July 8, 2017 - Monte Blanco

Monte Blanco 

Imagine sitting on a hill, under the blue skies with green farmlands stretched before you, surrounded by the hills of the eastern Andes, on a clear, cold morning.  The sounds are not typical of the city, song birds, parrots, and macaws, as well as a dog barking and a cow lowing.  The sound of a car or motorcycle happens about once every 5 or 10 minutes.  Mostly it is quiet.

A few weeks ago, I went to Monte Blanco.  Today it is a Christian camp, that sees tens of thousands of teenagers passing through its gates each year.  It is the largest camp of its kind in Latin America, and one of the largest in the world.  Thousands of lives are changed through its ministry each year.

I had breakfast with Tim and his crew this morning.  The men and women responsible for running this camp took a week off to gather together and evaluate their program.  What works.  What is a failure.  What needs to be improved.  I was invited to visit, but I am not part of their group, so I went exploring.

Monte Blanco originally was a missionary boarding school called Tambo.  At one time, the only option for missionaries was either home school or a boarding school.  My friends Tim Ramsey, Anna Foster, and Lance Gregory called it home for many years.  Anna taught here as many years as she went to school here as a child.  

I wandered up the hill, being told there is a cemetery near the airfield (that was how many children arrived at the school).  Anna encouraged me to look for it.  I don’t think she now knows there is a trail marked by arrows to guide me to it.  I easily found it.  My first emotion was excitement that I found it, but moments later I felt flooded with grief, respect, and reverence.  Even as I type this a few weeks later, I am overwhelmed.  There was a girl who was just 17 buried here.  She was a student of the school.  Tim’s dad, a veteran missionary for 60 years is also there.  There are about 10 graves, maybe more.

What struck me is that these are true giants, men and women who gave their lives for the gospel.  These are the people who loved Bolivia so much that they stayed here through adversity, like losing a teenaged daughter.  They didn’t give up when difficulties, hardship, or persecution hit.  They deserve respect.  I felt a reverence here, as if I had stumbled onto holy ground.  And I did.  How many prayers went up for the children here over the decades?  I bet tens of thousands. 

Maybe this is why the songbirds call this home.  They too want to be in a place sanctified by the saints who served here.  They want to be in a place covered by prayer.

Is this what Heaven will be like?  I don't know, but I found myself in the heart of Bolivia.

July 6, 2017 - A Busy Weekend

A Busy Weekend

My weekend included gorging on ice cream while listening to the son of a friend play the guitar at a local restaurant, eating a delicious lunch and walking in the river, and coffee with several of the seniors at the SCCLC.

Saturday evening, I was invited to listen to Diego, the son of my former student Jimena, play the guitar at the Cuore di Latte, a little restaurant near the Cristo monument.  I’ve run into him a few times while exploring the city.  Not only is he a good guitarist, but he is a fantastic amateur photographer.  If you are on Instagram look for santacruzdelasierraoficial.  Dinner with Jimena’s family was fun.  The kids played a game of what dip goes best with French fries – water seemed to be the crowd favorite.  

Sunday, I went to church, but had plans for lunch with Martha, a teacher at the SCCLC, and her friend Kimberly.  She is a young missionary working with children with disabilities, a good Christian, and fun to be hang out with.  We had lunch at the Cabañas de Pirai, an area at the river with dozens of restaurants.  We had soup, grilled pork, and loud music.

After lunch, we walked to the river.  At this time of year, it is dry enough to walk across.  There is a tradition that if you have walked across the Pirai River you can call yourself a Camba.  I did cross it several times in the 80s, but that wasn’t good enough for Martha.  She made me do it again.  This river flows north, eventually joining the Mamore, the river I was on last week in the Beni.  It continues north, absorbing dozens of Bolivian and Brazilian rivers until it finally joins the Amazon near Manaus.  The Pirai, during the rainy season is a big river, easily dwarfing the Trinity.  The Mamore, even in the dry season, is huge.  I cannot imagine the Amazon.

