Clean Chair

During my five months in Mexico doing mission work, we had a lot of seemingly magical times when the Spirit was alive and active in our ministry. Usually after we did our consistent children's ministry stuff (clowns, songs, etc.) and we moved on to our adult dramas, that's when we really saw the Spirit at work and hearts changed. One of the drama's we did was called "The Clincher" (which pronounced in a Mexican accent is "clean chair") after the main song in it by the band Chevelle. This was exciting for me, because the guy who was the bassist in that band went to the same Bible study group as me a couple years ago, and we became friends (the picture of him on wikipedia was taken in the same kitchen [his] as the picture I took [to the left] of one of our many dance parties...gosh I miss him). And so besides having been a huge fan of the band when I was twelve, I had a special connection to the song.

During our lecture phase we learned this scriptless drama, and I was decidedly the main

character in it. If you've seen the "Everything" drama to the Lifehouse song, it's very similar to that, only more violent.

So during the drama I get beat up and thrown around (see fingerprint bruises from them grabbing and pushing me in photo) and for a portion of it I stand and watch as Albertho (who played Christ in the drama) is crucified in my place. During that part of the drama in particular, I don't know if the inner actor I was born to be comes out or if it's just the fact that it is an overly emotional thing for me to think about my salvation in such a realistic way, but I am near real tears every time. It really did tear me up inside every time we did the drama, even when we practiced. It wasn't until we went on outreach that I saw that I was letting the Spirit use my belief to show the truth of Christ's redemption.

When I would look out to the crowd watching as we demonstrated the gospel story, there would be tears streaming down most faces. People identified with the drama, but I think more so, they felt God's Spirit speak to and move in them. It was always physically and emotionally exhaustive to perform that drama, but to see how people were brought to the Truth through it, created such a spiritual high that I felt fully restored. Every night we would explain the drama, and usually someone would give a short message, and then people would ask for prayers, and more often than not there would be people ready to give their life to Christ. Part of my job was to count those people every day, and by the end of the trip we had hundreds upon hundreds

of tally marks collected during out short two months. I am not one to keep score, but it was thoroughly reassuring to see that God was working so significantly through us.