News and prayer information from Richard and Pinuccia Wilson

I had a lot more time with the children this week, as Pinuccia had a meeting after school on Thursday, then on Friday when there was no school so the children were home, she had to go out both in the morning and in the afternoon, and then on Saturday another 5 hours in the afternoon/evening for a church meeting. So it was fun doing things with Stefania and Daniele in these last few days, especially as they regularly get new interests as they come across something different. Last week it was astronomy, this week it was firemen, and tonight they started on fashion shows. And today it was also Sunday School, which was gratifying for us. Stefania had her usual lesson this morning, whilst Daniele, who had a slight fever from a cold and stayed home with Pinuccia, had a personal Sunday School class. At lunch time they asked for another Sunday School class, so in the afternoon we did the lot together: prayer, singing, lesson, craft, prayer. It meant that I was able to repeat the lesson that I had done with my class this morning. Hence I was finally able to teach, not once but twice, on Luke 5, which is a great passage in Italian. Peter says, “I am a sinner (peccatore), leave me”. Jesus replies, “No, I won’t leave you, you instead follow me and I will make you a fisherman (pescatore) of people”. So Jesus changes everything: instead of being sent away he invites us to him, transforming us (as is needed to come to him) from peccatore to pescatore. I first thought of using this word play more than 17 years ago, when I heard someone that was learning Italian mix up the two words. And I have been waiting since then for an opportunity to teach Luke 5 and use it. Finally I’ve done it. Even better, the children understood and appreciated it.

Various happenings for this week and next:

1. Next Saturday afternoon at our house there will be a meeting for the new Youth Group. It will actually be the second meeting, but the first that I will be going to (since I was in Spain last time), and the first study. So for me it feels like it is just starting now. So please pray for this time together.

2. Yesterday I received the following e-mail:

I wanted to tell you that I have begun to study the Bible, using your Internet site. I am happy to be able to count on your help.

Just an encouraging remind for me that my site on the Bible (http://www.laparola.net/english.html) is used and helpful for Italians to get to know the Bible better. Unfortunately in this period, with a lot of Bible studies to prepare, I am not able to work on improving the site, but it is sitting out there in cyberspace doing its job anyway. And I do keep up with the e-mail correspondence that I receive as a result of the site.

3. This week turned out to be astronomy week at our house. We were reading one of Stefania’s books to her, and it started talking about stars and planets. She was really interested, so we found other material (books, DVDs, a planetarium program on the computer) on them, and she really enjoyed all of it. Unfortunately, when we went out to look at the real thing, we were just able to see one star. It is a problem with living in the city, especially with 2000 meter high walls (the mountains) blocking out most of the horizon. We will probably have to wait until we go to Sicily at the end of the year before we can get her to admire God’s handiwork in the heavens.

After arriving home on Tuesday afternoon, having missed Stefania’s birthday on Monday, it was time to catch up. So we were busy organising Stefania’s party for her school friends on Thursday afternoon, and then a small party after Sunday School today. Having nine children in our house for less than two hours was certainly an interesting experience. I don’t know how Pinuccia copes with up to 25 children everyday for 2.5 hours. On Saturday afternoon there was also a party for one of Stefania and Daniele’s classmates, which we managed to fit in before going to our Bible study group. Which is about as noisy and chaotic as a birthday party, since there are just as many small children (5 years and under) there as there are adults.

Tomorrow I’m off to Madrid, for one of my twice yearly meetings for ECM leaders there. But this time it will be a bit different, because as well as the usual 2-3 day planning meeting, there will be 5 days of leadership training. So I will be away from Monday afternoon to Tuesday afternoon of next week, which is the longest I have ever been away from the family, and which does create difficulties for Pinuccia to manage everything by herself. Thanks to God she is working at Lavis this year, at Stefania and Daniele’s school, otherwise it would have been almost impossible. Another unfortunate aspect of this trip is that I will miss Stefania’s fifth birthday next week, so her celebrations have had to be delayed a couple of days. But there are positive aspects to the trip as well! I am sure it will help the ECM ministry in Italy and my own work with others.