Monday morning, I topped off an enjoyable weekend by meeting three of the recently graduated seniors of the SCCLC at the Café Patrimonio.  Jisu had planned this for a few weeks, but what he didn’t count on was temperatures in the mid-50s and 30mph winds.  With humidity, that is bone chilling.  The cold led them to discuss the winters where they will be studying.  Shekinah will be in Tennessee and Sarah in Ottawa.  Sarah will be cold.  Jisu is planning on studying in Victoria, BC.  I don’t think he realizes yet that hw is going to be in one of the most beautiful places on the planet.

I ended my morning by meeting Melissa at the SCCLC.  She was here as a SAM missionary, teaching high school literature.  She is an amazing teacher.  For fun, she rewrote the 4^th Harry Potter book from the point of view of Hermione.  She can’t publish it, of course.  There are copyright laws about that.  But she printed it for friends who were willing to pay the cost of printing it.

I’d say this was a busy, but interesting weekend.

July 5, 2017 - Life on a Park Bench

Life on a Park Bench

“You came back,” Marcos the waiter said as he served me my soup.

“Of course, I did.”

My plan for today was to have coffee at the Café Patrimonio, visit with a few friends at the SCCLC, and then have lunch in La Guardia at the little restaurant on the Plaza.  Not all went as planned.

I did have my coffee at the Café Patrimonio as planned.  The sun vanished as soon as I arrived.  The temperature dropped, but it didn’t start to rain.  That was a good thing.  I take a notebook with me on the days that I go exploring, in hopes that I’ll find a quiet corner to write.  Some days I manage to write ten pages or more.  I don’t edit, I just let the ideas flow.  But this morning, my family and friends were texting me, so I didn’t get a lot done.

I went to the SCCLC to drop off a book to Matilde, and to talk to Debbie and Mariela.  School is out, so I assumed they’d be working in their rooms.  But this is a Christian school.  They were having a time of prayer in the chapel.  So I left the book with Rolby at the gate.  I’d have to visit another time.

So now I was early getting to La Guardia.  It was only 10:30 when I arrived.  My restaurant would not be open for at least an hour.  What to do?  Plant myself on a park bench, enjoy the breeze, watch the ladies cleaning the plaza, listen to the kids in the school, and write.

For the next hour that is what I did.  I have finished Onesimus, and have started another novel.  This one is about a third completed, since I was working on it the fall of 2012.  But I have two other idea dancing in my head.  One is about Mary, the mother of Jesus.  I came up with the idea of Luke interviewing her.  There is more about Mary in Luke’s writings than anywhere else.  He said he investigated these things, so I assume he must have spoken to Mary.  I also have an idea for a novel about Pharaoh’s daughter, who adopted Moses.  

For an hour and a half, I wrote about Pharaoh’s daughter.  I have an outline for the book, as well as the opening chapter when Pharaoh orders the death of the Hebrew children.  

With three novels in my head, I have decided until one surfaces, that I will spend two days each week working on Mary and two days on Moses.  Since Remembering Sorrento is further along, I will do three days a week on that one.  It is kinda fun having several ideas coming out at the same time.

I saw the gate to the restaurant open, so I finished my thoughts and ambled over there.  I didn’t see Marcus, the waiter from last week, but a lady was right there to get me the best meal possible.  They serve a traditional Bolivian meal.  It starts with a soup.  On the side is boiled yucca, which I love to pile hot sauce on top of it.  They have two choices for the main meal, which they call Segundo.  I chose chicken, which came with rice and chuño, a type of potato.

Within five minutes of my arrival, the restaurant was full.  Everyone who came in greeted me, sitting close to the door, with “provecho,” which means enjoy your meal.  Such is life in a small town.  A TV was playing the Simpsons.  My back was to the TV, but several in the restaurant were following the antics of the characters and laughing.  There were no children here, only adults on a lunch break.

