Hatibandha Village, Hatibandha People

Hatibhanda Village is in Bangladesh, about 3 hard driving hours outside of Dhaka. By the time I arrived, I felt beaten up by the travel and the attempt to protect myself from being constantly thrown about inside the vehicle. It jerked in all directions, bounced over pot holes, slammed the brakes. The car did drive almost all the way to the village this time. The previous and only time I came before, we had to walk along the soft, slippery road (rainy season) , me holding a man's arm on both sides. The children for our new home gathered happily to meet me for pictures. Each one has a difficult story of the death or abandonment of parents. Each one now lives with a widowed parent who barely survives, or a step parent who abuses him/ her or relatives eager to be relieved of them. They need to be out of the situations now, but I cannot do it now. I can only move it forward one step at a time. We need to build up sponsorship support first, then build the house, then move towards a better life with solid discipleship for these children. There is a small church planted in this village,with a young, faithful pastor. But we will literally be building the church with this home. We will train up 20 well grounded leaders, who will then be lights back to their own families and throughout the village. Hopefully, some pastors and missionaries will come from the group, but the Lord needs laborers and vegetable sellers too. Now, I am back in the partners home in Dhaka. The sounds outside are similar to any city in Asia. Men are walking through the streets "calling" out whatever they are selling, looking for customers, trying to bring home enough for the night to bring a meal for their families. Horns are blowing as vehicles make their way through the streets. Water is running from someplace. Children are laughing and playing. Life is going on as it does every day. I am the one who is different-- a middle aged woman from central Virginia, trying to do something to bring the gospel to people in a poor village, hours away from the capital city where I am sleeping tonight. When I return to US, I will work on the support that will enable us to provide a home and bring the children into it. Bangla beleivers are ready to care for them and teach them. We will invest in the precious small ones and also raise up some witnesses and leaders for this place. My role is actually the smallest part, but it does not happen without me. Some ministry does not happen without you. What is it? We all need to find what the Lord has for us to do, and serve it faithfully.

Family prayer time

Here in Nepal, the electricity comes only a few hours each day. As I share life in the Nepali home, I shiver with the rest of them as the temperature drops in the evening. It is February and there is no heat in the home. Our littlest one, 4 years old, has a fever. The electricity clicked off a few hours ago, but that did not prevent us from having a good dinner, cooked with propane. Now, the family is huddled around a battery lamp, trying to see their Bibles and read aloud, each one in turn. Lord is honored in this home and words of thanks are lifted up to Him in the midst of circumstances that are very common and ordinary here. Some requests were certainly made to the Lord, but I doubt that electricity or heat were even mentioned.

Beautiful Bricks

I never really noticed bricks before this trip, but now I see them everywhere. Bricks are the pieces that fit together to make a building for teaching and worship. The building provides a place for the people to gather and a place for ministry to happen. For the last two weeks, I have been on site with 11 American men, who were contributing their time and skill and brute strength to making a church building for our people in a Nepali village. It fills my little brain to think of all the advance work that has gone into preparation for this missions venture both in Nepal and US, but there is a special feeling of satisfaction when a plan comes together and WORKS. The days are completed now and the work on the church continues. There is much left to be done, but for two weeks America and Nepal worked side by side. Folks walking along the road stopped to watch. It was not something you see every day. Before much longer, the building will stand and the village will multiply throughout the village. We hope that many will come to know the Lord. Many will grow through the teachings given. Pastors will learn and fellowship and encourage one another. And most of all, we hope that the heart of our dear Lord will be blessed by the worship. Bricks built the church, each one carefully laid in the correct place and mortared down to serve with those around us. Our lives and our ministries are built in. The same way- one piece at a time.

Life is about to change

As I write, it is late on Friday night, and into the last 48 hours before I will leave once again for Nepal. That I love being in Nepal is without question. I do dread the long, miserable hours in an airplane seat that are necessary to get there, but I have done it many times before and I hope many more trips still to come. What I am pondering tonight are all the ways my life changes when I move from the US side of the ministry to the Nepal side-- or any of our ministry countries. My schedule for the day changes. My tasks change. My food changes. The language is different. Even my name is different. Everything is different and I love it. I know that what I do when I sit in front of my desk in US is very important for the goal of bringing help to the people, sponsorship for kids, funding for projects. But I do not need to consider very long to know which life I personally enjoy more. I begin longing for Nepal as soon as I get on an airplane to leave I am NEVER ready to leave, but tonight I realize that I do not feel ready to leave the US either. It almost feels like an imminent death. My life here is about to end-- for a month. Someone else will need to cover the day to day things that I normally do. Life here will continue- but without me. I will be living and serving in a different way, in a different place. It reminds me so much of heaven. I do long for the time when I will be with the Lord. I am sure I will have wonderful work to do there and I will love it more than here. I am ready to go in most sense, but not so excited about the events of passing from here to there. And-- I do not really want to leave here quite yet. There are a few more things I want to do, ducks to line up, T's to cross. But the time will come for each of us, will it not? Ready or not. There are a lot of people in Nepal who are not ready. They do not have the reason to long for eternity thatI have. Hope I can help just a little bit more as I go this time.

