Cobbler

I was mildly amused (and a wee bit embarrassed) when Don cobbled together an e-mail update out of my responses and messages to the kids for our grown-up friends and family. As I read back through it, I think there is a value in the elementary versions of my impressions of the first days of our Poland prayer trip. The kids' first messages from Poland follow:

Today we had church at ____'s house. We sang songs that you might know from our church like "How Great Is Our God" and "Open the Eyes of My Heart" but many people were singing in Polish while Lisa, Bill, Ally, and I were singing in English! It was very cool to have our service in both languages, and we all sat in a big circle instead of the rows of chairs like we have at American church. There was a guitar and really cool drum played for the accompaniment. Anyone can speak up or pray during the service, not just Jack.

[Lisa marked a birthday shortly before our departure for Poland, a teacher from the Christian school had a birthday while we were in country, and Ally celebrated one during our day trip.] We are having lots of cake because we are celebrating many birthdays here!

Tomorrow we will be going by van to Auschwitz/Birkenau and another town that I cannot spell (Czestochowa--- chen-stah-HOVE-uh) where the "Black Madonna" is located. It is very sad because many Polish people do not know that Jesus is the way to Heaven and God's love, and they believe they need to light candles, pray for the dead, and place flowers at graves so they will someday reach heaven. (The Bible does not say this, and I am sad because people are working so hard for something that is not true.)