Table Mountaineering, granny, and

Saturday was the perfect day for Table Mountain, as I hope all of you will be able to see when I can get the pictures up. I had called to go on the Cape Point trip with the other Robbies, but alas, there was no room in the van and insurance wouldn't take me. So when one of my newfound friends at the Warehouse, Jemima (not spelled like the pancake mix), called, I was excited to suggest that we hike table mountain on a winter day that looked a lot like our spring or mid-fall days in Chapel Hill. Luckily, her host family was willing to provide a ride to and from the mountain (transportation can be hard to come by) and I was able to get information about the best climbs. On the hike, I kept thinking that I wish my brothers were there, for the rock climbs, ladders, and stream obstacles would have provided much entertainment and certainly beat chimney tops in North Carolina. Some of it reminded me of the days Jason, John, Matt, and I climbed Sugarloaf the back way, realizing that if we happened to slip, it would be our end...but what would life be without risks, eh? Despite our quick paced hike, it took much longer than I would have expected because I wanted to stop every second for pictures. And I'm thankful now I did. Not only was it a gorgeous and clear day, but I had thoroughly enjoyed a theological conversation/debate up and down the mountain. At one point, we were passing a couple climbing the mountain and the woman said, almost in disgust, "You guys are having a deep conversation while we are just struggling up in silence." Sounds like a Hudson thing to do (yay for referring to myself in third person), doesn't it? wanting conversation up a rocky mountain. It's a good thing Jemima put up with me :-)

It was good though because we were able to talk a lot about the theology and approach of the warehouse, most of which I find very sound but some of which bothers me (more metaphorical prayers as I said in the last post, and telling people that God told you this or that). I particularly had a hard time with one of the prayer times in which one of the women was struggling with figuring out what to do with life and the group prayed for the "blocks" in her life. It quickly turned into a time when we would pause for one second and somebody would say, "you have three blocks." Another second. "God's telling me the first is insecurity (or whatever it was)" And so on. What bothered me was not praying for the woman, which I actually found quite powerful, but the tell-tale way of doing so. Without even a minute of silence people would say how many blocks she had and as a group name those three blocks. What if I heard differently? How do they know three and not five? I felt like maybe my faith was weak but I really just think that that kind of prayer can be dangerous because- although I am sure God talks to people in many different ways-- it is so easy with that approach to say what we are thinking as what God is saying. And then all of a sudden people take it as the word of God. Anyway, so it was great to have Jemima, who is also new to the warehouse, to discuss all of these questions and to argue a bit about the theology of conversion(or speaking to others in order and with the purpose to convert), which I am no fan of, as you all know. No more theological stuff for now though :-)

Sunday, I got to enjoy granny's (my host grandmother if you will) company again and plotted with her to take off with Erica's car and leave her at the grocery store. Granny thought it was a great idea, but reminded me that she was 88 and couldn't drive (and that I couldn't drive either, at least on the left side of the road).

And Yesterday, I had one of the better runs of my life, dancing along a scenic 5K route with my Rudy soundtrack pumping me up, to end right after sunset in the middle of a soccer field with the mountains rising in front of me (more pictures to come). It was good times :-)

Much more interesting stories to come..."revival" today and I now know where I will be staying in Khayelitsha. Until tomorrow...

Miss all of you (and you can comment now...hint)...

hudson