"Support Raising"

I stumbled across this email I wrote way back when I was support raising. I thought I would share... (and yes this really happened to me)


Okay, so I just heard some interesting news that I thought might give you a chuckle. And since “a merry heart doeth good like medicine” I thought I would share.

The pastor’s wife from a church I just spoke at gave me a call this week. She told me that during their services there’s a translator for the Spanish speaking members. The week I shared they had a brand new translator. The new translator was slightly nervous because she only grew up in a bilingual home, Spanish was never her first language.

Well it turns out that she did a superb job the entire time… except when I got up to share. Yes, that’s right I was the only one to stump her. The reason? I used the word “support.” Not having much time to ponder the proper Spanish word for support, the girl said the first word that popped into her mind (though she thought it sounded a little off). Not knowing of course that the translator didn’t know the proper word for “support” I kept saying it over and over and over again, emphasizing how important it was for me to get more support. As I kept saying “support” the translator kept translating and thinking to herself, “This doesn’t quite sound right.” So about half way through she switched to saying that I needed money instead of support.

That week at a ladies Bible study another bilingual woman asked the translator how she had done on Sunday. The girl replied that it all went well, except for one word that had stumped her, and she proceeded to explain. “What word did you use?” The woman asked. When told, she burst into laughter. The translator had used the Spanish word for bra. Yes… I shared in a Sunday morning service in front of an entire congregation and it was translated that I couldn’t go to Italy unless people helped me get more bras. How embarrassing.

Then the pastor’s wife who called to tell me this, sweetly informed me that if I started getting gift cards to Victoria’s Secret I would know why.

So I guess you never know what might happen while “support” raising.

~Heather