It is great to come up with an idea and tell two congregations this is what we are doing. Its another thing if they show help out. lol. A week ago, I created a poster "Free Workshop to learn to create your own compost, worm bed, and seed the community garden" I said "all are welcome". I invited my guest speaker Dave Avery back again for this event. But in the confusion I was not sure if he responded back to me if he will be there. I woke up this past Saturday November 10th and left from my Mentor's house to be at Takanini Church and prep everything to be ready. I wrote on the poster the event will start at 9:00am. I got there at 8:15am to get everything ready. I bought some baked goods from across the street what they call a hot dog. It tastes good and is baked with a bread wrapped around it with cheeses on top. I remember the food...lol.
I waited...8:30am passes by and I start to worry about my speaker so I start reading up on paperwork I was given by Dave at an earlier time. Just in case if I needed to be the teacher. 9:00am comes and there is a eerie silence. The vehicles are passing by as they often do on a busy street but I was there alone. No one was there but me. It reminded me of Cleveland, Ohio again. I prayed for wisdom and patience. At 9:05am I see a shadow, as my mind works with movies I immediately about the movie called the "the Shadow" the one phrase I remember is when the shadow learned something he already knew you would hear, "the shadow knows...ha ha ha ha ha (a hard almost evil laugh)" As the shadow drew closer to me I could hear that phrase in my head and I started laughing out loud like the shadow....lol.
As the shadow formed in my sight it was Dave Avery. He showed and I was pleasantly surprised. He looked around and asked, "Is anyone coming?" I told him no worries they will show. As we started talking Pastor Kili from the Samoan service pulled up and dropped three youths and told me he was going to find some more. I was happy to hear the news that He was here and helping me find people to learn about their community garden. At 9:30am another vehicle pulled up with Kent my youth leader of the Maori service and a few of his family. But when I turned around they and their vehicle was gone. Did I just imagine it was here? I thought to myself. At 10:00am they showed back up telling me they went to driver's father's place looking for grass trimmings but found none. I told them that is ok earlier in the week I mower the grass at my Mentor's place and kept the trimmings as well as my hair, I felt was time to leave me, was all collected and waiting. At 10:15am a few vehicles pull in and soon many Samoan youth and Maori youth are standing together listening to Dave as he teaches them about the garden. I was happy to see two congregations learning about their garden and excited to do the work. At one point lawn mowers were bought out and both youth groups worked together cutting the tall grass on the property and collected its trimmings next to the compost Dave showed us how to start. He gave us tiger worms for our compost, small but always hungry.
As the day went on the ladies came and some practiced for their Sunday service while others cooked for our lunch. I had two sausages with the sweet ketchup here and it was good. I sat down with some of the Samoans and soon I was gave noodles in a bowel. I asked why and in their reply because you are a pastor. I thanked them as I did not read the outside label and my lips and tongue were burning as the juices were full of spices. Spices and me are not good friends, they turn my face a bright red....lol.
The garden activities were done and the Church property was clean. Now we needed to clean the inside, I took it upon myself to have my youth clean out the board room and move things around to use the shelves of the unused room for storage in a couple of weeks for a food pantry for the community. The extra space can be used for the children ministry on a rainy day.
The day turned out better then I expected and I was so glad to see Samoans and Maori learning, working, and eating together.
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