An Atheist, An Agnostic, and A Catholic

An Atheist, An Agnostic and A Catholic

This may sound like the beginning of a great joke, but in reality this has been our life since July when Lorene and I opened our home to three young ladies from Eastern Europe. During their summer break from the university, they have been working with a company called Southwestern Educational Distributers here in Southern California. The company employs young entrepreneurial students from all over the world to sell their products, door-to-door, during the summer time.

This has been grueling and arduous work for them. They get up at 5:59am every day and return home around 10:00pm every evening. They carry this grossly over-weight backpack full of book samples around on their bicycles riding through the neighborhoods in 100+ degree heat. Their work week is 6 days long, and Sunday is the day they get together for team meetings and debriefing. That is the only day of the week they get to sleep-in...until 7:00am! This is really not a day off, because there are reports to file, managers to meet, and next week assignments to be distributed.

Needless to say, these are some hardy girls!

Renata is from Poland and from a Catholic family. Even after 70 years of communism and almost 20 years of degrading religious interest in her country, her grandmother represents a faith remnant for the family. Renata expresses an interest in spiritual things and has been asking us many questions about our church and our beliefs. She is a very sweet young lady and is the conscientious one of the group. She gets up first to make coffee, prepares many of the lunches and leaves the house last, making sure that all the dishes are clean and counters are clear.

Katka is from Czech Republic and was very quick to let me know that she did not want to be converted. She said "I am an Atheist and I am tired of people trying to convert me when I knock on their door!" Over the last couple of weeks, she has become more warm and inquisitive about our personal lives at home. She mentioned to me that "You don't look like a pastor, and I never knew that pastors rode motorcycles." There have been a few other things that have broken stereotypes of 'what Christians are like', so we keep living our lives in front of her for the sake of the gospel. Recently, when Katka said that she did not believe in God, I mentioned that I did not believe in Atheists. Just because we say something does not exist, does not make it true. In my experience, I have found that most Atheists are either angry at God, or they have not made much of an intellectual attempt to determine their beliefs for themselves. They have merely just taken someone else's word for their own. I could see her wheels starting to turn...

Eva is also from Czech Republic and she has lots of well developed questions about God, the bible, suffering in the world, eternity and even the validity of other faiths. Lorene and I can tell that she is giving real thought to her life and her faith but is not ready to settle on any single religion. They all seem valid to her. She has read much of the bible and is especially interested in Job since it has to do with suffering. The part of the book which she cannot accept is when God allows Job’s children to die. She knows the ending of the book when his family is restored but why did they have to suffer and die, just so that God could teach Job a lesson? She is even willing to accept that Job may just be a story and not an historical account, but still what about the children?

Well, as you can see, we are having some significant encounters with these girls this summer. Lorene and I count it an extreme privilege to host people from all over the world in our home . Many of you have been to our home and it is very plain to see that we have more house than we require. However, we had good reasons when we decided to buy such a large home. First, we knew that we wanted to host large groups for mission leadership gatherings and for missionary receptions (you can take us out of the south, but you can’t take the south out of us - Southern Hospitality is who we are!) Secondly, and most importantly, we have always committed our home to the Lord to be used for His purposes. Truthfully, it all belongs to Him anyway, we are just the caretakers for a brief time. That means if someone needs a place to stay, we have extra rooms for them.

So far, since we have been married, we have only had a few months when our home has been empty. We treasure those times alone, but we feel completely fulfilled when the Wilson B&B is occupied. Though we love to host our brothers and sisters in Christ, we are especially thankful for the opportunity to share our home with non-believers and even strangers.  For us, it is an opportunity to grow in grace and kindness and practice genuine hospitality.  It’s also a joy to share our hope in Christ with those who might not hear it anywhere else.  We’re so grateful to the Lord for each unique experience He has given us!

"Contribute to the needs of God’s people, and welcome strangers into your home." Romans 12:13

Weasel Poopuccino

There is nothing quite like the aroma of a Starbucks coffee shop at 5:30 in the morning. My sense of smell jumpstarts all of my other senses and there is a tingle which comes from underneath my skin that tells me that I’m starting to wake up. The problem these days is that I have fallen into a bit of a coffee funk.