Marcus brought me my chicken after I finished my soup.  He was glad that I returned.  I guess he doesn’t see that many foreigners or writers sitting in his restaurant.  

To me the meal seemed quick.  It was over before I knew it.  But I looked at the clock on my phone and realized I was there an hour.  I have slowed down my pace.  An hour at a meal seems fast, especially at a place like this.  

The bus to La Guardia and back cost less than a dollar.  The meal, including a tip, costs less than $3.  I don’t know how long I will remain in Bolivia.  Six month?  A year?  The rest of my life?  But I do know that I will be back to this restaurant in La Guardia once a week.  It is worth a hundred times the $4 that it costs me.

July 4, 2017 - A Hot Day in the Beni

A Hot Day in the Beni

The last two months, I have become accustomed to nights in the low 60s and days only occasionally topping 80.  In the Beni, the sun rises to a morning already in the mid-70s.  It is humid and there are lots of mosquitos who feast on Gringo meat.  I still had itchy ankles a week after I left.

I only planned on staying two full days at Trinidad, planning on going back to Santa Cruz on the third morning.  After breakfast, I looked at a few places around the cathedral, and walked around the cathedral too.  By 9:30, I had pretty much seen all there was to see in that area, so I would have to explore if I wanted to see anything else.  By 9:30, even on the shady side of the street, I was drenched in sweat, and I was not seeing anything that special.

I started a new plan.  I would find a taxi and have him take me to a few museums I was told about.  There is supposed to be a fish museum at the university and an ethnological museum near there.  But there were two problems with that plan.  First, there are few cars in Trinidad, and fewer of those cars are taxis.  There are millions of motorcycles, but few cars.  I walked a mile in the sun before I encountered a taxi. 

My second problem was that I did not know it was a national holiday, Corpus Cristi.  The taxi I finally found drove me to both, for me to discover that both were closed for the holiday.  I had him drive me back to the hotel to cool off and asked if he’d pick me up at 11:30 to take me to lunch at the lake.  That ended up being the highlight of my day.  The lake had a bit of a breeze and the meal was cheap and delicious.

I took a long nap, deciding not to venture out until 6:30, once the sun had set.  By then it was comfortable enough to escape out of doors.  I discovered that the Plaza was blocked off and a crowd had gathered on one side of the plaza.  There was a parade that was preparing to circle the plaza.  People were dressed in traditional outfits of the Moxos Indians, white robes that hung to the knees, sandals, and a hat that looked like the rays of the sun.  A few ladies were dressed in bright dresses of every color under the rainbow.  

I went over to study the procession and heard the priest pray.  He invoked the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the blessed Virgin.  It made me sad that this priest was teaching something heretical.  Mary is not part of the Trinity.  She was a woman, one who had to accept Jesus like anyone else, though I think she was a believer her entire life.  Twice Jesus corrected people about revering his mother.  She is not to be placed on a level even close to God.  That is idolatry.  We are to worship the Creator, not the creation.

Well, because of the procession, the few places that were open the night before were not open.  I encountered the first place in Bolivia I was ready to leave.

Home never felt so good the next day. 

July 3, 2017 - The Syrian

The Syrian

Sometimes a chance meeting can change you.  Today I met someone that changed my opinion on an issue that I thought was closed in my mind.  I met a young Syrian refugee.  My view on the Syrian refugee crisis has done a complete 180.

Yesterday, if you had asked me, I would have told you that we should do everything in our power to shut off the flow of refugees from Syria to the West.  It is too dangerous.  Just who is crossing that border?  So let’s close our borders to them.

Today, I say that answer is not so simple.  

Mejd is a young Syrian who has been traveling in Peru and Bolivia the last few months, something five years ago he never imagined he could ever do.  He was on the boat with me on the Mamore River, a tributary of the Amazon.  When he said his name, I could see the look on his face that said I’d be another American who either hates him or is afraid of him.  If you know me, you know I am neither.

As we floated down the river, I watched his amazement as we encountered monkeys, birds, and dolphins.  He was enjoying it more than me.

