Our new church assistant arrived a couple of days ago. Gentle is in his mid-twenties and has joined us from Ghana. He’ll be here for a year to help the church in all sorts of ways and, hopefully, to learn something of our culture and more of our Lord.
Last year’s church assistant, Gambit, was here and we were sitting around the kitchen table discussing the recent tragic loss of the Joker’s much-loved toy dog (don’t panic, a replacement has now been sorted, thanks to eBay.fr). Both Gambit and I had tales of lost soft toys in our childhoods and then I asked Gentle if he’d had a favourite toy when he was growing up.
‘Not really. In Ghana, children don’t have toys,’ he said. ‘There isn’t the money for toys.’
I looked around my chaotic kitchen, stuffed with children’s toys and games and felt a mix of emotions – guilt, gratitude and excitement at the prospect of learning more of life in Ghana, where kids have no toys but the Sunday school classes are packed.
The Vicar's Wife 
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