St. Louie, Missouri (yes I know, Misery, as everyone says)

Welcome to Missouri!

I’m not sure what I expected from St. Louis. Marc expected it to be run down and dangerous, seeing as it’s usually in the top 5 cities around the country for crime. We got there on a Wednesday, as you can read in my last blog, and were pleasantly surprised. Despite the fact that I was sick as a dog on Wednesday night, we had a pretty wonderful time. We met some new friends who were familiar with our pastor back home. They took us in, which was awesome because they gave us an escape from the heat and sweat shower (aka humidity) going on outside. It was funny, during the 2 months that we were at home recently, we were out and about and somebody mentioned something about the humidity being really high that day. I couldn’t help but laugh at loud. I, too, used to be blissfully naïve of true humidity-then I got to Texas, and most states east of it. How people do it, I just don’t know.

Picking up our St. Louie adventures, we spent most of Thursday recovering from the night before. I wanted to go to sleep at 10/11 the night before because I was so tired, but ended up being up until 2:30 (ish) because I was so sick I couldn’t sleep. Needless to say, I was exhausted. I guess I’m not so young anymore! (Weird.) Marc spent a good chunk of the morning calling different hospitals and looking things up online to see what our options were, and eventually fell back asleep. By the time we finally got up and out of bed, it was an embarrassing hour of the day, but I was feeling MUCH better than the night before. We had some breakfast-I was terrified to eat anything because I thought I had gallstones-and then we headed out to see what STL had to offer. Our first (and turns out, only) stop was the most famous landmark in St. Louis-the arch! It was definitely larger than I expected! At the base, each side measures in at 54 feet and tapers down to 17 feet at the peak of the arch. We didn’t ride up to the top, it was $14 or something like that, which would be enough gas to drive 100 miles. Weird when you think of it in terms of gas. Usually I say it would be 28 $1 burritos, which is a lot of burritos. So gas or burritos, it was just too much. We did go in the museum they had underground, but I started feeling gross again, so we headed back to the van. On the way, as we stood at the crosswalk, Marc struck up a conversation with a man who was walking the same way as us. After a couple minutes, I think he suspected what was coming, so he said goodbye and took off another way. That just about did it for Thursday.

Friday was much better and much more eventful. I had still been having slight cramps and nausea, although nothing compared to what it was. Marc was worried and a few friends back home told me I needed to go, so we found a walk-in clinic we could go to and went to see what was wrong with me. Turns out, there was no doctor on sight at the time. Instead, I waited to see the nurse who didn’t really do anything except check my vitals to make sure nothing serious was wrong. She said that I could come back to see a doctor, but that I likely just had a virus. I thought she was crazy, there could be no way that’s all it was, but I said thank you and we left.

We were told that University City was a good place to walk around. They have a street of shops and restaurants called the U City Loop, so off we went. There weren’t a ton of people, especially for a Friday, but we were able to stop and have a few good conversations. The first one when we were getting out of the van. There was a dude sitting nearby selling water. I think he was a homeless vet, but I’m not certain. He said he was a Christian and he knew the right answers to most of the questions, so Marc prayed with him and we were off. We got to one end of the loop then crossed over and walked back. As we did, there was a group of 3 guys (in jammies) wearing headphones and rapping along with the music that only they could hear. Marc was talking to one of them who used to go to church. He said that if he died that day, he would probably go to hell and the thought terrified him. Marc shared the gospel with him and what it means to live for Jesus.
Moving on from there, we kept walking for a bit, but our meter was up so we headed to the van. In a couple of hours, there was a home fellowship fairly nearby, so to kill time and try to find people, we went to a park nearby their house. There, Marc started talking to this kid named Jack who goes to church but had no idea how to get to heaven. After a bit of talking to him, his 2 friends came over. One was an atheist, the other went to church but also didn’t know how to get to heaven. That conversation was more about why we follow God and what He has done for us. Sometimes I wonder where the fault lies-we have all these people that we’ve met who go to church, but have no idea how to get into heaven, but that’s such a basic teaching. And if you don’t know, then what is the point of going? At that point, it’s selfish. I used to go to church because it made me feel good, it made me feel whole and cleansed, like I was right where I was supposed to be. I know God used that, but I was purely going for myself. It had nothing really to do with God. Sure, He was there, of course, and I enjoyed learning of Him, but I was spiritually blind. Just as James says, “For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.” And that was me, but I don’t think I was spiritually blind because God hadn’t opened my eyes-it was because I wanted to be. I chose sin and the “fun” that I was having over a fulfilling life of living for God. So perhaps nobody told me plainly what it meant to be a Christian or perhaps they did and  I didn’t want to hear it, all I know is that now it is our job to make sure that if people want to live in disobedience, it isn’t because nobody has told them of the saving grace of Jesus, that cleanses us from all of our sin.

After talking to them, we were a bit late for home fellowship, but we went and were welcomed warmly. We read and discussed out of Proverbs 1, and then it was off to bed.

