Norma

Norma professed at El Cristal in June.  She lives in (or near) El Guabo, which is in the field next to ours.  Said field is gigantic and has extended even further this year with new interest to the east.  That being the case, LeRoy asked Marsha and me if we would help our neighboring sisters out by visiting Norma once a month.  In that way, she could have two visits each month, one from us and one from the sisters in her field.  We, of course, agreed, and on Sunday, July 24, after our fellowship meeting and gospel meeting in Guayaquil, we boarded a bus bound for Machala to see what awaited us.  Our first stop was Río Bonito, about 2.5 hours by bus.  There, we studied with a family who has recently begun to listen to the gospel.  The son was a university classmates of one of our friends (who is nearing 70 years of age) and expressed interest in having Bible studies.  Don Antonio, our professing friend, met us there, and we had a nice little meeting in that home before heading on to El Guabo.  We spent the night in a hotel in the center of town, and the next morning, we headed back out of town a little ways to find Norma's restaurant, the location of our study.  We finally found it and had a lovely study.  Norma drank in our every word and didn't seem to notice all the distractions, of which there were plenty, though she did have to get up to serve a couple of customers.  The restaurant, pictured below, is one of a number of shacks along the main highway heading into Machala.  It happens to be right next to a speed bump, which makes things particularly noisy, as all vehicles have to slow down and then accelerate again once they have crossed the hurdle.  I suppose a person just gets used to such noise after awhile.  :-)  Anyway, this ended up being my only trip out this way as the next time we were scheduled to go, I was unable to accompany Marsha, and now it seems that the neighboring field has, at least for the time, been divided into two fields, leaving those sisters free to visit here more often.  We'll see what happens in the future.