“Dioscidencia:” A Romance, a Call, and an Improbable Mission

In Spanish, when things come together in unexplainable, remarkable ways, believers call it a “Dioscidencia” (Godcidencia) instead of a coincidence. A Dioscidencia demonstrates the miraculous movement of the Spirit not unlike what a young couple from Colombia experienced.

Diana Cruz met Felipe Preciado during the orientation of volunteers in Mennonite Central Committee’s (MCC) International Visitors Exchange Program (IVEP). They were both Mennonites from Colombia, South America, but from different regions. Their furtive glances at each other ended up in a romance that was sustained during their year in separate localities in the United States. After that year in the IVEP program, they returned to Colombia and got married.

Diana, right, at EMU

I worked with Diana in the Spanish department at Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, VA. She was a Spanish language conversation assistant for our Spanish students. Felipe worked on a farm near Kidron, Ohio. During the course of their year in the USA, both of them felt drawn to the African IVEP colleagues whom they met.

Because of their successful year abroad, their faith commitment, their admiration for missionaries who had founded their respective congregations in Colombia, and because of their affinity to African colleagues from the IVEP program, they both sensed a call to be missionaries to Africa.

Little did they know how many obstacles they would face in making their dream come true. First off, the Mennonite Church in Colombia had few resources to launch such an expensive endeavor, so other sources of assistance had to be found. When Mennonite Mission Network (MMN) Latin American director came to visit Colombia, Diana and Felipe met with her to share their dream, and to see if MMN could help. She told them that traditionally MMN only helped Latino missionaries to go to other Latin American countries. That was not what they wanted to hear. Their dream was Africa.

Secondly, the process of sending mission workers from the USA involves a missionary support team and a number of other requirements that Diana and Felipe could not meet from Colombia. Special arrangements had to be made to consider their candidacy. Who would sponsor them? Who would support them?

Before she left as a bit of an afterthought, Linda took their picture. She promised that she would tell Steve Wiebe-Johnson, MMN’s Africa director, about their interest. Months went by with no word from MMN. They figured Linda probably hadn’t even told Steve about them. Diana and Felipe felt like their dream was going down in flames. Diana buckled down on her university studies and Felipe got a job as the first paid youth pastor in their church.

Just as they began making alternative plans for their future, word came from Steve that MMN had an assignment for them in Benin, West Africa. A Mennonite Church in Burgos, Spain, had begun a school project in Benin called “La Casa Grande.” They appealed to MMN for mission workers with skills in teaching and agriculture. These were exactly the skill sets that Diana and Felipe had.

The four connecting points on a world map

Everyone involved in the process recognized the phenomenal work of the Spirit to bring all of these elements together. A Spanish-speaking congregation in Spain inviting a Spanish-speaking couple from Colombia to be missionaries in a French-speaking African country with the aid of a mission agency in North America. Each partner contributed to the funding of this endeavor. Pesos from Colombia combined with Euros from Spain, Dollars from the USA and to CFA Francs in Benin to make God’s work possible. To make Diana and Felipe’s dream come true. Oh, and the picture that Linda originally took in Colombia as an afterthought, became the picture on their prayer card.

Diana and Felipe are doing a tour of the USA after which they will visit the sponsoring church in Burgos, Spain, then on to Benin to begin their three-year assignment. Their faces glow with excitement and gratitude for their improbable dream coming true. A Dioscidencia.

 

Diana and Felipe gathering with friends recently in Harrisonburg, VA
during their USA tour on the way to Benin

I am recounting the story they shared with us and other friends here in Harrisonburg, VA. I apologize in advance if I misrepresented any of the parts of their story. If you want to contribute to this remarkable ministry you can do so by sending a check to Mennonite Mission Network, PO Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515, Benin ministry or connect online at www.MennoniteMission.net/Donate

A Still Small Voice

 “And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper.” 1 Kings 9:11-12 (NIV) (In other versions called a “still small voice.”)

Newspaper headlines after
the tornado that ripped through Hesston.