The next day was, once again, a sweaty oven, and we, mistakenly, chose to spend the day outside. Awesomely, St. Louis has a free zoo, so we walked around that for a little while until we realized that it was too hot and nasty and not really a great place for sharing. As we walked back to the van, we came across a free art museum, so we mooched their A/C to cool off. That got old quickly, so we left.

Kaylah's giraffe

bald eagle!

baby elephant!!!

Sunday was, of course, church. Pastor Dave Fitzgerald taught from Judges chapter 4 and made some very interesting points. Two of them were as follows:

1-sin can’t just be put to the side-it must be put to death. How true of a statement-when we leave our options open, we tend to fall back into sin, but Romans 13 says to make NO provision for the flesh. We won’t fall into a sin if it isn’t an option.

2-God didn’t call us to fight a cultural war; He called us to fight a spiritual war. I couldn’t agree more. We are to be more concerned with Miley Cyrus’ salvation than her dance moves, President Obama’s salvation than his policies, our boss’ salvation than his treatment of us, and our friends’ salvation than whether or not we offend them. If these people are truly saved and walking with the Lord, then all of these issues will work themselves out because our God, who began a good work is faithful and just to complete it. So pray for those people who offend you and are bad role models, who you vehemently disagree with, who treat you badly, and who make you feel alienated. Pray for them, when they’re saved, they’ll remember your witness and thank you for it. Trust me.
 After church, we talked to a few people at the church. For some reason, the vast majority of people there (or at least that we talked to) were from Cali or had lived there at some point in their lives. From there we took off to the Festival of Nations, aka the International Food Festival! They had more than just food, but food is, of course, the most interesting part. From what I heard, this was the first year that admission was free, which is my favorite price, so off we went. It was PACKED. There were so many people there! We walked up and down scoping out what food we wanted to try. They had a lot of options that I didn’t expect from Iranian to Burmese to Afghan to German and even Romanian! Of course they had all of the usual international foods, Mexican, Chinese, Thai, and Greek. Two foods that I was interested to try that they didn’t have were Irish and French. Oh well, so it goes. We surveyed every table carefully, then made it to the end and turned around to make our decision. While I pondered the most important question of the day, what to eat, Marc found a kid that he knew he needed to talk to. It was actually 2 kids, the first one that he talked to said that he was a Christian and called to be a pastor. The second guy, the one Marc was originally targeting, believed in God but other than that was very apathetic, with no concern for his relationship or walk. They talked for a bit, but Marc left it in the hands of the kid who was called to be a pastor.
We left them and decided on Burmese food. I got fried zucchini and fried rice noodles. The noodles looked much better than they tasted, the zucchini made up for it. It was so bomb! So we got our food then kept walking around and eventually stumbled upon the religion table. I didn’t intend to go and talk to them because I don’t like feeling like I’m picking on a religion representative, but there was a Christian Science table and because I’ve never talked to one of them, we (very innocently) went to ask them what they’re all about. Here’s what I found out before I got distracted: they’re very big on healing by faith rather than medicine, many of their members don’t believe in going to the doctor although that stance is not directly held by their church, and they don’t believe in heaven or hell. Just as they started getting into that conversation, my attention began to be torn between that and the table next to us-the Mormons. There were 3 people who had been at the Christian Science table before we got there who had now made their way one table to the left and were beginning to engage the Mormons. If you’ve read my blog before, you’ll know that I thoroughly enjoy talking to Mormons. That religion is actually what got me interested in apologetics, so naturally, my attention was torn and eventually I was lost from both conversations, so I just hung back and waited. In that time, one of the guys who was kind of the “ring leader” of the 3, if you will, stepped back from their conversation and asked me if I was religious. I told him I was a Christian and that began a conversation that I was pretty well over my head in. I had researched bits and pieces of it before, but not thoroughly or frequently enough to really be able to talk to him. Basically, he was an Egyptologist with an overall emphasis on Africa. When we asked him what his religion was, he said it wasn’t a religion but if he had to name it, he would call it the African Spiritual System. He had a lot to say about Jesus and different Egyptian “gods.” It was a lot like Zeitgeist-I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s where he got a lot of his information. I tried to keep it basic and come back to questions like what was the point of his “evangelism”, so to speak, and what does it matter if Jesus was black, and other questions, but never got any very clear answers. It was borderline frustrating, but then Marc came over and took over the conversation. He did a much better job than I was doing and hopefully got through to him with a couple of points that he made. Either way, I’ve got some crazy research to do in the upcoming weeks.

people for days!

not the healthiest, but it was good :)

