Five-Talent Stories - Bob Gallegly
During our 5 Talent worship experience we invited the people of Aldersgate to share some of their God Story.
Bob Gallegly: (I thought I was generous.) in 1990 I was part of a mission team that traveled from N. TX to Concepcion, Chili (roughly 300 miles south of Santiago) to assist a missionary that our church had been supporting. We had recently packaged 20 soccer balls and shipped them to the missionary and when our Sr. Pastor made contact and found that they had actually received the balls, he asked, “Is there anything else that you need?” Of course, the missionary said, “Yes, we need some workers to help us finish building at the church.” Reverend Canafax took the charge and formed a team of 17 of us that took off for Chili.
The team arrived only to find that a building permit had been forgotten and we could not do the primary job that was desired. Undaunted, we separated and 12 of the team went to work building a storage shed at Second Church (the shed would be to lock up the materials and tools for the eventual construction and in the interim, serve as housing for the onsite superintendent). I was part of a group of 5 that went to Fifth Church to help continue a long-neglected building project that would roughly double that church’s total footprint. Both projects were full of their own stories but that is for much later.
I was fortunate when the housing assignments were made as I ended up staying at the District Superintendent’s home. The DS and his wife operated the home almost like a halfway house for traveling students coming and going to two local colleges. There were new people around the table at almost every meal and all were anxious to practice their English, much the better as my Spanish was very limited!
My most interesting time of the 2 weeks was coming to an end when the DS’s wife offered to take me on a ‘tour’ of the town on Sunday afternoon after church. Of the many highlights of the trip, this tour stands out as she showed me the various areas around the city, culminating with the question, “Would you like to see where I work?” I said of course. I had been working at Fifth Church which was in a pretty impoverished area (annual income around $1500 per household), so it was sobering when she drove me into the poor neighborhood (around $600 annual) and took me to her ‘day school’.
I entered the narrow, mud brick building to see where she and some other volunteers conducted school. On my way in, able to see only through the light coming in through a few windows, I noted a row of bricks with a few boards that made up a low display of what looked like children’s clothing. The lady noted my interest and offered that the kids were having what we would call a garage sale, trying to raise some money to turn the power back on. Se up, I asked, “Where did they get the clothes,” and she replied, “They took them off.” Before I left the next day, I made up a story and gave all the cash I had left - $50 and felt bad that I didn’t have more.
We thought that we were being generous and the church was most grateful for the progress we made at both sites (shed completed and the expansion very well along), but their generosity towards us when times and resources were very hard to come by was clearly the greater gift. I truly came away with much more than I took with me! A couple of weeks after our return, I got a thank you note from the DS’s wife – she said the $50 paid for their electricity for the next 2 years!
