They make the decisions.
26/06/17 02:13
In Capulispungo, David, pictured here with his mother and me, is secretary of the church. Sunday was a "General Assembly Meeting" with the purpose of reorganizing the church. We had met with Antonio, the pastor, several times previous to help him plan the meeting. His proposal is to change the leadership structure of the church. Usually the church elects seven deacons every two years. These seven are the church "leaders." The system hasn't worked very well, so the pastor is proposing that he choose his own "team." The meeting lasted about three hours, and the whole time they spoke Quichua. I could almost keep track of the general theme they were discussing. Faby, Luis Moya and I attended. I was constantly reminded that we were in a different culture. What we expected to happen, and how they ran the meeting were two different worlds. In the end, the congregation agreed that the pastor should continue, and that they needed to redo their bylaws, and seek more member participation. The pastor is counting on us to help him in this process over the next six months.
Saturday, the group studying in the "FLET" bible program took their fifth exam. One more to go over the next three months to finish the course. As in the General Assembly, I would like them to make a decision on how and when they want to continue on to level two, but they have a different way of making decisions, and I have to wait.