From there, we went to fill up our water bottles, but Marc wanted to go back to the table and talk to the Zoroastrians to ask what their religion was all about. There weren’t any actually there, but there was a table for a religious center. There slogan was something like, “One source, many paths.” At this house, people come in and are helped to find the right religion for them that will ultimately help them worship what they believe is the same god. This isn’t the first time we’ve come across this relativist philosophy, but what caught my eye was a few of the symbols-the cross, the Star of David and the star of Islam. I could see a Buddhist or Hindu or Native American spiritualist agreeing with the “One source, many paths” mantra, but these other 3 were monotheistic religions that promoted that their way was the only one. Even more intriguing, there was a Mormon representative at the table. So I asked the main guy who was a Hindu, how do they encompass these other religions who, very blatantly, say that they are the only way, that you must worship how they say? He replied that they can include monotheistic religions as long as they don’t stick hard and fast to being the only truth. So I turned to the Mormon woman and asked, “Is that your feeling also? Even though Mormons are monotheistic, you leave the position of being ‘the only truth?’” She went on to say that technically Christians aren’t monotheistic because they believe in Father/Son/Holy Spirit are all God. This is the first time I’ve ever heard an LDS member admit that they are polytheistic and once she established that, there was little left I could say to her. Once someone who claims to believe in the Bible says something contrary, you no longer have a base in common to go from. So our conversation didn’t last very long.
As we walked away and towards the van, I looked around and just saw desperation everywhere. Women dressed in very revealing clothing because they didn’t realize their worth is more than the sideways glances that they get from dirty men, teens trying to find who they were by trying to be someone else, and vendors just trying to make a quick buck. The rat race man, and everyone just believed whatever they were told. My heart was hurting for these people and for myself. I felt like David when he wrote, “There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God.” (Romans 3:10). There truly was none who sought the Lord. This was a lesson that I learned early on in our trip, that there was nobody who sought the Lord, nobody believed in God and those who did didn’t follow Him, but they chose what they wanted to believe and left out what they didn’t. I was very unsettled in my spirit as we walked out; I told Marc that I felt like I was the only one who believed the truth. Of course, that was foolish and I told him that also, but I just felt like everybody was so willingly lost and had no interest in serving the Lord or even knowing Him. So that was my Sunday!

On Monday morning, we woke up and went about our usual routine. As I sat to have my study, I read Romans 11:1-5, which says:

I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not! For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel, saying, “LORD, they have killed Your prophets and torn down Your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life”? But what does the divine response say to him? “I have reserved for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” Even so then, at this present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

 I was in awe. Basically, Elijah felt like he was the only one who sought after God, but God showed him that there were many, that God hadn’t given up on us because of His great grace. What a great feeling, to have hope restored. Thanks be to God who gives gentle reminders instead of slaps in the face.

From there, we kind of farted around. I went to the gym and then we visited the science center but there weren’t too many people there so after walking around for a bit, we took off and headed downtown. St. Louis has a specialty that sounded right up my alley-toasted ravioli. Marc isn’t particularly a pasta fan, but if a region has a food they’re known for and either we can’t get it anywhere else or it’s just way better there, his heart is set on it. This is why we had to stop for cheese in Wisconsin (no complaints here), wings in Buffalo, cheesesteaks in Philly, pizza in NYC, and lobster in Maine. Needless to say, we stopped in for some toasted ravioli, but they only had meat ravioli. Marc thought it was fantastic. I don’t really like meat ravioli but I tried a small bite and from what I had it was pretty good. So if you are in St. Louie, you must have toasted ravioli. After dinner, we had time to kill before our plans that night, so we walked up and down the U City Loop. We ran into a couple of guys that Marc stopped and talked to. One of them was on his way to turn himself into the authorities and go to prison because he didn’t show up for his court date. Man, what a reason to do time, huh? Because you didn’t show up somewhere? If you think about it, pray for him, his name is Kenny.
Then came the fun part of the night-game night, at the game store. I didn’t really want to go, not because I knew I was going to be surrounded by nerds (not that I mind them at all), but because I don’t like feeling like I’m infiltrating someone else’s world, which is exactly how I felt going there. We played a game called Last Night on Earth, where our objective was to survive the zombie apocalypse until morning. It was essentially capture the flag but there were 4 items that had to be protected through 10 rounds. We fought the zombies through dice rolls and could battle them with the cards that we picked up. It was probably the closest to Dungeons and Dragons that I’ll ever come (except now that I’ve said that, I’m sure I’ll end up playing it), and it was actually very fun, much more fun than I expected. We got to share a little bit, but the nature of the game wasn’t very conducive to conversation that didn’t involve strategy and “What should I do?” questions, namely from me, so talking was kept to a minimum. All in all, I’m glad we went, but by the end, I was sleepy so it was off to bed.
Tuesday was our last day in St. Louis, we drove around a couple of different parks but it was so hot & humid that nobody was really out, so we headed indoor to the mall where we could mooch off of their A/C. It was a huge outlet mall, a lot like Ontario Mills, so we walked around there for a couple of hours. The only conversation that we were able to have there was with 2 workers at GameStop. I don’t know where everyone was, but it was terribly slow there, also. We were having terrible luck finding anybody, so I went to the gym and then we headed back to the house to do laundry.
That just about sums up our time in good ol’ St. Louie. We are so blessed to have met our gracious hosts, Jean and Joel Belding. We spent a lot of our last night there talking with them, they were super nice and great to be around. Pray that the Lord would bless them, they really were awesome people. 

Jean & Joel, our awesome hosts and new friends :)