After a few hours, I got the nerve to ask him to tell me his story.  Then almost immediately, I apologized, saying his story was none of my business.  He assured me that he was happy to tell me.

In 2013, he and part of his family made the decision to flee Syria.  At his age, he feared that one side or the other would force him into its army.  He told me there is no black or white with them.  Neither side is good and both are evil.  He said I might have heard differently, but both sides are an evil gray mass.  If he were to serve in either military, he would be forced to commit atrocities and kill innocent lives.  Eventually he would have died, because both sides expect their soldiers to fight to the death.

So he fled his country, managing to cross the border into Turkey, where he and his family were not accepted.  One thinks that they are all the same because they are all Muslim.  But that is not true of them any more than it is of Christian nations.  White Americans are afraid of our brown neighbors to the south, though we are both Christian.  Turks don't trust Syrians.  His family kept going, eventually crossing the Aegean with 30 other people, all terrified that they would die at sea.  They made it to Greece, but were forced across the border into Macedonia.  There they applied for refugee status.

He is a refugee in the Netherlands.  He has to work and has worked hard to make his own money.  He can study, something denied him in Syria, because there he doesn’t know the right people.  He met a Dutch girl and they fell in love.  If you see them together, you’d know they love each other.

One of Mejd’s dreams was to see the Amazon, so he worked and saved his money.  He and Lieka, his girlfriend, are traveling from place to place, working to pay room and board.  They have already been at Chuchini for three weeks.  

I don’t know what the future will hold for this young man, but today I understood what being a refugee means, and what freedom looks like.

I probably didn't do justice to his story, but I wanted to share it with you.

July 2, 2017 - Chuchini

Chuchini

Efren picked me up at the hotel right on time, but immediately questioned me on the way I was dressed, in shorts and a light shirt.  Later I would understand.  

We drove out of the city on ever decreasingly paved roads, eventually coming to muddy pits that made me wonder if I’d have to get out and push.  But we quickly turned a corner and a little slice of paradise was in front of me.  

I paid for a day tour.  It began with a traditional breakfast of something similar to sonso, I think they called it masaca.  I was dining with a girl from the Netherlands name Lieka and her boyfriend, a young Syrian man named Mejd.  They had been at Chuchini for two weeks or more, doing some volunteer work and enjoying the scenery.  

Quickly we were on the boat, heading out in the lagoon and later on the Ibare River.  The trees were full of birds of every sort, parakeets, vultures, cranes, wood peckers, king fishers, egrets, and dozens of others whose names I can’t remember.  We also saw alligators, capybara, capuchin monkeys, and howlers.  

It wasn’t long before we spotted a pink dolphin.  Yes, there are pink dolphins.  They are fresh water dolphins that inhabit the Amazon River.  They are not as pretty as the bottlenose dolphins, but they are curious and they are pink!  They also don't stay above the surface enough for me to get a picture!  I ran my phone's battery down trying to get just one.

After several hours on the boat, we stopped for lunch at a sand bar on the Mamore River, which is huge even in the dry season.  Well actually a mud bar.  Mejd was light enough that he could almost run across it, but the moment I touched it, I was knee deep in the mud.  I thought I would never get out of it.  I understood why Efren suggested I dress differently. 

Apparently, the tour included a mud bath.  Efren, his wife Miriam, their two kids, Mejd, and Lieka all covered themselves in the black mud.  Miriam’s mom, visiting from Switzerland, and I sat in the boat and chatted.  How they got that mud off still amazes me, but they all swore it was good for the skin.  But next time I will be prepared for a mud bath.

We planned to go fishing, but never caught anything, that is except one tough looking fish.  As we were all about to doze going down the river, a fish jumped over the side of the boat.  Mejd saved the day by capturing the fish, whose teeth convinced me that I will never go swimming in those waters.

