Theres a Sheep in My Bathtub by Brian Hogan

Author:Brian Hogan
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Non-Fiction, Religion
ISBN: 9780979905605
Publisher: Asteroidea Books
Published: 2007-09-29T00:00:00+00:00

Seventeen

Alone at the Helm

When summer finally arrived, our team paused from the frantic activity into which “Miracle April” had plunged us. On June 17th, 1994, Magnus and Maria left Erdenet to take their first break home. When almost the entire church turned out on the railway platform to see our team’s leaders off for their extended time in Sweden, we were, without realizing it, setting a pattern that would be followed whenever a missionary left Erdenet. We had a worship service right next to the train as all of the other travelers and their families and friends looked on with jaws agape. No one in Mongolia had ever seen anything like this large crowd of crying and smiling Mongolians, singing about God and hugging a blond foreign couple, all accompanied by guitar. It was quite a scene. With Magnus and Maria gone, Louise and I were now alone and in charge until summer’s end.

Reality quickly set in. Sitting in our kitchen that evening, Louise and I prayed for my mother who was celebrating her retirement that day on the other side of the world. We felt incredibly far away, isolated and vulnerable. We were eagerly counting the days to my mom and step-dad’s visit in August. For the next three months we would be the only church planters for hundreds of kilometers. We had a quickly growing Mongolian church movement on our hands and were barely conversational in the language, and a Russian group I could only lead through a Mongolian translator who spoke all three languages. As I met with the various leaders for training and discipleship, I realized how much I’d leaned on Magnus’ linguistic proficiency in the past. With no other English speakers around us, our language skills quickly improved. We prepared house church group lessons, met with the elders-to-be, led the house church leaders meetings, and dealt with problems as they came up.

The Russian congregation held its first baptism service at a sauna for miners up at the edge of the second largest open pit mine in all of Asia. There was a small plunge pool outside the hot room. Alex, the only man being baptized, arranged for the facility and had thoughtfully filled the pool with hot water. I have nothing against comfort, and I’m rarely accused of being traditional, but I felt compelled to insist he drain and refill it with more tepid water. It just wouldn’t seem like baptism otherwise. While he was fixing the pool, the ladies were changing. When they came out I was shocked. They were in their underwear. Not one had brought any bathing suit or clothes in which they could get wet. I told them they had to cover up. They seemed puzzled by my prudery, but compliantly trooped back to the dressing room. When they emerged again, Alex, Ganna, and I were stunned to see an apparition—six Roman matrons in full toga. They’d found bed sheets. The baptism immediately took on what I imagined to be a decidedly New Testament flavor.

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