I was trying not to stare, but it was so bizarre. I looked around to see if anyone else noticed it, and then I realized I didn’t really want to bring attention to it anyway. While walking around on campus, I happened to meet a girl, and she was so nervous that as we were talking the muscles in her upper lip were twitching.
I lifted my gaze and re-focused on her eyes, asking her questions to keep the conversation going, making sure to speak slowly, so she could understand me more easily. She was with her boyfriend, who also seemed a little nervous. Neither spoke really good English, but as I added my simple Asian, we were able to communicate well enough. We walked a ways and then found a place to sit in a garden gazebo.
As I went to sit down, the boy thrust his text book down on the seat for me to sit on. (Surfaces are generally considered dirty in Asia, so if people do sit down on something like a park bench, they will often bring old newspaper to place between them and the surface.) Even though I declined the offer, the boy persisted. So I sat on his book. Then I had to know.
“Have you ever spoken with a foreigner before?” I asked them.
“No, you’re the first one,” the girl replied. Well, that explained the quivering upper lip! We sat and talked for a while. I found out she is from C-town, the city where I lived for the past two years! I’ve been missing that city so much, and now I have a friend who misses “home” too!
Then they decided I needed a tour of their school. A few steps further we came upon some rooms for practicing piano, and before I knew it we had permission to use one and I was playing worship music! They asked me if I knew any Asian songs, and I started singing one of the few Asian worship songs I knew.
“There is a God, He is our God…His name is Jehovah…He has all power…He was and is and is to come…” The truth of the words burst forth, shooting into the lives of two people who had never heard it before. Light piercing the darkness!
I’m so excited at how quickly there was an opening to share with them about God!