.:We had NO clue...:.

Today I found some older videos in our GHI video file.  I ran across this one from our first trip to India in October 2010.  It's amazing how much I feel like we've grown and changed and so much has happened since that first trip!  

We had NO clue at the time how much God would break our heart for those people and their need for Jesus.

We had NO clue how much God would grow our marriage and unite us more as "one".

We had NO clue how much we'd fall in love with those children and want to rescue our own from there one day.

We had NO clue how we'd come back ready to quit our jobs and rearrange our lifestyle to fit His.

We had NO clue that it would be the beginning of a big adventure God had for us that would permeate and influence our time together, our wallets, and our future plans.

We had NO clue how much saying "Yes" to going on this trip would make us fall so much more in love with Jesus and His grace and power!

Praising God today for His path...inviting you to join us at anytime!

.:Last Day in India for a little while:.

"For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it"  Matthew 16:25

1/7 - Last Day!
Well it's our last day here! My mind is so full of so many emotions - sad mostly.  I always get this feeling towards the end - excited for the smells and comforts of home but sad to leave such a needy country and such opportunity to serve.  When I am here I'm constantly humbled and amazed by the need but also by the believers who are meeting the needs and being the hands and feet of Jesus.  

Sudi, for example, is a single woman my age who has adopted a child and is praying for the funds to finish the children's home she has started to build.  She also has started a church for beggars and "untouchables" who beg at the temple doors. Her mother, brother, and sister are all church planters as well.

Sheelini - my new favorite friend is one year older than me.  She traveled with us all week to villages and served by translated and answering ALL of us girls' many questions about the culture.  Our team fell in love with her true beauty in Christ, her servanthearted attitude, and her friendly humor.  She was denied a student visa to get her Master's in Public Health Administration here in the US but believes that it is God's will for her to stay in India.  She was working as a physical therapist in a hospital in India but has recently followed the Lord's calling of her into ministry.  She will be working on a special project with India Christian Ministry that I will be blogging about soon!

Then there's Hannah - sweet mother of Evan and wife to Su Kimar.  Hannah is a quiet and gentle spirit but is a BOLD follower of Christ!  She has quit her job to follow the call into ministry and is now working for India Christian Ministry as the village development coordinator.  She'll be communicating with Global Hope India and helping us connect with the neediest villages in India.

And finally, Sarah - another gentle spirit who follows the call of the Lord in utter abandon.  God gave her the call to plant children's homes for healthy and unhealthy children.  She is a mom to 5 biological children and knows many of her 200+ children's names who live in her children's home!  I was challenged by her heart when we met - she definitely has a vision for caring for the least of these.  Check out her blog and stories on her blog 

Talk about being blown away and challenged?! Meeting these women inspired me to get off my butt and MOVE!  God has been enlarging my vision and heart for this nation in ways I never expected Him to.  My heart longs to help provide mothers and fathers for these children I've met.  There are SO many here who need love and to know that they were born ON PURPOSE for huge reasons!  I've sensed the Lord calling me to give up even more, to do more for these children who could so easily be my own flesh and blood.  My heart breaks and my stomach is queasy when I think of the baby girls who are just thrown into the bushes, literally, because they are unwanted.  I know that this saddens the Lord much more than it does me, and I'm excited about how God will help me to be a voice for these forgotten children!

.:Toothbrushes and Cotton Candy:.

1.5.12/Day 5
Thank you LORD for small reminders/revelations today of your love and goodness!  
Yesterday - we went in the morning way out to a village (2 hours from Ongole, our base city) and did a medical camp.  The need was great and it was amazing to see them get so excited at just the simple things we gave out like soap, toothpaste, and toothbrushes.  Before we left the village, the pastor whose home is under the church we did the medical camp in made us lunch and I was amazed and so happy to see that him and his family took in an additional 9-10 children to their own.  The orphan boys showed us their organized bunk bed room! It seems as though many pastors in India take in more children than their biological - what a wonderful example of how the church takes care of orphans there.

Then we traveled forever (it seemed) to a very jungle like village.  When we pulled up to the tiny church, the people were waiting and waving.  They giggle and smiled as we got out of the vehicle, acting like they had never seen white people before.  Since many couldn't speak english, to "play" with the kids we started the repeat-after-me game, where the kids would do as us girls did.  They giggled more and it was so fun to see the joy in their faces at a shared game despite the language differences.

