We (Matt and Miriam Barnes, Debbie Magnuson, Matt's cousin Benjamin, and myself) departed for Washington, DC around 9am on Monday, November 11. It was a trick to squeeze in all the luggage of five travelers in one minivan. Who normally totes around a printer and guitar while on the road? We were just all very grateful we had decided to drive rather than fly! We literally used every square inch of space.
The conference was being held at the National 4-H Conference Center, and we arrived around 8 o'clock that night after having a bit of an adventure trekking through a little suburb trying to find a suitable place for dinner. Thanks to Benjamin's navigation, his 4-star restaurant choice ended up being a hole-in-the-wall retail store of some sort… We tried to not give him a hard time about it, but from then on we relied upon Matt's smartphone.
The conference center is situated in a beautiful suburb of DC and right off Connecticut Drive, a main road that takes one right into the heart of downtown. It was so nice to have our lodging, conference room, and meals all in one location!
On Tuesday morning, Matt and Miriam Barnes introduced us to Luciano Bongarra, President of Parlamento & Fe and the conference leader. I previously had some email communication with him over the last several months, and it was so nice to meet him face-to-face. He and his wife were so kind and gracious to us the entire week, and he even offered me a job to come and work with him in Argentina!
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| From left to right: Luciano, Matt Barnes, Miriam Barnes, and Debbie Magnuson |
Most of Tuesday was spent meeting people and trying to gain a better understanding of details still needing to be addressed before the start of the conference the next morning. Communication was a bit of a challenge given the language barrier. Luciano didn't know a whole lot of English, and his helpers were equally challenged with Spanish, so two and two equalled puzzled expressions and second and third trys. At times we pulled out the pen and notepad… But there were smiles and laughs all around as we practiced patience in between miscommunication!
Here we are trying to understand what still needed to be done in less than 24 hours:
There were a few details with huge holes that had the Indiana team a bit on edge, but we saw God provide for our needs at the last minute! One area of need was a bus to take about 100 conference attendees to the US Capitol building for the first session the next morning. The few contacts that Matt knew in the city either had buses with no drivers or a driver with no bus. As each person returned Matt's call with a "no," we began to wonder what we would do. We didn't really want to send about 100 foreigners (who could not speak English) to the metro to ride the subway into downtown and just hope they all showed up at the correct location. While working on a myriad of other details, we prayed for a miracle. Late that afternoon, Matt received a phone call from a pastor in the area who had both a bus AND a driver. Praise the Lord! As I said, the provision was last-minute, but it was perfect!
That evening we were invited to a performance and reception at the Argentine Embassy. The International Baptist Theological Seminary Polyphonic Choir is conducted by Luciano's daughter, and they all made the journey to DC to perform at the embassy as well as provide music throughout the conference. It was amazing to hear the praises of God fill the halls throughout the embassy! I am told the ambassador did attend the performance, and I can't help but wonder what he thought. Following the performance, it seemed as if the entire choir surrounded us so eager to meet "the Americans from Indiana" and expressing their deep gratitude for our attending their concert.
The Argentine embassy is a beautiful building!
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| From left to right: Myself, Debbie Magnuson, and Pam Russell |
It was a great start to what would be a wonderful week! We went to bed that night with hearts full of praises to our God.
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