Wasabi!

I have been in Cappadocia Türkiye for about two weeks now and I can definitely say that here is one of my top favorite places I’ve been on the world race. My team was placed here with a small church lead by a man named Yeshua. There has been three different ways we have been asked to serve the church while we are here.

The first way we help out is simply cleaning the church. Seems menial and maybe even boring to some people but I find it so fun. The church is small but half of it is a cave in the side of a hill so it constantly fills with sand and dirt. It needs to be swept often as well as the typical church cleaning activities, like organizing the kitchen and office, and preparing for Sunday. It’s simple but hopefully it helps.

Second thing we do is house visits. House visits are challenging sometimes. As always the language makes an extra obstacle to jump over but at this point my team are old pros at working a google translate or playing a little impromptu charades. Plus although Yeshua isn’t fluent in English he still helps a lot to fill in the spaces google translate misses. The most challenging part really is trying to navigate where the family we visit are religiously. Some families we have visited are Christians and some are not. In Türkiye we are never sure if we can mention the name of Jesus Christ or not. It’s always a case by case situation that we are leaning to navigate as a team. The people we have been visiting are mostly people who have moved here because they houses were destroyed in the earthquake. All I and my team want is to bring them some comfort and a little hope. Even though this people are suffering and having a hard time in life they still always outdo themselves with hospitality. There is always open arms to receive us with coffee or tea included. I never had so much tea in my life!

And lastly my official ministry is on Sunday. My team leads worship, Sunday school and tells a small testimony to the congregation. It is so sweet to sing worship and even though I’m singing English and everyone else is singing Turkish we are still come together to worship our Creator. Sunday school is also so fun and goes by way to fast. It’s good to see a body of Christ, even if it’s small, in this country where Christians are few and far between.

So that’s what our ministry with The church has looked like so far. I feel so blessed because in between our ministry Yeshua has been kind enough to show us around his home turf. It is so beautiful here! Almost every morning has hot air balloons dotting the sky. And we would drive to a underground city or a old cave that has Greek written on the walls after house visits. We live right off the river too so prayer walks by the river are a must! It almost feels like home with the hot air balloons, pretty sunsets, and desert atmosphere. I am so thankful to be here serving people of Türkiye, experiencing their culture, and serving in a church with my team.

p.s. you may be wondering what’s with the title of this post? Why wasabi? What does that have to do with anything? Well it’s because I was sitting on the couch trying to finish this post and I asked Maggie (really a professional blogger herself) what I should entitle this post. And she responded: what did the sushi say to the bee? Whasa bee! So that’s how the title was born. Thank you and goodbye for now!