We later led what GHI calls "Kid Jams" - where we shared a bible story and then completed salvation bracelets to remind the children that Jesus came to die for them and have relationship with them.  When we pulled out simple gifts for the children (goody bags, t-shirts, toothpaste & toothbrushes), it became crazy as so many hands were grabbing at me!  I was overwhelmed by the neediness but the Lord reminded me in that moment of my own neediness, just like the kids', is so great.  It was an in-my-face moment of how much I need Jesus' love and nourishment like these kids do.  Although we live worlds apart and our worlds are oh-so different, I need Jesus just as much as these kids do.

 1.6.12/Day 6
Today we only had 1 medical camp (if I am remembering correctly/all the days run together!).  Since I don't have much medical expertise, I spent most of the time handing out goody bags or playing with the kids who came to the camp.  At lunch time, many children from this village came out during their lunch to check out the white people in town.  Around this same time, we found a man selling cotton candy on the streets.  We bought all 30 small bags of pink cotton candy and shared them with the children (worth $4 for all of that cotton candy!).  Kevin and I then led an informal "kid jam" session and shared Jesus with them.  The one thing that stood out to me was the amazement in the children's eyes and the fact that when we asked them if they had a bible or had heard about Jesus, they said no!  Oh the things we take for granted...

.:Fat:.

"Courage is not about knowing the path.  It is about taking the first step." - Katie Davis

1-3-12/2nd day in India - 

Can't get used to writing "January" as the date again.  It's so hard to believe it's January when it's so hot like summer here.  Getting in the shower tonight I was thinking how FAT I feel when we're here.  I love the food here and we snack a lot.  We don't eat veggies much here but fill ourselves with carbs in the form of rice and noodles to avoid our mouth being on fire with the spicy foods!  The Lord reminded me of how spiritually FAT we as Americans are.  We have everything we need to have a close walk with the Lord but yet sit around often "fat and lazy" and comfortable and often don't get off our butt to "work out our own salvation" (Phillipians 2:12) yet just sit back to receive more from the Lord.  In India, I am so aware of the neediness everywhere that I see the complete opposite. 

      

I struggle to understand at times why I was born to such physical (and even spiritual) richness when my friends in India lack things simple as clean water, sanitation, or even a hug everyday!  Many of them live under blue tarps made into tents, work under tin roofs full of asbestos selling their produce (if they even have a job), and some even have to wait up to 3-4 days before they can have a new tank of clean water to live off of.  When I think of the disparity and lack of fairness, I also thing of the RESPONSIBILITY we have to share to gospel and care for the poor/forgotten/abandoned.  

What IF we used our excess "fatness" if you will, to "feed" those across the world who "have not"?  What if instead of thinking of our American dreams and getting higher up on the chain of command that we pour out of our excess?  Maybe you say that those needy don't deserve it - but maybe we need to remember that even JESUS reached down to us in our spiritual poverty and filthy rags and sat us, ME, at HIS table of abundance and joy?! It could've been any of us born to poverty...

.:Taking Care of Babies:.

 

This post starts the beginning of some of my journal from the trip we just took to India.  I felt led to share with you all what the Lord showed me and how He is changing my heart through my involvement in India missions.  Don't ever pray the prayer "break my heart for what breaks Yours" to our God unless you mean it.  He WILL do it. 

All I can say is WOW! If you haven't read this book YOU SHOULD! I finished Katie's book above on the long plane ride to India this time around.   Katie Davis is such an inspiration to me - her book and story wrecked my world and had me praying for the Lord to "enlarge my vision" when it comes to HIS plan, not mine, for my life.  I highly encourage you to order it off of Amazon and/or read her blog here

Her book really fueled the fire in my heart for adoption.  After reading, I was left with so many questions to ask the Lord about my life.  What is next for me/us?  How do you want me to be involved in the adoption crisis in the world?  What would Jesus do if He was in my situation?

" I get to provide a home for children who feel threatened, lost, and unwanted.  Most of all, I get to love children who don't know love otherwise.  I get to accept them for who they are.  I get to present them with my love and then teach them of the Father's extravagant love"   - Katie

THIS is why my heart longs to adopt.  The beauty of adoption is providing a means for allowing a child to understand the undeserved favor of the Lord!  It is a direct example and representation of what God did for us - adopted us as sons and daughters into His family for no other reason than that he loves us!