Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve turned out to be a very busy day. Rusty left out to teach in the schools, and Pawn and Hope were getting ready for their trip to the village with Antioch Church. I was busy getting ready to go to a Christmas Eve party/program at the big school Rusty teaches at. It was probably unlike any other Christmas Eve, but the holiday season turned out to be exactly what we needed.

There are 1500 students at this school. When Rusty was invited to come to the Christmas program we really had no idea what to expect. You can see that there were a lot of students present and one dog. There always seems to be a dog involved here.
The program began with the Christian group presenting the Gospel and several Christmas carols. We were really impressed that one young man stood up on the stage alone and shared with his classmates the true meaning of Christmas. I'm not sure if it was the emotion of the season or the emotion of the Christmas program, but this brought tears to my eyes. I was completely humbled that a young man would stand up in front of his peers in a country where fewer than 1% are believers and proclaim the Gospel boldly. Then to see a group of young people sing praises in front of their peers was absolutely wonderful! It encourages me to remain faithful and be bolder in my daily witness. I was also blessed to see so many students in the Christian group. When we found out there was a Christian group who would be presenting we really had no idea what to expect.
As always Rusty was put to work. He got to present the gift to one of the groups. Rusty was off getting ready for another part of the program when this group presented the Doraemon song. I'm always teasing Rusty about Doraemon because he doesn't get too excited about seeing this character everywhere. It is a Japanese character. The storyline involves him getting sent back in time to help his owner's great-great grandfather so that the family will have better circumstances in the present day. Doraemon has a pocket where he can pull out gadgets from the present-day in order to help. It sounds like a cute storyline, but I seriously doubt that we'll be purchasing any items any time soon.

I'll close with a video that shows how many students were in the Christian group and how many students attended the Christmas program. Hope you enjoy!