Sometimes Bono gets it Right

Sometimes it really is a beautiful day.  And today was a beautiful, interesting day.  So that new church I mentioned in my last post...I went to it today.  Turns out it is a Spanish-speaking congregation. 

Me: *looking at the stained glass and trying to figure out why the pews were oriented incorrectly*
Haley: Do you think this is going to be in Spanish?
Me: *shrug* Maybe...well, the hymnals are entirely in Spanish...so...probably...
Haley: *chuckles*
Lady 1 (Mary): Welcome!  Do you speak Spanish?
Me: Not really.
Mary: We're going to have to find a translator...
Lady 2 (Anna): We'll try to find someone to translate for you.  We also have a woman's group that meets every other Thursday at 7pm.  You should come.  It's a lot of fun, but you have to keep track of whose house it's meeting in.

So the service begins and it's 90% in Spanish.  They tried valiantly to do it bilingually, and at one point Mary was translating the Powerpoint slides on the fly during the Psalm reading.  During the responsive reading poor Jose got flustered and ended up reading from one chapter while the congregation was reading from another chapter (both in Spanish).  We sing something about dancing like David (yo danzo, yo danzo, yo danzo como David) that sounds like Gloria Estefan.  And then we sing Chris Tomlin.  In Spanish.

Then Anna gets up and explains that this song is something they like to sing while they greet one another, and, "we are so glad to have visitors with us today, so please welcome Haley and....um...my brain isn't working..." and the lady next to her whispers into the microphone, "I think it's Megan."  "...Megan?" she asks.  So I respond from the back of the room, "No, it's Maggie, but that's okay."  "Okay, well, this is the time when we either greet you or make you feel really awkward."  At least she's honest about it.  I can get behind honesty.  And then I got 30 hugs from complete strangers.

The testimonial time was entirely in Spanish as was the message.  And surprisingly enough, I understood almost all of it.  My translation wasn't perfect, but I understood the high points.  Like when the pastor whacked the microphone like it was the back of someone's head and said, "Yo soy tu padre, tengo (the word for plan)."  As in, "Wake up you idiot and follow me--I'm your father and I have a plan for you." 

We ended with another song, and then everyone greeted us and asked us to come back.  Mary offered to pick us up since we lived about a 45 minute bus ride away.  I thanked her for making accommodations for us (something that hadn't happened to me before) since it obviously wasn't planned, and she said, "Oh, we're supposed to be bilingual, but we've gotten lazy and just do it in Spanish," which made me feel less bad about it.  Mary also said, "You should come back--it'd be nice to have some more gringos."  How do you respond to that?

I told Mom about it tonight and when I told her about us figuring out it was going to be in Spanish she said, "Did you stay?"  "Of course we stayed.  They were making special accommodations for us--how could we leave?"  And I'm so glad we stayed.  It was such a blast!!  The music was fun (as far as I'm concerned every church service should include a samba), the people were nice, the kids were hilarious during their "testimonials" (ever heard a 5 year old give a testimonial?), and the message was good.

It made me think about in Romans where Paul is talking about the spirit mourning for us when we can't find words deep enough for it on our own.  While that is definitely true, sometimes the spirit also finds words of praise and worship for us when we can't find them on our own.  It really was a beautiful thing.  We're going to look around some more, but I do hope we go back.