Everything New
A New Life Together
On the 10th of December, Zulay and I were married for the third time, and this time it counted. We had previously decided that we wanted our last and final ceremony to be our official date to start our life together. Unlike in the states, in Venezuela and Colombia (if not in all of Latin America), marriages can take three basic forms:
1. Concubinato: This is where the couple simply start living together and are legally recognized as husband and wife after a certain number of years depending on the country. Zulay and I did NOT participate in this type of union.
2. Civil Union: In the States this is the equivalent of getting a marriage license, except that here the couple is legally married in the eyes of the state and everybody else. Many evangelicals only celebrate the civil union since the traditional wedding can be cost prohibitive. Zulay and I celebrated our legal union on the 14th of October. Everyone promptly congratulated us on our marriage and gave us very weird looks when they saw us saying good bye to each other and not living together. You might ask why we performed the civil marriage so far in advance of our planned date. Due to our respective not-very-firm immigration statuses in Venezuela, we weren't sure if we would actually be able to get married. Thankfully, there were no hangups and we got civilly married on the first try. Note that pastors, priests or any other minister cannot perform a formal wedding until the civil union is performed, nor do they have state authorization to perform a civil union.
3. The Formal Wedding: This is what we all associate with the word wedding, but are relatively rare here. We had one simple blessing ceremony in Zulay's church on the 26th of November and the formal wedding on the 10th of December. Since Zulay is the youth pastor in her church, it was important to have a ceremony where the entire congregation could attend. After being married the second time on the 24th, everyone congratulated us on our marriage and gave us very weird looks when they saw us saying good bye to each other and not living together. But finally the 10th arrived and we were more than blessed by a beautiful day, wonderful friends, and a lovely celebration of our now very official union. After three weddings Zulay and I have both agreed that we're never getting married again. Weird looks have since stopped.
After the final wedding, we took a brief honeymoon in the gorgeous mountain state of Merida, Venezuela before busing on to Zulay's home town of Barrancabermeja, Colombia. (Don't worry about pronouncing it, it took me a month to learn how to say it correctly.) I had the privilege to meet Zulay's beautiful extended family and was more than warmly greeted and treated by all. It was sad to say goodbye to my new extended family, but well worth the visit. Zulay and I have been in Caracas since the start of the year. We have moved into my tiny little dwelling and made it a home. We are now two months married and more than enjoying life together.
New Starts
In the last C-mail I mentioned about some different people our team was discipling. I'll give a brief update on one of those threads: The youth that I was with meeting are now meeting almost daily in a nearby skate park. They decided on their own that they wanted to get together to pray and share about Jesus with their friends and co-skaters. I was super excited to hear about their initiative! Keep praying for them that Christ would be their foundation and for them to be able to express His love in word and deed to those in the skate park.
In addition, our team was recently blessed by a group of hippie travelers from all parts of South America. They travel from country to country on bicycle, maintaining a vegetarian diet while performing juggling acts and various skits to who ever will listen. We invited them to present during our kids club and later cooked and shared a vegetarian meal with them. One of them asked us to come and pray for them and read the Bible with them. (Funnily enough, the only the bible they had was given to them in passing on public transport by Jeff, one of the youth I've been discipling I mentioned in the previous C-mail that helped start the meetings in the skate park.) We followed up with a visit and a few of them showed some interest to start studying the bible with us. At our next meeting, I expected one or two of them to show up for the study but was surprised when seven out of the ten came! We just had our first bible study with them on Genesis 1 which went great. All were enthused and want to continue. Pray for God to show up continually in their lives and for us to continue to meet regularly.
Continued Ministries
The team has continued strongly with youth ministry this year. The school in San Pablito has been very open to receive us as we give talks about creation care. I'll be taking the bicycle/light generator over there later this month. In addition, every Thursday night kids from our barrio come to our team base to participate in our kids club where they engage in a healthy dose of exercise, art, songs and interactively learn the stories from the Bible. I also continue to visit the three boys with muscular dystrophy weekly where they are drawing, learning how to read and write, and now learning English. We'll also be starting up our tutoring program again in March.
Prayer Points
- Pray for four new households of peace: We are praying and looking for individuals, families, or social groups that are open to reading the scriptures in order to learn about God, put what they read into immediate practice, and to share what they read with those around them.
- Pray for Zulay as she leaves her job starting in March for a two month sabbatical which will include a much needed time to rest, volunteering with our team, and being with the youth in her church.
-Pray for our visa situation. Pray for Zulay to become fully nationalized in Venezuela (she's from Colombia). Pray that I can then get my residency in Venezuela as her husband since I continue to wrestle with the frustrating legal status of a tourist.
- Praise for continual health
- Praise for those that are coming to know Jesus in the past couple of months in the skate park, and in two nearby barrios. Pray for consistency on their part to keep following Jesus.
- Praise that Zulay and I have a place to live albeit tiny. Still, pray for a new place to live where we can accommodate visitors and practice hospitality.
That's going to be it for this time, but I'll be back soon. Please write me back and let me know what you think of the new format. Until then, stay strong, seek the Lord and
Press on for Joy!
Cameron