He added to His Church

This past week and again tomorrow, we are doing medical clinics in poor villages. We do this kind of ministry for several reasons. (1) Because the Lord did it in His ministry. (2) Because the people have many health problems and meeting the need shows our love for them. (3) Because it gives the pastors a good opportunity to meet and talk with people, who will often welcome him into their homes thereafter (4) Because once the people have stepped inside the church and met some of the believers, it is easier for them to join a worship service. We do distribute evangelistic tracts and the pastors pray with many who are open to that, for their health issues. We do not normally preach or give an invitation, trusting the spiritual results to come slowly,probably after we are packed up and gone. Today,  my partner casually shared with me that a family has been added to the church in the place where we held a clinic a week ago. "Really?"  I thought. "That is wonderful." I listened attentively to everything he said about it. The family were or are Hindus. They came to the clinic to see the doctor, and the pastor spent some time with them and prayed. They asked questions and expressed a desire to follow Jesus. They returned today to join the worship. "Wow. That is the reason we are doing this," I thought and I started thinking of ways to share it in a report to folks in the US. I wanted to ask (but did not) how many individuals were in the family. To Americans, "family" usually means two adult and 2-3 kids, but here in Nepal, the word, "family", might mean grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins. How many people can we count? This shows the benefit of the medical project to this who help us with the funding.  I wondered why my partner  did not seem quite as excited as I was. Of course, he was pleased, but he was not going to add these people to any list or "count" for his record. Why not? (1) Because interest does not equate to a new regenerated believer. We need to wait to see if the seed grows or if it gets plucked away or drys up in the sun. (2) Because this is not an uncommon event for the partner. He works and he sees God give an increase (3) Because even if the family is ten people, all saved and faithful and growing,  my partner is not going to claim credit for it. Acts 2:47. The Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.

Monkey on the porch rail

I did not get a photo of the monkey that day, but it looked very much like this one.

One would expect that a monkey running loose in an American neighborhood would draw some attention, but likewise it is not an every day event in Nepal. Seeing monkeys in wooded areas as we drive is fairly common, about as common as seeing a deer in Virginia. But they do not usually come out of the jungle to the homes where I am living....so we all stood at the window this morning to watch as a this creature jumped from roof to porch to lattice to window grills among our house and others nearby. He was not small and cute. He was a mature male, perhaps 50-60 pounds. His face, in my opinion, was quite ugly and he did not have a happy expression. His  limbs were long and powerful. I felt no desire to have any sort of confrontation with him. He landed on our porch rail and waited for a while, looking around as if not sure what to do-- but in no way intimidated. He jumped to the neighbor's porch, causing their dog to go wild. The neighbor hurriedly captured her dog and took him inside. The monkey was certainly willing to fight for the right of passage and he would have won the battle quickly against that pooch. Monkeys are known to frequently carry rabies, so we were ready to pull our dog in as well, if he headed back towards us. A few days ago, we were in a small, one room, village church, the site of our medical clinic. Because there was a lull in patients coming and my back was aching, I went inside the church to lie down on the floor for a few minutes. It was a hot day and both doors were left standing open. Though I missed most of the words, I could hear the urgency in the Nepali voices around me. Looking up, I saw a small snake with a foot on it. I do not like snakes, but I did not feel any sense of terror. The situation seemed to be under control, and it was only a small one, a baby snake, I thought. Why all the excitement? I did wonder that a man happened to have his rubber sandal on, since all of us inside the church were bare footed. Later, I learned that the man was called in from outside BECAUSE he had his shoes on. The snake, though small, was at it's adult size and it was one of the most dangerous vipers--comparable to the King cobra, they said. It's strike is quick and it delivers a neurotoxin for which there is no need to go to the hospital for anti-venom. The victim cannot be expected to live more than a few minutes. It was only a couple feet from my head as I lay resting. We can plan and prepare and try to anticipate, but dangers still come. Perhaps the greatest threats are those from within. Our ministries seem safe and secure and all in harmony at the moment, but we have seen many threats in the past. Some of them hurt us and some were averted. Certainly more will come. it is easier to pray for what we know, than for the things we do not see coming. But please pray-- for the Lord's continuing protection over our people and our ministry.

Beauty in the slums

We walked through narrow, filthy paths among the poor of the poor in Kathmandu. Makeshift shelters built of literally anything found on the streets made up a community of humanity drawn together by their common poverty. Children wore dirty clothes. They had runny noses and tangled mats of hair. Most doors, if there was a door, stood open to reveal tiny living spaces with very few possessions of any kind. How did people end up here? The answer in many cases, was that they were born here, grew up here and without skills or education, just continued on- surviving as best they could. We were told that the beggars of Nepal live here, but no one approached us with any request. In their own way, they honored the culture of Asian hospitality to a guest who was on their turf. Our partner showed us a building that was better than the rest and we ducked inside to find several rooms with ceiling high enough to stand. Rows of wooden benches lined each of three rooms. The benches were rough and fragile, like the children, but someone had spent some time and what funds were available to build them. This was a school. American children sit in classrooms filled with books, maps, educational materials of all kinds and electricity. These classrooms had almost nothing, except the benches. My partner was serving a huge task, but one that could make a real difference for these children. A few steps away from the school, we came upon another place that could make a real difference for the slum community. It was a church, newly built and amazingly beautiful. Its beauty was not in décor or furnishings. It was a very plain, one room structure. But it was clean, fresh painted, solidly built. It contained a simple pulpit, some musical instruments, a hard carpet floor covering. It was a house of worship in the middle of the slums. I felt humbly grateful to learn that Allow contributions to the slum ministry had been used to build the church and it is our privilege to be a part of this work. The Awana club is up to 90 children. These are children who formerly had nothing in life, except begging. Now, they go to school and to Awana club. The church formed from the Awana ministry. As the leaders worked with the children, it led to relationships with the parents. Praise to our Lord for what He is doing among these needy people Praise His Name that he care for these “least” of the world, many of whom have come to know Him. What we do to the LEAST of His brethren, we do to Him.