What I Learned

On Friday night, August 3, we ladies were invited to give a presentation of our India trip to Fair Haven Primitive Baptist Church. After our presentation, Fair Haven's pastor, Brother Matt Strevel, asked each of us what we learned from our experiences in India. That was a very thought provoking question and one that I had pondered even before leaving for the trip, among others. My main question was: Has God called me to make this trip? Also, what is the purpose in going? What am I to learn from the trip and in what way am I to teach or to help the people of India? I believe that God called me to make the trip. I don't know that it was for one very important purpose or if it was for multitiple purposes - which is what I highly suspect. I believe that the main thing I learned was that we as American Christians need to be more involved with the worship services. We need to make a greater effort to assist and support our pastors and be less dependent on them to do all the work. Brother Guna is driven to serve Christ - that is obviously his main goal in life. He does it by prayerfully spreading the gospel and serving others. But Bro. Guna has a tremendous base of support. The people of India have very little but they are a very generous, giving people. They are a hard-working, prayerful people and they reach out to help others even when it would appear to our eyes that they are the ones in need. Bro. Guna, as dedicated as he is, could not do what he does without the help of those around him. He also has a tremendous amount of help from American Christians - and I know that God blesses us in those efforts as well. I also know that God is in control of all things and without Him we can do nothing. It is my prayer that we as American Christians would strive to do more with the many blessings God has bestowed upon us. When I say this, I condemn myself most of all. I need to pray more. I definitely need to visit the sick more. I need to study my Bible more. I need to be more active in worship services - come with a prayerful attitude ready to sing and pray and meditate on God's word. Every time I enter God's House, I need to ask myself, "Am I an active participant in the worship service, or am I here only as an observer?" That is an important point American Christians could learn from Indian Christians: to stop thinking that church growth and duty is solely the pastor's responsibility. We (that is, I) need to be striving for growth and opportunities to serve as well. If we worked as we should alongside our pastors, through God's grace we could truly turn the world upside down.

Wednesday 7/25/07

Wednesday morning we woke early and started packing for the return trip home. We drove to Salem and then boarded a train for Chennai. The train stops for only short periods and during this time all luggage and passengers must exit or board or get left behind. (Poor Suganthi told me she once had actually fallen underneath a moving train in a desperate effort to catch it.) Bro. Guna and Bro. Nixon rode with us – Bro. Guna all the way to Chennai and Bro. Nixon to Vellore to return to his home. His wife Jody is currently working at the Christian Medical Center (the large hospital located in Vellore) and he was returning to his wife and small son, named Chris. Bro. Nixon sat in the seat across from me and we took turns talking for about an hour about our Christian experience and how God had blessed us and our families. Bro. Nixon’s father had been Christian but he died when Bro. Nixon was just 3 years old. His mother raised him and she was Hindu. He became Christian as a young man and belonged to another denomination until about 2 years ago when he first heard the message of sovereign grace preached by Bro. Guna. He told Bro. Guna, “I do not believe that doctrine.” Bro. Guna gave him a copy of Bro. Zack Guess’s book on sovereign grace doctrine and Bro. Nixon read and studied it. He is now a very able Old Baptist minister. He told me that when he first became Christian, his response was more outward actions but little inward change. He believed in the Christian God, but knew that the doctrine he was being taught was not what the Christian Bible taught. When he came to the knowledge of God’s sovereignty, he said he finally had joy in his heart because he knew that doctrine lined up with everything in the Bible. Today he is a very happy man. I wish our church members could all meet him. I was surprised that Bro. Nixon spoke pretty fluent English because I had not noticed him speaking much English before that time. At the end of the conversation he told me it was a miracle we were speaking because he usually did not speak or understand English very well. When he left me and came back a while later we tried to make idle conversation and could barely communicate with one another. What an interesting conversation indeed!
We arrived in Chennai (a city of approx. 6,000,000 and formerly named Madras) at around 11:00 p.m. Indian time. (It had been a really LONG train ride – approx. 7 hours, although I did sleep a while with a migraine headache). We came in from the train station and saw a much more beautiful side of the city than the side we saw upon arrival. The airport is in a more rundown section of town and I wondered when we arrived that I saw almost no traffic lights in a city of 6,000,000. The traffic in the rundown section of town we were in on our first day in Chennai was AWFUL, but it wasn’t so bad on the return trip – nicer area with traffic lights and a more modern city. Anyway, we shopped in the Chennai airport for some beautiful Indian handbags, jade hand-carved elephants, and clothing items and then we left by plane at 2:00 a.m. for an almost 10 hour flight to Frankfurt, Germany. In Frankfurt, we had breakfast at McDonald’s (oooooh, wonderful!) and then really pigged out purchasing German chocolate – oh boy! There was not time in the Chennai airport to convert over my remaining rupees and I tried to convert it in Frankfurt, but against the Euro, I was going to lose about half its value. I told the cashier no thanks, but it wasn’t a lost endeavor because a young American serviceman was standing beside the cashier and Jill, Ashley, and I struck up a conversation with him. We found out that he lived only about an hour away from Jill in Alabama. Home was getting closer! Next we boarded the plane from Frankfurt to Charlotte, NC. I do not sleep well while traveling – whether by train, plane, or car – and the flight to Charlotte seemed to take FOREVER! We also had a lot of turbulence over the Atlantic and were told to remain in our seats with our seatbelts fastened for quite a bit of the trip – it made me quite sick at my stomach – actually, I think about all of our group felt pretty lousy on that flight. We arrived in Charlotte and it was actually ahead of time – no delays like we suffered on the trip over. We went through customs since this was our port of entry. We had to receive our luggage and re-check it for the short flight to Atlanta. On the flight to Atlanta, I think we all finally slept before we actually got off the ground and we were in Atlanta before I realized it where we were met by a bunch of warm, loving family members. We loaded up our luggage (no lost luggage this time) and Leah rode with Karen and me to exit 201 to pick up her car. We arrived home midnight Friday night and thank the Lord for a wonderful, safe trip and a comfortable bed on our return!