To lose weight, I ask for a non-fat cappuccino now instead of using the good stuff (oh, half n’ half is what my big fat dreams are made of). In addition, I usually forgo the need for a sweetener, unless it is a special day, and then I add a little Splenda – just enough. I don’t want to go all crazy with that stuff! A recent change that has really grieved me is the switch to decaf.  I was told that caffeine can stay in your system for well over 12 hours, so to help improve my sleep, I had to give it up.

My morning routine: Decaf coffee with non-fat, non-dairy creamer and artificial sweetener - What’s the point in getting up now?

Well, on a recent trip to Southeast Asia, I decided to throw caution to the wind, and indulge in my beloved drink made from the coffee bean. I drank coffee every day. I had full fat cream in my coffee and real sugar. On a few occasions, I even ordered an extra shot of espresso with a pump of mocha – Heaven!!!

When we arrived in Vietnam, I had only heard rumors of the coffee prowess of these people. We may have a coffee shop on every street corner here in California, but they have 3 on every corner. And when you enter into these shops, the aroma does not produce a tingle under my skin, but a jolt of lightening that goes straight through to the bone.

Their traditional method of preparing this magical elixir is quite unique. No filters allowed here, so you get the full benefit from all that coffee has to offer. A small metal brewing cup, called a phin, is placed on top of your mug with ground beans inside. Hot water is then poured into the coffee grounds, which is then filtered through to your cup which is waiting patiently below. Once this brewing is complete, they add sweetened condensed milk and stir – OMG, Yum!

About half way through my cup of coffee I asked the question that I have learned over the last 25 years of international travel, to never ask – “So, what kind of coffee is this?” I should have known better, but I think I was charmed by this magical potion. I completely lost my sense of reason when feasting on exotic cuisine. I would never ask, “What kind of meat is this?” because most of the time, you just don’t want to know. The rules for international dining are very clear: Smile, say ‘thank you’, swallow and say the prayer “God, if I can get it down, will you please keep it down?” That is it! There should be no further discussion about the food around the table. But, alas I did ask a question to which the answer came, “This is weasel coffee.”

Now at this point, in hindsight, I should have stopped there with my initial belief that “Weasel” was the name brand, but noooo! This coffee had its spell on me. With every sip, I felt like there was a party in my mouth. I must know more about this dark temptation. A second question emerged so effortlessly from my lips, “So, where does Weasel coffee come from?” The answer, “Well, from weasels, of course.”

Clink!

That was either my coffee cup or my chin. One of them struck the table when I actually realized that I was in another country, consuming food and drink, and asking too many questions!

So here’s the deal. Vietnam is one of several nations which are known for its exotic “natural” coffee plantations and processing. Indonesia has Civet coffee, Ethiopia has a feral cat coffee and now Vietnam has Weasel coffee. Basically, the animal eats the red coffee berry from the tree, which is then processed through its’ digestive tract. The end results are coffee beans which have been ‘organically’ treated with proteolytic enzymes in its stomach which infuses rich amino acids into the bean. This gives the coffee a stronger aroma and reduces the bitterness. The turds – oops, I mean the beans, are harvested from the cage, washed, dried, roasted, ground and sold for about $100 USD for a kilo (½ pound) in Los Angeles and New York. This is for the domestic stuff - the wild “free-range weasels” produce a product that costs nearly $1,000 for a kilo.

Even when I found out what this coffee was, I ignored my basic instincts and continued to enjoy it. It had sort of a chocolaty texture to it and the flavor was a bit nutty. Though I must admit that this was not my number one favorite coffee, it comes in as a close number two.

I received a full education that day in Vietnam about coffee in general, but specifically about the exotic coffee export industry. If you are interested in buying some of this coffee, it is very important that you buy from dealers who are trustworthy. There are reports of coffee exporters who are packaging plain old coffee beans and selling them for a much lower cost. So, don’t be fooled by gimmicks or fancy packaging, you have to pay a lot of money for coffee beans picked out of real weasel doodoo.

One of these days, maybe for a very special occasion, I will forgo my daily Starbucks decaf, non-fat, non-dairy, artificially sweetened cappuccino, and Lorene and I will go into Los Angeles for a nice cup of Weasel Poopuccino.

This is weasel poop... In a basket... Under glass... In the coffee shop!!!