On American soil

Jai Masih Ki! Praise the Lord! We have arrived in Newark after a very interesting and long trip. We have one more flight until we are home. 

The journey so far has included a blown out tire on our bus, a little trouble finding the parking area for our bus, a 2 1/2 hour delay for our first flight, and a few other bumps along the way. But it also included several moments of noticing God’s mercy and love. He has carried us through al of the trials of this journey and has continued to sustain us. 

Thank you again for your prayers. We are looking forward to sharing our stories with you. 

See you soon! 

Your India Mission Team 

Journeying home

The journey home has begun. We have spent all day in a bus driving to Delhi. We will board a plane headed back to the other side of the globe. (Pre-posting revision ... we couldn’t get WiFi so we are posting this from 32,000 feet and more than 2 1/2 hours behind scheduled flight departure.)

We are eager to be home to see our families and friends and to share all of our experiences with you. But we are also sad to be leaving these great people. We have shared so much with them and the bonds continue to be strengthened. 

We will fly home. They will get on the same bus and drive back north to their home. Our parting is sad but we know we all have much to do in our own communities. Our mission resolve has been strengthened and encouraged by the zeal of our Christian brothers and sisters here in India. 

An example of the encouragement we’ve received is to see how the Dasuya community is softening to the message of the Gospel. Vision told us of a neighbor that was drawn to the church because of the eyeglass clinic. She had many wrong ideas about the beliefs and teachings of Christians, but she felt comfortable talking to Vision because of the open arms the church was showing the community. Vision was able to sit and talk with the woman and clear up those misconceptions. The woman was very open to hearing of God’s love and said she wanted to come back for worship but her husband wouldn’t let her go for 3 hours (yes, the church is so on fire that they gladly praise our Jesus for hours). Vision gently told her she was welcome for any amount of time, even if it was only for 15 minutes. The woman was excited and said she would be joining them for worship. 

It’s so encouraging to hear how small acts of kindness and a willingness to listen opens doors for people to respond to the Holy Spirit’s whisper in their hearts. 

Please pray for this neighbor and for all the people that heard of Jesus’ love over the last week. We thank you for your prayers for our safe journey home. And we look forward to seeing you soon!

Blessings, 

Your India Mission Team 

Team pondering

Well, this blog post started about 30 hours ago when we were discussing who would write yesterday’s post after our last day of clinic. Ray had a great story he wanted included and we got to talking about the day and the week. We decided it would be fun to share a few thoughts from different members of the team. So, here we go...

Ray’s translator was Rosie and I noticed in the afternoon that she was wearing a winter coat inside he clinic. It struck me as odd because I was sweating. I asked Ray jokingly if the Americans were freezing her out with the fans. She told Ray that she wasn’t feeling well. He asked if she wanted to go home and she declined. He said as the afternoon went on, it was obvious that she felt terrible and he tried to make her go home. She replied that she was working for the Lord. What an incredible young woman with incredible faith and a willingness to do what god calls her to do even when she’s feeling her worst. 

Next are a few thoughts from Clay:

I would like to take a minute and thank my roommate on the trip. I don't know how many of you know Ray Riggs and his lovely bride Tracy, but if you don't you should seek them out and introduce yourself. 

I'm an 8:15er. He plays in the Prayer and praise. To my knowledge we have never met before. He and Tracy are professional musicians. Ray is a retired firefighter EMT and fits perfectly into our team for prescreening clinic candidates for infectious diseases. While he fills that slot so well he also fits into the team, which he only joined so we could hit our minimum of 8. He can follow the pack or when asked, take the lead. He spoke from the pulpit with about 10 minutes advanced warning. He prayed with the sick and took pictures for all to see. Something about Ray makes the locals want to get a picture with him. I'm not sure if it's because he is White, wears a Detroit baseball hat, carries a camera around, or just that infectious smile. Maybe the locals can see the heart of the man deep inside.

Regardless, Ray is da man that stands in the gap. He tells a great story or two or three. We love them all. He loves people and has a heart of Gold for God

Lord, bless Ray and Tracy and their family in all that they do.  

Janet included the following thoughts to share:

     This trip has been an incredible experience. It is truly a land of striking contrast... big beautiful houses next to makeshift tent living, trucks on the roads with bike pedaled carts, every woman dressed in beautiful colored clothes in a land of dirt and brown, religious temples and shrines outnumbering churches. 

     Yet I have seen such a similarity in the people’s hearts. Every person expressed such thankfulness in receiving their eyeglasses, the young ladies serving as our translators working so hard to help us understand, the joy of the church members worshipping our God.  This is truly all about sharing God’s love and the gospel to a people so different from us, but so similar to us in need of His grace and salvation. I pray for their hearts to be changed as much as mine has been changed.

And Sandy added this:

Over the past several days, I watched as 8 individuals, each with different gifts and talents, come together and work as a well orchestrated team. Each with our designated task of serving at the eyeglass clinic. And, it reminded me how we, as the body of Christ, come together with different gifts and talents to serve others. This has truly been a life changing journey and I pray the seeds we have planted here in Punjab will grow and bare much fruit. 

The last day of clinic was our strongest day. We worked until the last person outside came through. Our grand totals for the week have us seeing 633 unique individuals who heard God’s love shared with them. And we distributed 846 pairs of glasses to those individuals. God is good!

Those 633 people now have the gift of better vision. But they have also have a greater gift! They heard the gospel of Jesus! They heard that Jesus loves them. They heard there is salvation through Jesus. There is no better gift than Jesus. 

So, you might ask if the eyeglass clinic really makes a difference in the community here. We ask the same thing. It makes a difference. While we don’t get to see all of the ripples from our 4 days of distributing eyeglasses, we get to hear little bits of how God has already moved. 

Pastor Daniel has a neighbor across the street that has been very opposed to his family and his ministry for many years. The person never speaks with respect to him and tried multiple times to get the police to stop the church from meeting here. That person came to the eyeglass clinic. And for the first time, she called him “Pastor.” She sought him and Vision out to specifically thank them for the eyeglasses. Did it make a difference? Was her heart softened a bit? I think the Holy Spirit is working in her heart. 

Vision shared other stories of other people that were impacted. Maybe we will share a few more stories in the coming days. 

For now, we are just a couple of hours away from departing here and beginning the journey home. We continue to thank you for your prayers, support, and love. Please also continue to pray that those 633 people would seek to know Jesus more and more. Pray for God’s love to be displayed to the many people of this great city. 

In His grace,

Your India Mission Team