The other thing that I will miss is the first meeting of the new youth group. After a two year gap, we are restarting this ministry with eight teenagers. However, it is a lot harder to get them together than the old group, both for geographical reasons (two live more than an hour north-west of Trento, two others more than an hour to the south, another half an hour to the east) and because of other commitments (eg most have school six days a week). We have settled on a Saturday afternoon per month for a study, with a few social outings as well. But the only possible starting date was this Saturday, when I will not be there. There is another lady that will be helping us with all the meetings and that we will be training, and another that will be a support person to the group, so they will look after this introductory meeting. Then there will be the first meeting with a study next month. So pray for these meetings, and especially for these teenagers as they pass through an important stage in their life, making many decisions that will have an effect for the rest of their life.

We are getting ready for our 3 yearly trip to Australia! It is still more than 8 months to go, but I wanted to make sure I got the cheapest fare. It costs enough as it is… So we will be back in Australia next year on June 2, leaving again on August 18. It is a long time away, but we are accepting bookings already, if you would like to have us visit you.

Since we will be in Australia this (northern) summer, we will be missing our trip to see Pinuccia’s family in Sicily. So we will go instead this Christmas for two weeks. Since it is a shorter period than in the summer, we will be taking the aeroplane instead of the church. So that trip got booked this week as well. All these trips certainly made a dent on my credit card… I also checked in for my flight to Madrid next Monday, but more in my next message.

In the meantime, Daniele started to go to preschool full time this week, which meant also having a sleep after lunch. Like Stefania before him, he has not slept during the day for a long time, but at school enjoys have a little siesta in the afternoon. And naturally he has no intention of having a nap on the weekend whilst he is at home. He is also starting to learn that he will have to vary his diet, because if he does not want to eat what the school provides (which is often the case), he won’t eat anything. But gradually he is getting more varied tastes, just like Stefania did when she started eating at school.

I really do love being with my children, but despite that tomorrow will be the day that we have been looking forward to for a few years. Daniele starts pre-school full time, so after I take him and Stefania and get home around 9.15am, I will be free until a bit before 4pm, when Pinuccia will bring them both home with her when she comes back from work. So there will be almost seven uninterrupted hours to get things done – well, with only Pinuccia interrupting me anyway. And a romantic lunch together, just the two of us.

As for the rest of the title of this message, this week was special in a few ways. On Tuesday, assuming I retire at 65 years, I reached exactly the half way stage of my ministry in Italy. 17 years 363 days down, and the same to go. I’m looking forward to seeing what God has ready for me for the next almost 18 years, there was certainly no way I could have guessed where I am now when I landed at Rome airport all those years ago. Then on Wednesday, we had to go to Trento but when we tried to go home, found that the car battery was flat. We did manage to get it going and a new battery installed before Pinuccia had to go to work, but it meant a morning (and a bit of money) gone. Then on Saturday morning, I tried to turn my computer on but it refused to start. After lots of testing, it looks like the mother board has gone. So Monday (and another bit of money) will be spent trying to get that fixed – and for quite a few days I will be trying to set up my computer again as I like it. Then on Saturday afternoon, we realised that the hot water system, which had had its compulsory annual check-up on Wednesday, had been leaking water since then. Naturally we realised two hours after the repair shop closed for the weekend… But we managed to get someone to come and fix it on Sunday evening, after a weekend without hot water, often without any water, and a dozen soaked towels as we tried to stop the water from coming out. On Monday the permanent fix should be coming, but at least it won’t cost us anything since it seems to be the fault of the person that checked the hot water system. Just as well too, as the leaked water came down from our attic and spread over the wall and roof of two rooms, and has possibly spread to a neighbour and the apartment downstairs. So there could be quite a bit of fixing up and painting to do shortly.

This Wednesday night there is my first Bible study of the year. After have worked on Acts for a few months already, I am looking forward to being able to share what I have found exciting about the book so far. Pinuccia will be organising a beginning of year “party” for the Sunday School next Sunday, and then the lessons will start the following week. There are a few other ministries that we will be involved in this year, and that will be starting a bit later, but more on those later. So pray for these first meetings.

