry as you could wish.

There was a lovely, potluck sort of meal, and afterward I spoke for half an hour or forty-five minutes. I told them about what I’ll be doing in Belgium, how I was called into missions, and gave a mini-sermon on Peter and Paul and how God changed their lives but also used the talents and personalities He’d given them. They were a lovely audience. They laughed frequently.

We had a short hang-around-and-chat time afterward, and I went home with a remarkably generous contribution to my cash budget. Tiny church, great generosity. I left very encouraged.

A teapot named Claudia, teacups, and Greek study books, on a sari.

Itinerating usually means speaking to large groups, usually churches, about one’s call to missions and the work one is going to do. For me, in November it meant holding tea parties.

I have a lot of family and friends in the Missoula, Montana, area, and few of them go to any of the churches I would be itinerating at. So when I was thinking about how I could introduce them all to my new life, short of sending out a mass letter, which can be a bit boring, I remembered that when my sister Maria came home from her two missions trips to Kenya, she held a Kenyan dinner for her friends and family. What a great idea! People always want to come and have food.

However, I’ve never been to Belgium. I know nothing about Belgian food and Belgian customs. In addition, I’m not technically going to do ministry to Belgians. I’m going to do ministry in a multicultural setting. And then I realized that I already have everything I need to hold a multicultural event. I own loads of tea, and tea is drunk around the world in a million different ways. I own loads of teacups and loads of teapots from all around the world. I have cookbooks with many European recipes. I love to bake. Why not have a multicultural tea?

So I had three multicultural teas. I sent out about forty hand-written invitations on neat little notecards to about sixty people and spent three weekends crafting and holding tea parties. I held the teas in my programming team office in an old, quirky, brick building and decorated with saris (of which I have many), a few foreign objects I own, and Greek-study books. I baked European desserts, like these Hungarian butter biscuits, Italian olive oil cake from a recipe by the same cookbook author as the Hungarian biscuits (one of my clients), and proper cucumber sandwiches, because what is tea without cucumber sandwiches?

Japanese tetsubin and Chinese yixing teapots.

And I had many kinds of tea in their proper teapots with their proper teacups. Black tea (a blend I created called Romany Caravan), served English-style with sugar and milk in a lovely vintage teapot (named Claudia) with lovely vintage teacups. Indian chai in an English Brown Betty teapot (named Harold) with mugs. Kenya chai in Kenyan thermoses printed with Bible verses, also with mugs. Chinese oolong and pu-ehr in little clay Yixing teapots with small tea bowls. Japanese genmaicha (green tea with toasted rice) in a Japanese cast iron tetsubin with Japanese rice bowls and tea bowls.

Mathalia, who makes and sells potholders in Missoula.

Four people came to my first tea, including my friend Mathalia and her mom, whose website I’ve helped with, and we had a lovely, cozy time. Eight or nine people came to my second tea the next weekend, mostly people I know from church but also one of my web development clients and my aunt and uncle. And about nine people came to my third tea, all of whom just happened to be family members, including my sister’s very dear in-laws and my two brothers, neither of whom I get to see very often.

We all sat and stood about eating and talking and having a lovely time, and presently I drew everybody together and told about my future missions work in Europe and my current itineration journey. The lovely thing was that I wasn’t giving a speech. I was just telling people things, and they were interested and asking questions and giving ideas and discussing among themselves.

Even if none of the people who came ever support me (which some of them already have, lovely them), it was valuable for me to meet with them and get them involved in a way in my ministry. I learned that about itineration recently: it’s not about raising funds so much as it is getting people involved in ministry and in your own missionary journey. I hope I inspired my friends and family. At the very least, they had a lovely tea.