Sunday morning rolled around and I had planned to stay in D. to go to church. If you can believe this, I had actually suggested to Nate that he go to a new church plant with Abebe (Ethiopian teammate). Since I genuinely believed he was in D. to visit our team and check out our ministries, I thought he'd enjoy the scenic walk by the river and the new church meeting under a big tree. But the next morning I heard from Grace that no, Nate was going to go to D. church with us. ; )
He waited for us by the dining hall and smiled at me as we walked up. I smiled too, feeling shy all of a sudden. Grace had forgotten something and said she'd catch up so the 2 of us headed over to the church. I couldn't sit with him because the men sit on one side of the church and the women and children on the other. I love M. church especially because of their amazing singing. There are congregational songs led by someone up front, spontaneous songs that erupt as people are touched by the message and lead out, and anyone who has a song to share (either individually or in a group) can get up and sing at various points. Also, visitors are encouraged to get up and share a word with the congregation so in this instance, Nate was asked to. He got up and brought the traditional greetings from his area and the churches there, which is an important custom. He used some Arabic and some English which was translated. Then he shared an encouraging word from John 14:27 about peace from Christ vs. fear--very appropriate for this group of people. I was impressed with how he communicates cross-culturally and interacts with different kinds of people.
It was a fun church service because Nate and I both experienced our first baby name vote! Yes, that's right. A baby was being dedicated that day and the congregation voted on 2 names--Joseph and Gabriel. We all had to put our heads down and raise our hands for the name we liked! Joseph won out and after church we were invited to the feast. I've included a picture of me with the ladies and Nate with the men at the party.
After the feast we went home and I went to my tukul to change, a bit dejected because I wanted to spend more time with Nate and didn't know how to make that happen. Well, it just "so happened" that I needed to go and get a cooking utensil from Abebech's kitchen hut that I would need that evening. Nate was staying in their safari tent and as I walked over I bumped into him by the hand-washing station. I didn't know he would be there, honestly! We stood there talking for a few minutes until Abebech, who was making delicious Ethiopian food for us that evening, invited us to come and sit down in her kitchen and have tea while she cooked. We did and ended up having a great couple hours, talking and laughing about interesting cultural customs and funny things that had happened to us in Sudan. Abebech had been praying for a husband for me for a while and I think she was delighted to keep us talking in her kitchen! Eventually, I had to reluctantly excuse myself and drag myself away from Nate to go and cook a peanut stew for our dinner.
Later that evening, I emailed my parents and told them I was getting to know this amazing guy and really liked him. I was a bit distraught because my feelings were growing and I didn't know if they were reciprocated. Only 1 day left with him--they were planning to leave on Tuesday...
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