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!!!!! : )

Deaf Worship Experience…

This evening was my first Deaf worship experience here…it was AWESOME!!!!! I arrived a little after 4 pm to help get stuff set up for dinner and to practice with the signing choir. The bulk of the choir is made up of Deaf/Hard-of-Hearing individuals, but any hearing people who want to join are welcome. Phyllis (the Deaf minister) leads the choir from the middle of the sanctuary and we follow her as she signs to the music. Tonight we did “I Will Give You All My Worship” and “Amazing Grace (My Chains are Gone)”…both really cool songs. I have a video that I’ll email out of the signing choir. I tried to upload it on here, but I can’t get it to work. Next month, they are going to video the entire service for me so I can bring home a copy.

Also during the service, a Deaf man who just recently accepted Christ signed ”Cry Out to Jesus” (with Phyllis guiding him) and it was so powerful…he’s very expressive. It was just one of those “wow” moments. He was baptized at the end of the service…pray for him as he is beginning his new life in Christ. 

They asked me to share a little bit about how I ended up in Michigan for the summer and what all I’d be doing while I’m here. After that, I got to sign “Everything to Me” by Avalon. The Deaf were so encouraging after the service. They were very curious as to why I would bother coming all the way up here to spend time with them, why I wanted to work with the Deaf community, and about anything else they could talk out of me. They were all very friendly and I met so many new people…some drive up to an hour or hour and a half to come to this worship service once a month. I know I’ll remember most of their faces…names, however, are a different story. Pray for me as I continue building relationships here within the Deaf community.

Funny Story: So I arrive at church and there’s another girl there, about my age, and we started talking. She’s hearing…an interpreting major at a local school…we hit it off really well. We started having all these people come up to us and tell us that we looked a lot alike. By the end of the night we were really messing with people’s minds…we had on similar shirts, we have the same length dark hair, same build…it was crazy. The Deaf people kept saying we were twins. They stood us next to each other in the signing choir just so people could see how much we looked alike. We’ve decided to play off of this for next month. We’re going to coordinate our clothing and hairstyles and we’re going to work on a piece to do for worship…maybe something playing off a mirror-image type thing. Anyway, I thought it was really funny and to see the people’s faces was just hilarious. It was really messing with their program.  : )

God is really at work in the Deaf community here…you could totally feel His presence during the worship service and could see it in the people’s faces as we had a great time of fellowship. Pray for the Deaf community, in general, that they will see God and come to know Him. Pray for the Christian Deaf community, that they will have a fire in their hearts to reach the lost. Pray for the leaders of the Deaf ministry at the church…ministry can sometimes be stressful…pray that God provides the leaders with a peace and assurance that He’s sovereign in all situations. Pray for them as they go ahead and begin planning for Deaf upcoming Deaf socials and next month’s Deaf service.

On Monday, I leave with a group from church to go to GA (Girls in Action) camp about 3 hours north of here. I think there are about 10-12 girls going with the church and that many (or more) adults going to help as leaders. While I’m there, I’m co-teaching a mission track time where we’ll have the girls for 1 hour…we’ll teach them about our assigned missionary and their ministry…we’ll teach them basic sign language as well as signart to “Set the World on Fire” by Britt Nicole. When I’m not teaching mission track time, I’ll be helping wherever they need me…I may also be working with the Acteens a little bit. Be in prayer for the girls at the camp as well as the leadership. The girls will be learning about finding their place in the world. I know that Bible study times will include the story of Mary Magdalene and Hannah with a couple of others. Be praying for a powerful week of camp where God will touch the life of each young lady there.

Thanks so much for your prayers! They are definitely felt! I will update again when I get back from GA camp! : )

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. : )

The Deaf-Blind Experience

So, this weekend was incredibly hectic, but totally worth every minute. Friday, around lunch, I went with a group of Interpreting students and a couple of the teachers from EKU to a Deaf-Blind retreat out in the middle of nowhere…seriously. When we arrived, one of our teachers did an orientation time for us where she explained what would happen throughout the weekend and then gave us time to practice guiding our blindfolded classmates from place to place. I was a little worried about guiding people considering I ran one of my friends into a door frame on accident while guiding…she was fine…it just scared her a bit. She definitely didn’t walk as fast after that. Getting used to having double the body width would take some time.

After people arrived, they could request to have an SSP (Support Service Provider)…all the students that went were SSP’s. People could request either an SSP to voice things for them (more for those with varying degrees of blindness) or one who would sign for them (more for those with varying degrees of deafness). Each SSP would then be matched with a person to assist them at different times throughout the weekend. We helped them find their rooms, get their food during meal times, and basically just be there to help them out if they needed it.

I was nervous at first, but quickly became more at ease with the setting and people around me. It was very interesting and I’m really looking forward to working with the Deaf-Blind in Michigan this summer. I met some incredible people and have lots of fun stories that I don’t have time to type. Overall, this weekend really helped prepare me for this summer…I just wish I could have stayed longer than I did.