Tuesday 7/24/07

Tuesday morning we ate once more at Shevaroy’s. Per Karen’s recommendation, we had masala omelet which was out of this world. Bro. Guna and Bro. Nelson ate a more traditional Indian breakfast in their room, but then came to join us. Per Indian tradition, nothing is left on the plate and Bro. Nelson ate what we did not want so it would not be wasted. (I don’t know that he really wanted to eat again). Then we held church services in the home of Bro. Baboo (pronounced bob boo). The Old Baptist Church on Yercaud Mtn. began in his home and we had a sweet service with his wife being extremely gracious to us. (She fed us another breakfast and Bro. Nelson ate what she gave him. I think by that time he was looking a little green. We teased him about having his 3rd breakfast for the day). The church is meeting in 3 homes on Yercaud because their congregation is too large to meet in one place. They are currently building a church which will seat approx. 200 people but they think that will be too small. Bro. Baboo has a reputation for being an excellent minister and local response to the gospel has been tremendous. After an able service with Bro. Jeff preaching from Hebrews and Bro. Nelson translating, we visited a tourist attraction nearby called the Lady’s Seat because a British woman had supposedly once jumped off the cliff to commit suicide there. It was a pretty awesome place and we were actually in the clouds looking down (WAY down) below. Then we returned to Bro. Baboo’s home and had a wonderful lunch of fish, fries, and fruit. We were given gifts of bangle bracelets and earrings. It seems we were given gifts and really honored everywhere we went. We women did not have gifts to return and I felt really humbled about always being just on the receiving end while in India. We then visited a remote village where we walked and walked and walked some more up a mountain side to view a small but beautiful church. We sang How Firm a Foundation in the empty building and prayed. The minister, new to the Old Baptist Faith, wants to start a congregation in this building although I believe there are currently only 2 or 3 Christians in the entire village. This young minister has a doctorate in divinity and his wife has a master’s in divinity. He was converted to sovereign grace by Bro. Baboo.

Since we women had not been to the bathroom since the hotel that morning, we then asked for a bathroom. We walked and walked and walked some more further up the mountain to where the new minister was staying. Indian bathrooms consist of a hole in the ground that you stand over with a tread on either side where you’re supposed to put your feet. It was also very dark in this place when you closed the door. It was really funny to hear the first one of us to use the bathroom call out asking how do you use this contraption? We gave instructions thru the door as best we could. Afterwards Ashley told her Dad that in the future he should just point us to an available bush. No need to walk way up the mountain for a hole in the ground. (Oh, the joys of “roughing-it”!)
Afterwards we drove down the mountain (this huge mountain was an all day drive) and the scenery was absolutely breathtaking. We arrived back in Salem and held services in a local home of a former Hindu priest. This was a poor section of Salem but we were told the inhabitants were members of a higher Hindu caste than the dalits. It was a sweet service with Bro. Jeff preaching from Luke 4:16 – 18 about Christ the healer. (Once while Bro. Guna was translating what he said, Bro. Jeff turned to me and said under his breath that some of the blind were driving on India’s streets). Afterwards, a Hindu woman who had been very attentive the entire time asked how she could get to Chettipatty to attend regular services. We told her that the homeowner would be happy to let her ride with him and his family for Chettipatty services. A high government official had planned to attend the services and provided the money for all the food – snacks before the service and dinner afterwards. But we arrived early (not knowing he was coming), and unfortunately by the time he arrived, services were over and we were leaving. It was then we were introduced to him and informed that he had provided the meal. Bro. Guna is beginning to preach in this area also, and hopefully, he can hear Bro. Guna preach there next month. He was very gracious.

It was on this return trip back to Shady Grove that I witnessed first hand what Bro. Jeff termed the "definition of a traffic fine in India." We were driving through Salem when a taxi driver had tried to enter a main street from the wrong direction and caused a traffic jam. The police officer didn't issue a ticket, but he was so angry that he took out his billy stick and knocked the side view mirror right off the taxi! I think this method at least saves a lot of red tape.

