From the Helm – Tuesday, April 22, 2008

12:35 PM

Another good service last night.  Two of the students were selected to preach a brief sermon on the material from the day’s studies.  We selected Ronaldo and Geziel.  The funny thing is that all 60 guys had to study and prepare a sermon because we didn’t select who would preach until the very last minute!  It was fun watching them sweat it out – good for them though.  Keeps them focused on task at hand.

After the service, a couple of guys came up to me and told me they were so and so from Curumucuri Lake below Juruti.  The were D. Juanas’ boys!  I had not heard of her or the lake in some 20 years!  She has a daughter named Katia who won my heart years ago.  She is autistic.  I remember she loved to sit by me and rub the hair on my arm.  What a precious child she was.  I guess she’d be about 30 years old today.  I’ll try to find a special gift to send home to her with her brothers.  It never ceases to amaze me how people show up out of the past in the most unlikely places to share experiences and memories that have long been tucked away.  What a deal…

This mornings’ study went well.  It was on the last part of the Book of James, dealing with “showing partiality”.  The students were active in the discussions.  Many questions and comments.  When things became confused, we simply referred back to yesterday’s study on “asking for wisdom” when a direction and motives aren’t clear.  Pretty neat.

Got hold of the boys this morning.  They had a tough soccer match against Harrison last night.  Didn’t count as a conference game.  Nonetheless, these guys just don’t seem to enjoy anything less than a victory.  A good reality check going in to the State, 6A Championships this weekend though.