Sweetest Sound

“Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, singing: ‘To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!’” Revelation 5:13

It’s dark, relatively quiet…impressive for a roomful of about 50-odd teenagers. Quietly, a few guitars begin playing. Two of the worship leaders, one being my boss—Adam (easiest Czech name for me to remember, I bet you can't guess why? lol), the other, my teammate—Shelly, begin singing.

Music has been described for centuries as the way we express emotions –when words just don’t seem to be enough for. Countless quotes are out there about music and songs, we use music to evoke emotion, whether on TV or in films, or in multiple other situations, and throughout the Bible music is referenced as a way to praise the Lord. In fact, a Psalm is a sacred song or hymn and if you never noticed it’s the longest book of the bible. ;-)

When Shelly and Adam began singing, it was one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had. Church here in the Czech has been great. Each week we go (meaning my team and I) and we sit in a section of the church that has headphones so that we can listen to someone translating the sermon for us. Anything that is said through the mic, is translated into English for us. It is wonderful to get to have the opportunity to hear God’s word still told to us in English and be a part of the community around us. We get to be a part of the body, fully. However, the one thing that is not translated for us is the singing.

All of the songs have been sung in Czech. It has been great practice so far to attempt to sing along and pronounce Czech words, but it is amazing how you can feel as though you are missing something when you don’t understand the praise and worship. As a team, we have made sure that we are being fed this way by worshipping together and such, but when you grow up in the Church, it can be something to get used to. (Don’t get me wrong, I find it incredible and beautiful to listen to those around me praising God in their native language. It’s just different).

But last night, at this youth meeting, these kids began singing and with all of our voices blended together, it was a perfect meld of Czech and English. Each song chosen was a praise song that had both English and Czech versions. If ever there has been a moment when I have felt God’s presence, last night when listening to 60 some voices singing in perfect harmony in two different languages glorifying the same Lord was it. To know that He can bridge age differences, cultures, politics, and anything else that could separate His children is a humbling and awe-inspiring thing. How amazing that we could come together from around the globe and praise Him together.

“Glorify the Lord with me; let us exalt his name together.” Psalm 34:3

I encourage you to take the time this week to spend some time listening to some praise music and praying for missionaries around the world that don’t have the opportunity to have corporate worship. It is a powerful thing that I know I have taken for granted. I also feel very blessed that I have been placed in a region where I have the chance to worship with other national believers and my teammates. I ask that you would pray for these times with me and that God would continue to work in the lives of the youth here in the Czech Republic that are already Christians.

I Spy with My Little Eye

When you are first learning the bus system, here is my biggest tip of what not to do. Assume! We all know what that gets you in life. On the day that I took the picture above, my teammates and I made three major assumptions about public transit. One, that we were going to make it to the trolley bus on time. Two, that the coin machine would like our coins when we needed it to. And three, that the bus would go the way we wanted it to when we tried to go just one stop further than we usually took it. Why walk when you can ride right? It should make perfect sense! However, none of these things came to pass in the way that we wished. Instead, we missed the bus we wanted, the coin machine refused our money repeatedly and then proceeded to spit out all of our money back out at us (but why we voted me to do work with the electronic device I’m still trying to figure out and I think my roommates are learning that this is not a good idea either. Considering I have already had my computer break twice, my Ipod go haywire, and several other electronic things not work properly since we got here. They just don’t like me. Lol). Then we got on the bus finally and when saw where we wanted to go, there was no stop! The bus in fact turned and just kept going about 10 blocks in the wrong direction. In the end, we were about a half hour late to meet with the rest of the people we were to meet. I have to say though, I feel pretty blessed. That has been our only instance of being disoriented/lost/not on time and we weren’t really lost we just couldn’t get off the bus! Haha. Success has been the word of our time here in Ostrava so far! We have felt successful with each and every little thing that we have done. We have taken small steps to accomplish little things, and hopefully as the days go by, I will be able to do more than I dreamed I could here.

