Preaching

So we came here to preach and that’s what we’ve been doing! I went out Tuesday evening - English had their CO so we didn’t have a midweek meeting as regularly scheduled - it was moved to Thursday.  Then Nate and I went out Wednesday and Friday. Nate went out Saturday. Thursday was a work day/prepare for meeting day and the internet was slow so I used Saturday to catch up on work.

Here are a few pictures from Tuesday

A mango tree

Service snacks

Some parrots we tried to witness to

Pine tart

When you approach a house, there is often a gate and fence around it.  You call out “Inside!” And wait. Yes, I know - they’re deaf, how are they going to hear you? They don’t. You see if a hearing family member is home. You look at a neighbor’s house and if they are sitting outside, you ask them if the deaf person is home. You may go ahead and enter the gate and try to get their attention by waving a mirror or fabric around. You take your shoes off when you enter their house. This means that you are barefoot or in socks on their steps.  You sit outside - it’s usually cooler than inside.  You chat, pull up a scripture or video, discuss.  There is no rush. Often the women are home and often they are cooking so periodically you pause to allow them to check what’s on the stove.
We have been invited to preach with English so when we do so, you can read about it first, here!
Wednesday we joined two others and drove to another town to pick up a deaf brother. The 5 of us then drove to the eastern edge of our territory, which is seldom worked, and spent the day meeting and preaching to the deaf.

On Friday we tried to finish contacting the deaf who had yet to be invited to the assembly next week. We had 4 car groups, 2 with cars and 2 that needed to get hire cars. My group was one of the ones that needed to get a hire car but since there were 3 of us and another car group had 3 as well, we crammed 6 into the car and drove to the territory where the 3 of us in my group got dropped off and walked.

Picking mangoes at a call’s house


So you know we have food in service but what is service like??

If the deaf know ASL, its because they’ve studied with Jehovah’s Witnesses.  Otherwise it’s home sign or local signs.  Just like there is a spoken Creole that is loosely English, there is a sign creole.  They use ASL for the meetings and on Bible studies but for initial calls and the first year or two after, you’re mainly learning that person’s signs and then teaching them ASL signs.  Some of the local signs are also incorporated into the ministry and the meetings.  For example, we have local signs for video and for market, among others.