The Hazards of Student Church Planting?

This is the team from the Asian American Baptist Church in Houston. They are serving this week at the Port Arthur PowerPlant project, doing outreach in the local Vietnamese community.

We prepared our teams for almost every contingency ... except this one. While visiting in Asian homes, it is considered polite to remove one's shoes and leave them on the porch. Our teams have been careful to observe this custom. Adult participant Danny Tape, a long-time teacher in the Middle School ministry at AABC, faithfully removed his shoes for a visit this week and left them outside. All four team members did the same. After the visit, they went out the front door and prepared to put on their shoes ... but Danny's were gone! Everyone else's sandals and flip-flops remained in place. But Danny's sneakers were AWOL. A mystery!

The homeowner immediately knew who the culprit was. A neighbor's dog isnotorious for taking items from neighboring porches and yards, dragging them off, and chewing them into oblivion. She immediately ran down the guilty dog and retrieved Danny's shoes. They were thoroughly soaked in mutt slobber, but otherwise functional, except for the large chunk missing from the rear of his right shoe.

So go the hazards of Student (and Counselor) Church Planting! BTW ... the visit went great. There is now a copy of God's Word in that home. Praise the Lord!