The picture above was taken just a few minutes after that story from the top of the city hall. You could literally see the entire city from there. Helena, a former Fishnet teacher, had met us and was showing us around the city that day. She was telling us where some of the different things were. To give you a little bit of a reference point, in almost the middle of the picture, there are two white and green church steeples side-by-side.  Although you can’t see it, right to the left of that church is my building. During my last video if I would have moved the camera a little to the right, you would have seen that big church right there. In the forefront of the picture, off to the right is Fishnet’s office and my other teammate’s flat. You can’t quite see either, but it is about a ten minute trolley bus ride from my flat to theirs. 

This is Ostrava. I hope you like it. So far I am really enjoying this city!

Typical Day in Ostrava-So Far

Get up about 9:30 or so (if you know my feeling toward getting up, you know that’s a relative term), stumble toward the kitchen for something to eat (luckily, I have found my two favorite morning comforts—cereal and apples). The only problems I have had so far with morning breakfast thing is that instant coffee is definitely not my cup of tea (I couldn’t resist the idiom) and that you can only purchase milk in a liter container. It is so frustrating to use milk basically once and then feel like you need to go buy some again right away! Next, take my food into my room to eat and spend some introvert time before the day begins.

For the record, I totally have one of those beds that you see on infomercials where the woman jumps on it with the wine glass sitting right next to her. I actually tried it with my glass of water this morning that I had with my koláče! A koláče is somewhat like a cheese Danish. It is a very good Czech pastry with either fruit or cheese in them.

Random tangent, anyway, after dressing, which I am always sure base on the weather by checking through the 270 degree windows of our flat that you can see for miles out of, my teammates and I usually hit the public transportation system.

Ah, public transport! Come from a town that’s closest thing to public transportation is one extremely expensive “taxi” or the people that escort the Amish around in large vans, I think you either love it or hate it. In Belfast, I hated it and refused to use it. I walked everywhere instead or took a taxi. Here, so far it has been infinitely better. For the most part, it is almost always on time, can get you pretty much anywhere you want to go, and is rather cost effective. My only piece of advice is that you totally should not try to haul a large and heavy dresser from IKEA halfway across the city to your flat on public transport with just you and your teammate’s arms as movers! Although, it does make for a great bonding experience and a hilarious story! However, for the most part, I have really enjoyed the metro system. In fact, I already have plenty of crazy stories of the things that I have seen. And I have only been here for a little over a week!

Let’s see what else, oh yes! We spend some time at the office. We have been reviewing our grammar. As much as I knew about grammar in college and such, I have since realized (and no using this blog to base my knowledge on. ;-) I know nothing! Non-native speakers learn grammar in a completely different way than we do. Ask a native speaker and they will probably tell you that we have 3 tenses or something close to that. Past, Present, and Future tense. You ask anyone that learned English as an adult and they will be able to tell you that English actually has 12 tenses and they could probably tell you each and every one! While we all know what they are and use them everyday, we don’t know the names or definitions. We ESI teachers have spent a lot of time, both at training and here, in Ostrava reviewing and learning grammar so we don’t sound like fools when we begin teaching our students who will most likely know more about English grammar than we do!

The rest of my time I have spent exploring. We five girls, Shelly, Ashley (my two roommates), Erica, Jessica (our other teammates in the city), and myself  have done everything from buy groceries, go to the movies, eat in several different restaurants, see the different places we are going to be teaching, look at the city from the top of city hall, and much more! 

I have also had a lot of time to spend praying for the people of Ostrava. I would ask that you would pray with me for the people not only here but also the people that you come in contact with at home. Remember that that person that you meet on the street, your student, co-worker, or store clerk, you may be the only be the only person praying for them and you may never know what impact it might have on life. For the Bible says that the prayer of a  righteous man is powerful and effective (James 5:16b).

So sorry that it has taken me this long to post anything else about being here! I am going to post much sooner next time.

Below , I have also posted a video that I honestly can’t believe that I did, but here it is. Me in a ridiculous state with my teammates going back to our flat. Watch and see me humiliate myself. :-) All I can say is at least I am not a dork alone! Outside my flat with my goofy teammates. ;-)