When we first went to Jericho, we went to teach English as a Second Language. We had no idea how many people would be interested in classes, but we were told the class would be full. At first we had to find out what they knew about the West. For instance, we found out they knew Mickey Mouse, but had no idea about Minnie Mouse. They did not know about Romeo and Juliet or Gone With The Wind. I say this because these were in the lesson books we had taken with us from the International Bible Society. From the very beginning we had to come up with our own curriculum. We had not planned on that.

We sat down and discussed this with a couple of friends who knew English. It wasn’t easy, but we finally came up with a lesson plan they understood.

We had two evening classes a week mostly attended by young men. We had one evening class attended only by young women. Some of the people knew some English and others knew nothing. It wasn’t easy but it was fulfilling.

Bob did most of the teaching. I was there when the young women came for lessons but, when the young men were there, I sat out on the porch and talked to other females who came by the house.

It wasn’t long before the police captain of Jericho found out what we were doing. He wanted Bob to come to police headquarters to teach ESL to them. Two mornings a week a police car would come to the house to get Bob. He spent 2 or 3 hours teaching, was expected to have refreshments with them, then he was brought home. Of course all the police knew who we were and waved every time they saw us.

It was an opening for years of ministry in Jericho and I am so grateful to have had this opportunity. People came to Jesus later as a result of the ESL classes. I will tell you more about that in other posts.

More to come,

Jan