Sharing Our Witness

Recently Brendan and I have been excited to have some opportunities to share our witness. The first was right before the day remembering the life and example of Saint Magdalene of Canossa (an Italian Mother Teresa who founded the Canossian Sisters). The Sisters and the 80 girls who live at the school had been doing a novena that would finish on the eve of St. Magdalene's feast day. Sister Terezinha invited us to help with the prayer on that evening.

We prayed and sang psalms together in Tetum and read scriptures. Then out of nowhere Sr. T asked us if we would be willing to share our witness of our recent life and how we ended up in East Timor. So we stood up and told all the students and Sisters how God had worked mini-miracles in our lives to bring us to East Timor and what He has been teaching us here. They seemed to understand and appreciate what we said. We just hope it will encourage them to really strive to know Jesus more and to have a good attitude about the crazy twists that happen in life that God uses to get you where He wants you.

Another opportunity came when we were asked to be on a vocations panel at a Singles for Christ retreat. Here in Timor there are very strong and supportive programs for Kids for Christ, Youth for Christ, Singles for Christ, and Couples for Christ. Each group meets regularly for prayer, praise and worship, and to encourage each other in the faith. We've been really impressed by the people who organize all of them, who we see at Mass every week and who have been a blessing to meet.

So we agreed to be on the panel, talking about both marriage and missions as potential vocations. It was a 2-day retreat and the young people were pumped up for God by the time we got there for the workshop the 2nd day. Among the speakers were a Sister (Sr. Sonia), a priest, another married couple, an international lay missionary, and us as married volunteers/missionaries. All were Timorese except us and Sr. Sonia, who is Filipino.

It was beautiful for us to see all these people - most were young graduates our age trying to pray and search out what vocation God is preparing them for. They were at this retreat hoping to hear from God in a special way.

The vocations talks also seemed very helpful for them. We couldn't understand all of the fast Tetum of the Timorese speakers, but the retreatants laughed often at the speaker's anecdotes and were also very attentive when speakers shared about more difficult times in the discernment process. For us, in addition to our mission experience, we shared about dating throughout college and trying to pursue purity in our relationship, while discerning whether or not we were supposed to be married or a Sister and priest respectively. We shared with them that for most people it's quite a process with lots of prayer involved, but the answer will come. For us that came when we felt God's blessing for us to be married and He also worked everything out for the marriage and our volunteering trip.

After everyone presented there was a Q & A time when anyone could ask questions to any speaker. The question we and the other married couple received was 'How can you make sure you will stay together forever?' (no divorce). Divorce is starting to become an issue here, as it is everywhere. One thing that we told them was about being 2 + God and that the strand of 3 is a lot harder to break than 2 (especially since one of them is unbreakable already). We talked about how as a couple when you pray together, read the Bible together, and do other Church activities together it keeps both spouses focused on Christ and what's important. That's what keeps marriages together - so has been our experience in our marriage so far and it has also been the advice we've had from many long-married couples who we really respect.

In my opinion we have really benefitted from this advice. This year has been an amazing time for us not only to really make an impact on others, but because we also get to spend a lot of time with each other and much of that time is doing activities focused on Christ. To me it's obvious that our marriage is very healthy and blessed because of this time. I'm especially glad that God gave us this time together at the beginning of our marriage so that we have a strong foundation to build on in the future.

The last opportunity I'll write about was with English Club. We spent a week talking just about faith and one of the days our conversation topic was, "Is Jesus important to you? Why?" We discussed for a long time and I think it was as encouraging for me as it was for them. Each student said at least one very profound thing with a distinctly different perspective - Jesus as a friend, Jesus as a confidant when there is no one else, Jesus making the impossible become possible...We also talked about the difference between going through the motions in your faith only because it's a family thing, and the need to go much deeper into a relationship/friendship with Jesus and to let your daily actions be inspired by that friendship. They said that they want that deeper faith and I believe it. Some of them really understand already, especially some of them who have suffered most. One student's father died this year and she seems to have the deepest faith of all.

During a more recent English Club I shared my faith story with them. It was almost all in Tetum and afterward I realized that I finally have a good grasp on the language and can quickly figure out how to say what I want to. So that was a great revelation, but the better part was that they seemed to understand and react to it. I just prayed that the Holy Spirit would work in their hearts so all these little things will add up to make a real difference in their lives.

After my story and some discussion, I gave them each an English New Testament with a special note for them in the front from Brendan and I. It's great because it's really multitasking: to help them know Jesus more, to help them learn English, and to help them fulfill their life goals (the other week we made Life Goal lists and many of them said they wanted to read the Bible often or daily).

It's really been an amazing experience to work with these students who I see as my younger sisters (and one brother : ) Brendan has had similar experiences with his university classes.

So God has generously given us many formal opportunities as well as countless informal opportunities to share His love here in Timor. Maybe someday we'll know the impact He has made through us. But you don't have to go out of the country to make a difference - remember to keep making an impact right where you are (as many of you are constantly doing)!

K, hope you are all well at home! We can't wait to see you! 1 week and we'll be on our way! Love you and miss you A LOT!

Always,
Rachel and Brendan