In March of 1990 I was living in Hesston, Kansas, when a powerful F5 tornado ripped through, destroying a third of the town. I watched from my basement window as debris whirled around the black cloud that passed only two blocks to the north west of my house. Although only one life was lost, many people suffered significant damage to their properties and the psychological scars cut deep. It was an extremely frightening event.

Torre Latinoamericana in Mexico City
from the sidewalk.

In April of 2012, I was with a group of students in Mexico City looking at the street below from the observation deck on the 44th story of La Torre Latinoamericana, one of the tallest building in the city. Suddenly the building began to rock significantly. It was more than the gentle sway when a strong wind buffets such a building. Below, people were scurrying out of buildings like rats fleeing a sinking ship. We were stuck in a skyscraper in the middle of a major earthquake. Even though there was little damage nor loss of life from the earthquake, it was an extremely frightening event.

In June of 1994, my family had just moved to Harrisonburg, VA. Esther had bread in the oven while we all were huddled in the family room in the basement watching a TV show. Suddenly, the smoke alarm in the kitchen went off. We hurried to the kitchen to see smoke billowing out of the oven. Soon the whole upstairs was engulfed with smoke. We called 911, and miraculously our neighbor was monitoring his scanner and rushed over to our house long before the fire trucks arrived. He was a volunteer firefighter and knew exactly what to do to contain the blaze to our oven. Apparently accumulated grease in the oven by the former owners caught fire and except for the quick action of our neighbor, our house could have been burned to the ground. It was an extremely frightening event.  

I was at a silent retreat in rural Pennsylvania. A group of about 40 contemplatives huddled in a small room practicing centering prayer for 20 minutes. I was used to practicing silence alone, in an isolated place, not with a group of people. I expected lots of distractions with so many people in the room. However, the silence in the room, despite the presence of so many people, was so thick you could slice it with a knife. Time stood still. The hunger for God in that small space was palpable. I was moved to tears. When the chimes sounded signaling the end of the twenty minutes, I could hardly believe it. I wanted to remain in silence, united with forty other souls basking in the eternal embrace of God’s love. It was an extremely rewarding event.

My personal life has not only gone through literal tornados, earthquakes and fires, as described above, but also many emotional upheavals. I often wished I could hear the voice of God speak to me in dramatic forms like in the wind, an earthquake or a fire. Like Elijah, I needed a direct message from God telling me what to do during my times of emotional stress and uncertainty. In spite of the wake-up calls that God gave me in the literal winds, earthquake and fire, they were not events that helped me to find the message I needed to hear from God. Indeed, the fear those events produced made me aware of the awesomeness of God’s presence in nature and sovereignty, but not the inner voice I needed to hear to assure me that I was indeed made in “God’s image and likeness,” and that I was “beloved of God.”

The event that spoke to me more directly was the “sound of sheer silence” (NRSV) experienced at the silent retreat I also described above. What is “sheer silence?” It is: utter silence, complete silence, total silence, and absolute silence, to use synonyms from the dictionary.

Few of us ever experience such silence. We are surrounded by noise. We are scared of silence. When we enter a room and are alone, we turn on the TV, a radio or a streaming music service to keep us company. “Sheer silence” makes us afraid. We are afraid that we must face the inner demons that surface in silence. Our culture supplies us with many noisemakers beyond those used to celebrate the New Year.

Throughout the silence that I experienced during the centering prayer exercise, I felt a unity with those around me that I had never experienced before in the same way. There were numerous denominations in attendance, and I’m sure many different interpretations of scripture and political persuasions. That didn’t keep us from being one in silence, and I believe in mind.

The “still small voice” that I heard in silence challenged me not only to spend more time in silence, but also to find unity within myself and with others. There are myriad voices within our psyches from our socialization that pull us in many different directions. In fact, when we are tormented by them, they could easily be represented symbolically by the wind, the earthquake and the fire. To still those voices, and to try to attain wholeness within (unity), we need silence.

Perhaps God speaks to us through a storm or some earth-shattering event. In my experience, however, God has spoken most clearly and at the same time most enigmatically, through the “sheer silence,” or the “still small voice.”