Once we were back at the resort, Lieka and Mejd went swimming.  I guess if I was young it would be exciting to swim in alligator infested waters.  I, on the other hand, went on a tour with Efren.  I was first shown the artifacts recovered on their hill of the Moxos culture.  After that he introduced me to a few rare native fruit trees and some animals that had been rescued, howler monkeys and coatis. 

I discovered they have cabins if someone wants to stay longer.  Efren also does walking tours into the jungle that take three or four hours.  At night, he will take you on his boat to hunt for alligators.  The resort forbids you to go swimming after dark, because that is when the gators come out to play.

I decided, since there was so little to do in Trinidad, that when I return one day, I will just go to this resort for three or four days.

Never once did Efren and Miriam treat me like a customer.  In the spirit of Bolivia, I was treated like family.  It is what I love most about Bolivia.  Will I go back to Chuchini?  I hope so.

 

 

July 1, 2017 - A Rock So Big!

A Rock So Big!

One of the arguments against the existence of God is omnipotence.  That is a word that means all-powerful.  God is usually described as being all-powerful.  As a Christian, I believe this.  One of the more popular arguments against omnipotence goes something like this.  Imagine the following converstion.

Christian: God is omnipotent.

Philosopher: What does that mean?

Christian: God is all-powerful.  He can do anything.

Philosopher: Can God do anything?

Christian: Yes, He can.

Philosopher: Can God create a rock so large that he cannot pick it up?

Christian: Of course.

Philosopher: Then I just proved your god is not omnipotent.

Christian: How so?

Philosopher: Because he can’t pick up that rock.  He is not powerful enough to do that.

Christian: Wait!  Let me rephrase that.  He can’t create a rock that big.

Philosopher: Then your god can’t do everything, so he is not omnipotent.

In this scenario, the philosopher just stumped the Christian.  You might have encountered this or you might one day.  So it is important you know how to answer this, because both are wrong.  The problem with this is that some vital information is missing.  Neither understands God’s nature.  God has a nature that He works in, as does the entire universe He created.

Here are some examples of operating within something’s nature.  As a human, I can run, but I can’t outrun a cheetah.  I can swim, but can’t outswim a dolphin.  I can see, but not as good as an eagle.

Likewise, God has His own nature.  His omnipotence must be considered within his nature.  God for example cannot lie.  Within his nature is truth and honesty.  In John, Jesus proclaimed that He is the way, the TRUTH, and the life.  His nature is honesty.  The idea of creating a rock so big that God cannot pick it up is a paradox that atheists use.  Basically a paradox is a lie.  God cannot create something bigger than himself.  But that does not negate His omnipotence.  He can do anything that is within his nature.

Matt Slick says it like this, “Not being able to do this does not mean He is not God, nor that He is not omnipotent.  Omnipotence is not the ability to do anything conceivable, but the ability to do anything consistent with His nature and consistent with His desire within the realm of His unlimited and universal power which we do not possess.”

God cannot violate His own nature.  If He did, He would be contradictory.  If He were contradictory, he would not be truthful.  So to create a rock this big contradicts God’s nature of being truthful.

Take a look at the definition of a rock.  “A large piece of material that has become detached from a mountain or cliff.  Mineral material forming part of the surface of the other, or another planet.”  A rock is smaller than a boulder.  A rock, by definition, is not infinitely large.  It is a part of something.  So the question does not make sense considering the size of a rock.

We likewise can find a definition of God.  It includes being the creator and sustainer of the Universe.  Most Christians would agree that God is bigger than the Universe that He created.  Even people who do not believe in God, believe that the definition of God means someone bigger than the Universe.  So if God is bigger than the Universe, how can He create something bigger than Himself?  If He is the biggest, how can there be something bigger?  If He is the strongest, how can there be something too difficult for Him?  The idea of a rock too big for God is contradictory to the nature of who God is.  He cannot do something contradictory, because contradiction is a lie.

God is not illogical, though this question is if you know who God is.  God is truthful, so he cannot create a paradox.  And yes, God is omnipotent.