Daniele has been accelerated at pre-school, and will be able to go from the start of the school day from Monday, instead of starting at 10am for a few more days like the other new children. This is because he has fitted in so well. Instead of crying when he has to leave me or Pinuccia to go into the classroom, he pushes us away to run in as fast as he can. And cried the first day when he had to come home. Of course, it has helped that he has been to the preschool almost every day for the past two years, to pick up Stefania with me. So he knows the school and the teachers. It was also because the teacher had a bit of pity on us, having to make 4 trips a day. So this week we will only have to make three – take them both at 8.30/9am, pick up Daniele at 11.30, then Pinuccia will bring Stefania with her when she leaves school at 3.30pm. Pinuccia has really been enjoying working close to home, and it has helped her to become a part of town life here at Lavis. It helps that she is the teacher of Stefania’s best friend at school, and of the grandson of someone in our apartment block who is also the nephew of one of Stefania’s teacher. (Lavis is a small town!) So she already knew quite a few people, and will no doubt know a lot more by the end of the school year.

Well, yesterday was certainly a big day. It was the first day of preschool for Stefania and Daniele. Since it was the first ever day for Daniel, he has a gradual insertion into school life, and only goes from 10am to 11.30 for the first week. So between Pinuccia and I, we made three walks to the school and back in the morning. Daniele cried a bit at preschool – but only when I came to take him home, as he wanted to stay at school. Then after lunch, it was Pinuccia’s turn to drive to a different preschool for her first day, and then Daniele and I went back to school to pick up Stefania. A bit later my mother arrived for her visit – we had to make her take a bus and two trains from the airport at Verona, since we were not free to pick her up. Then it was Pinuccia’s turn to come home from school. A bit after she arrived, she got a phone call from another preschool with not one, but two job offers. Not just for a short time, but for the whole year (which is what she wanted). And not from any school, but from the school at Lavis where the children attend, and that she can walk to. And it was for 2.5 hours, which is just what we wanted. And it was not the after school care, which is usually the most that she can expect, but in the normal class, which is personally more rewarding (being more like teaching and less like babysitting). And one of the two jobs finishes at the end of the school day, so she can bring Stefania and Daniele home with her, saving me an trip (and an hour) in the afternoon. All in all, there is nothing that could be improved in that job. So she has resigned from the other job, and will start this one this afternoon. So it means now more than 6 hours free without the children and with the car available, of which 3 hours by myself. This will give me a lot more possibilities for work and ministry in the church. We thank God a lot for this job!

Daniele, Pinuccia and Stefania at the lake

More time this week with the family, and with friends as well. It was a bit more like holidays than the first week of the school vacations, and I also managed to get a bit of work done preparing some Bible studies on Acts. Now it is time to get ready for our trip to Sicily for a few weeks with Pinuccia’s family. It is a long trip: we leave at 2am on Tuesday morning, catch a ferry at 1pm from Naples down to Messina, and then have a few more hours in the car. We should arrive after midnight on Tuesday night. Usually the children cope better with the travelling than the drivers do… The portable DVD keeps them amused for hours, and the timing of the trip is planned so that they sleep during a lot of it. When we are in Sicily, it will be more like holidays than now. Pinuccia’s family lives close to the beach, so we will be going there often. Usually however it is too hot to go to the beach, we (and others) just go around 5pm for a few hours. And then there will be lots of going out to see extended family and friends down there.

Those with children know that vacations don’t mean holidays. In fact, ever since school finished on Wednesday for Pinuccia and Stefania, we have been even busier than usual with trips to the park, to the swimming pool, to a birthday party, and inviting friends to our house. At least I had led my last Bible study for a while on Wednesday night, and then only had to lead the service this morning, so there were not many other commitments to prepare for. However I certainly did not get as much done on my other projects as I had been hoping. But it has been fun doing these things with the family.