Westminster Confessions

WTS has the feel of a very international community. The student body is not very large, yet we have many, many international students. A large segment are from Korea. I had lunch today with two students who I am getting to know. I am learning about kimchee and other Korean food. They even pointed me to an Asian market in the area. From my past experiences, I thought it might be a small-ish corner market kind of store with floor to ceiling packages of food I could not begin to identify and a nice fresh produce section. Far from it! It was a huge grocery store with an amazing amount of fresh produce, fresh fish, fresh sushi, aisles (plural) of rice varieties, and all kinds of snacks and treats. I usually have to really look to find the nori seaweed sheets I like to use, but here there were more kinds of seaweed (in every shape and size… up to almost blanket size!) than you could imagine. I hope that I can visit again with my friend and that she will help me to figure out some new things to try.

In addition to developing an appreciation for the various culinary delights of the international students, I am humbled by the sacrifices that some of these students make to come here. One man from Nigeria left wife, 5 kids, language, and all that is familiar to come here for 4 years so that he can go back and preach the Gospel. My friend from Korea is married and has 3 young children. Both she and her husband are full-time students! Can you imagine learning Greek via a second-language (English) while taking notes in Korean (and keeping up with laundry for 3 kids)? Then there are the students from China who know persecution not from reading Christian magazines but from living through it. And the list goes on and on. I hope we will get to know more of these co-laborers in Christ during the years we are here. We have much to learn from them: their attitude toward the Gospel, their willingness to sacrifice, their appreciation for every good gift.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 22nd, 2004 at 5:57 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.