Rested and Recharged…

Well, I have gotten a good week of rest after my week at GA camp. Camp was incredible, but I didn’t bounce back near as fast as I thought I would : ) Monday night I had dinner with the interpreter I live with, a hard-of-hearing man and a deaf-blind woman from church. It was an interesting meal to say the least. I can communicate really well with the HH man, but talking to the woman was quite different. She doesn’t know sign language and can only see maybe 4 feet in front of her (if that much). She talks to us, but we have to write in a notebook for her to really understand what we’re saying. Trying to sign to him and keep her involved in the conversation by writing was a full-time job during that meal. It was a great visit with both them!

When I arrived at church on Wednesday night, we were running a little late. My ride was parking the car so there was no one there to interpret the songs at the beginning of the service. The pastor asked me if I could interpret until his wife arrived. I, hesitantly, went up to the front to sign. It went well until we got to “Be Thou My Vision”…if I had the sign language hymnal out with me, I would have been fine…but since we were late, I didn’t have time to get it. Needless to say, that song was a bit rocky. Any song with “thou” in the title has the potential to make interpreters nervous. : ) The Deaf were very patient, except one, but he just likes to give people a hard time. I survived and I think they knew what was going on so I guess it was an ok night.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to go over and visit with another deaf-blind lady from church. Her sister lives close by, but other than that, I don’t think that she gets a lot of visitors. She has Usher’s Syndrome, meaning she was born deaf and as she gets older her tunnel vision gets progressively worse until she’s completely blind. Anyway, I went over around 10-ish and she had made a cinnamon crumb cake for breakfast and served it with strawberry yogert tart-type things. She was very excited about showing me her house and telling me about the blankets she’s been making. We had a great visit! I was there about 3 1/2 hours just talking with her and building a relationship with her. The Deaf minister at the church sent a laptop with me in case we needed it to ease the flow of communication, but we totally didn’t need it. God took care of that wall. There were times when she used signs I didn’t know and I used ones she didn’t know…by the way, she’s really just learning sign…she knows a little bit, but not much…but when we encountered unknown signs we spelled them and worked our way through it. It was an incredible visit! I had a lot of fun and I hope she did too! Keep her in your prayers!

Tonight I’m going to a Missions Tea where we’ll be praying over a team from MBC going to Prague soon. I’m really excited because I’ve never been to one of these before. As I get prayer requests for this team, I’ll pass them on!

This weekend we have a BBQ scheduled for the Deaf group. We’re going to meet up, eat, play cards, etc. Should be lots of fun! I’ll write about that later!

Thanks so much for your prayers!!!!! : )

The First Service…

So this weekend I attended my first worship services there at the church. There was a really good sized congregation there on Sunday. This week, the orchestra played…for such a small stage, they have a rather large orchestra. I got to meet with the Deaf Sunday School class…there were about 9 Deaf people there. I introduced myself and got to know some of them. They were very welcoming and helpful if I didn’t know signs. Sunday night I actually got to interpret a little to give Linda a break. There were some praise choruses she wasn’t really familiar with so she let me sign those…I’d rather do those than try hymns…they tend to be a little more difficult. I also got to interpret the spoken transitions between songs. After the service was over, I asked the one Deaf guy that showed up if he could understand me ok. He said he could understand…he said my style was very different from the usual interpreters and that my signs were a little different.

We survived a tornado warning yesterday…the storm that blew through apparently did a lot more damage than I realized. We lost power at the house yesterday around 5:30 pm and, as of 2:45 today, we still have no power. We’ve heard a rumor that we won’t get power until tomorrow. Praise God for getting us through the storm safely!

My biggest struggle right now is learning how to speak and sign at the same time. During Sunday School and Deaf worship, everything is typed in captions on the screen for those who have vision problems or don’t know sign language…and yes, there are a few here that are completely Deaf and don’t know sign…they rely on lip-reading…that’s also taking some getting used to. Another obstacle I have to deal with is the fact that there is really only one person that attends the church who signs in ASL format…the rest either use a combination of ASL and English or they just sign straight English. For the past 2 years, I’ve been learning proper ASL, I’ve been taught not to mouth words when I sign, I’ve been taught to not revert back to English word order. Now, I have to undo some of that. From what I’ve been told since I got here, there are some Deaf people here who will have quite a bit of difficulty with the ASL word order if I sign that way. It’s going to be interesting for sure. I know God will teach me Michigan sign (He’s already working on that) and get me through difficult conversations.

Pray for the Deaf ministry there at the church…it’s a growing ministry and God’s really working in those lives right now. Pray for the church as a whole. The whole church has just pulled me right into their family and made me feel so at home. This church is a very mission-minded church and they are preparing to send 2 mission teams out very soon. Keep them in your prayers!!! Thanks for all your support and encouragement! I’ll give you another update after Deaf worship this coming weekend. : )