A True Friend

The summer I turned three, my family moved off the family farm (now Greenfield Restaurant and Bar for those familiar with Lancaster Co., PA) to become town dwellers in New Holland, PA. We lived on Locust Street in the first house (click on the link) in a duplex. Except for the fact that the duplexes weren’t connected together, our block comprised of what could be described as row houses on both sides of the street.

We were the only Mennonite family to live on the street, so we met quite a few interesting families in the neighborhood, including a Hawaiian family whom my father befriended. The man had just been released from jail for involuntary manslaughter due to an automobile accident, and my dad took him under his wing to help the transition back to life on the outside.

One of the other diverse families lived eight doors down the block from us. They were Catholic. They had a son Paul who was my age. If you grew up in the 50’s, I probably don’t need to define for you how most non-Catholic evangelicals, including Mennonites, viewed Catholics.

Paul and I became inseparable friends. He was an only child and his parents doted him with all the wordily goods children our age wanted. Our family consisted of four and grew to seven before we moved. Needless to say, there weren’t many extras at our house, so I spent all my time at Paul’s house. I remember my brother desperately wanting a baseball glove like all the other neighborhood boys. Since we couldn’t afford such a luxury, my mom sewed together a glove out of old material. My brother was so proud of the glove he ran right out to play, slapping his fist to form a pocket to catch a ball in. The other boys laughed him right off the field.

Paul had a sand box in his back yard, and we moved endless amounts of dirt with his front loader and dump truck. We played cowboys and Indians. He wore the chaps and strapped his pistol around his waist and he gave me the bows and arrows. He had a tent, so we spent a number of summer nights sleeping outside. I do remember the first night was a bit frightening. We heard a noise and got scared and ran home.

I can still visualize and smell his house. It was a mixture of cigarette smoke and beer—two smells totally foreign to me. Upstairs there were statues scattered around. In their basement was a workshop where his dad spent his free time working on various projects. And they had a TV! Of course, Mennonites didn’t have TV, so I would go over to his house to watch cartoons on Saturday mornings.

Other that a few Western shows, where we learned how to authentically play cowboys and Indians, we didn’t spend much time watching TV. We were too busy playing. The wide expanse of land on the other side of our house gave plenty of space for exploring. In the summer, the empty field was usually filled with corn. In and out of that we would run, inventing games as we went.

On the top of the hill behind my house was a church and a large graveyard. We remember Memorial Day ceremonies, where a troop of soldiers would come and after playing some patriotic songs, would shoot their guns into the air. Once we sneaked into the church basement through an open window. We played hide-and-seek in the Sunday school rooms.

In spite of the differences between Mennonites and Catholics, my parents never forbade our activities and friendship. Perhaps they warned me about the dangers of TV, or other things, but I don’t remember.

Our first separation came when school began. I went to the local elementary school for first grade, and he went to a private Catholic school. We could handle that, because we still had afternoons and summers together.

Our biggest separation came before I entered the third grade. Our family, having grown out of the little row-house, bought a house and moved to Goodville, some five miles to the east of New Holland. It was the summer that I turned eight. This was a bigger challenge. I was devastated. I can still vividly remember a dream I had that we had returned to New Holland, and when I woke up I was distraught. I wanted my dream to be real. I missed my friend Paul more than anything else.

One day, about a month after our move and just before school began, there was a knock at our side door. It was my friend Paul! He had ridden his bicycle, without his parents’ permission, all the way to Goodville to visit me! Five miles on a 20” wheel bicycle was quite a feat for an eight-year old. This was how much our friendship meant to him!

My mother, half in shock, called his mother to tell her where her son was. Paul’s mother was also in shock. They came in their car to retrieve him and the bicycle. I don’t know what punishment he received for his little excursion, but I can imagine it wasn’t pleasant.

Illustration by Maurice Sendak from a vintage ode to friendship
by Janice May Udry

I don’t remember having any contact with Paul after that incident. I returned to New Holland for high school, but he continued attending a Catholic school.

I’ve had many friends since Paul. But I don’t remember ever being as devoted to any other male friend as with Paul. This despite huge differences in upbringing and faith traditions. The innocence of childhood with the lack of socialized prejudices—what a refreshing reminder for an adult.

Have you had a best friend?