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Have you heard the expression “Boots on the Ground?” Well our Live Dead Missionaries are the boots on the Silk Road. Here we’d like to take a moment and allow one of them to share a snapshot of their life with you. Some names and details have been changed, but this is a true story from this colorful, vibrant, and sometimes surprising region.

We spent this past week facilitating a youth camp with our core group of believers and also some of the older orphans that we sponsor and spend time with at one of the local homes.

We’ve been studying the local “heart language” of the people for the past almost 10 months, but living in the capital city we have found that the secondary, colonial language is extremely prevalent and so language “wins” have been hard to come by outside of our time with our language helper.

While at the camp, which was being held about 3 hours outside of the city, we had many opportunities to practice what we’ve been learning by telling stories, listening to their stories, describing our home country, and hearing about their plans for the future. As they discovered more about America, they asked me to make some quintessential dishes from our famed land….specifically, apple pie. Our location was perfect for this. There were plenty of apple trees surrounding us and it is the beginning of harvest season. I was also able to pick bags of blackberries from some bushes on the edge of the property and decided to make a cobbler as well.

Language Barrier

I gave the list of ingredients I would need to the host family. She seemed fine with everything and indicated she had all but one ingredient on hand. I planned to pick that one thing up when we were out in town that afternoon. We set up a time to start cooking and when I arrived her attitude had changed. She said she didn’t have the ingredients now and didn’t seem overly comfortable with me being in her kitchen. I was confused. Had I misunderstood her through the language barrier?

I spoke to our local team leader and he cleared things up with her, and we sent one of the teens to go get the items that we needed. I began preparing and got the cobbler in the oven first, then started on the crusts for the apple pie and made the caramelized sauce to pour over the finely cut apples. The cobbler came out beautifully. Then, I put the apple pie in the oven. Not ten minutes later, the power went out. Ugh!

We waited and didn’t open the oven. I just prayed that it would keep cooking with the warmth that had already been generated. Fortunately, it was a short outage and about 30 minutes later the power came back on. I checked on the pie and figured it still needed another 20 minutes. We got it out and served it around, in the dark, because yet again another power outage! There were still several pieces left after our group of 26 youth had eaten and so I took the rest of the pie and cobbler to the host family and served them. They were ecstatic, they loved it and she asked me to teach her daughter and daughter-in-law how to make it the next night.

Building a Bridge

Her attitude toward me was completely different the next day. She came up to me several times, holding my arm and talking to me about her family.

I had no idea that apple pie would be such an opening to relationship with someone!

That evening, she found me and said it was time to cook. Her daughter, daughter-in-law, and son came into the kitchen with us. Her son said he was there to translate as he had experience speaking English. Within a few minutes, before all of the apples were even cut up, he left the kitchen. We continued and finished the pie and put it in the oven. The two ladies said it was a very easy recipe and we got it all written down for them. I then walked outside and saw our host’s son. I asked him why he had left and his response was, “You don’t need a translator.”

I was stunned. There had been several words and forms I had stumbled over in my explanation.  A few times I had used hand motions to show what I meant, but it had all been understood. It really hit me then.

I had spent an hour in the kitchen with two ladies and communicated with them in their heart language.

I know it wasn’t perfect.

I’m sure I sounded like a pre-schooler, but we communicated and that has all along been the goal of our language learning.

It was a “win” that I really needed to boost my continued efforts because I still have so far to go. But, I have hope now…hope that the people here accept us, that they appreciate us, that we can communicate our Father’s love for and to them.

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