Lessons from India, Part 1

I love my life. In just 8 days away from my life, God showed me an incredible new perspective on the things and people I take for granted every day. Now that I am home, toilet paper, a hot shower, and a cold glass of milk prompt me to gratitude. After a week around Nepali children and those I met at the Chetna colony and even Grace Children's home, my children look plump to me. God, why me and my family? Why have you blessed us so tremendously? There is no other place like the US.

Today I begin a series of blogs about our trip to West Bengal, India. It was going to be one blog but I cannot fit all that God taught me into a condensed snippet, so it will probably be one a day for about a week. I hope you'll tune in. Thanks.

I must start by thanking everyone who prayed for us while we took our recent trip to India. I felt the specific, consistent lifting of prayers on my behalf and for the team. That brings me to the subject of lessons I learned in India, the first of which is:
1. Prayer is the beginning, the means, and the end.
Sleeping was a challenge when we first arrived and I spent an entire night laying in bed, praying for the hearts of the people, the skills of our doctors, and the safety of the team. When assignments were given Monday, I was placed in the prayer room. In my visions of what the trip was going to be like, thinking we would have a prayer "tent," I imagined birds singing, warm sunshine, and a bright red tent with long tables. In reality, we were in a basement with two windows (actually just two large holes in the wall) on the backside of the building sitting on rickety old benches. It was dark and cold most of the time.


My God is the one brings the Light of the World to the darkest corners of the earth! Sometimes people sat shivering listening as I shared the gospel and it was hard to continue in light of their physical discomfort. I had nothing to offer them but the message of Jesus Christ and that was exactly where I needed to be. Now I can do nothing more for them but pray and that's exactly what I need to do.