Monday 7/23/07

Monday morning during devotions Ranjanny came to see us. She was very excited because her biological father had come to see her. When her mother died, her father had to give her up because in India a man does not raise little girls. It is a very separatist society with very little interaction between the sexes. But Ranjanny’s father had heard that she was sick and he came, I don’t know whether from a distance or not, to see her. It really meant a lot to Ranjanny because her father had come to see her. We were having our morning devotion when she asked us to come meet her father. We told her we would come in just a minute and she said in a very respectful, sweet little tearful voice, “No, you come. My father here.” We stopped our devotion and went to meet her father. You just don’t put off a sick, upset child when they’re pleading with you. Her fever was better that morning but I believe she was taken to a doctor anyway while we packed up and left for Yercaud Mtn. This mountain rises 5000 feet above sea level and is a famous tourist resort in India. It is right outside the city of Salem. There was once a British hospital on the mountain top because it stays very cool there, more like British weather, and when a soldier was wounded or suffered heat exhaustion, he was taken there to recover. When India gained its independence, the Indians took over the mountain and turned the hospital into a hotel for tourists. I believe Yercaud Mtn. is the most beautiful place I have ever seen. As we went up the mountain, monkeys and chipmunks were all along the walls. The vegetation is extremely lush and there are many remote villages on this huge mountain but most are located pretty far apart. When we reached our hotel (very NICE but with COLD mountain running water, sorry - no hot shower here folks), we ate at Shevaroys, a nice Indian restaurant. It was interesting in eating with our Indian brethren because we were told they were allowed in the restaurant only because they accompanied Americans. Most of our Indian brethren are dalits (pronounced dah leets) which means they are lowest Indian caste and are not generally allowed in restaurants. I noticed the Indian brethren were not given menus. I offered them mine and they said that’s o.k. they knew what they wanted anyway. The restaurant served some of the best soup I have ever eaten and I had a delicious dish called chicken strongoff which closely resembled chicken and rice cooked in cream of chicken soup. After lunch we took a walk and took cover under a long, beautiful arbor while it rained heavily. Later we rented a rowboat and toured Shevaroy Lake. After that we toured the park around the lake and saw deer, peacocks, rabbits, parakeets, and various other animals in a small zoo. I mentioned to Bro. Guna that many of the trees looked like our oak trees back home and he said that’s exactly what they are – Silver Oaks. We were also shown a tree unfamiliar to us and told they were eucalyptus trees. They had smooth, white trunks that resemble our sycomore trees. We purchased boiled peanuts stir-fried with nuts, mango, and cayenne pepper that was very good. We also had some roasted corn. The Indians have a can of hot coals that they pump air into to heat up the coals and turn the ears of corn over it. Halfway through the process, they rubbed cayenne pepper all over the corn and continued roasting it. It was very good also. The food was served on rolled up newspaper, which served as a plate and when you finished, as your napkin. That night we visited the orphanage on Yercaud Mtn. – Paddypatty. There are only 11 orphans staying full time at this orphanage because of lack of space. But I think around 25 additional local village children come daily to receive 2 meals (breakfast before school and dinner after school) and to be taught English – which is taught from the Bible. Same program we saw earlier at Veppamarathur. These Hindu children then go home and tell their parents about the Bible and their Hindu parents request a Bible in their language. It is a very ingenious and successful program – so successful that there is mounting opposition from the local Hindus to the work on Yercaud Mtn. and several of our Indian brethren there including old women (Sister Esther, Sister Grace) have been beaten. The Hindus have tried a similar program to reclaim the people, but with little success. Feeding hungry people, providing medical attention, or any other form of assistance is foreign to the Hindu religion since they believe in karma – that if one has misfortune, it’s because he was bad and being punished by the gods. To help the unfortunate is to bring the god’s wrath on the provider. That’s why the orphanages that do exist in India are Christian-based and many more are needed. As I said they have only 11 actual orphans staying at Paddypatty due to space restrictions. Directly behind the orphanage there is 3/10 of an acre available for purchase (at a cost of $7500 U.S. dollars) that would allow the orphanage to greatly expand as this would provide sleeping space for additional children. I pray to God that this need will be met. We held services at this location on Mon. night. These people are very poor and very loving. One of the members gave us a large plastic bottle filled with homegrown honey – his livelihood – and it was absolutely delicious! It tasted like honey flavored with the slightest hint of citrus juice. I wish we could have brought it back with us, but customs would not allow it so we left it in the kitchen at Shady Grove. We stayed later than anticipated that night and after services, the men brought the cars around to the front door for us. We were told to get in the cars and lock the doors as a precaution against local Hindu opposition.

Sunday 7/22/07

Sunday morning Bro. Jeff and Bro. Guna preached at Cuddalore where the tsunami hit in 2004. There they constituted a new church. At Shady Grove services, Ashley, Leah, Jill, Karen and I sang Blest Be the Tie that Binds and For the Beauty of the Earth and Ashley gave her testimony with Richard translating for her. Then Bro. Nelson preached a powerful message on election in Tamil and English. He really is an awesome preacher! That afternoon we visited Bro. Boopithy’s house because it was his 3 year-old daughter’s birthday. Bro. Boopithy lives close to Shady Grove and I visited his home the prior week. During that first visit, his children (Hannah and Abigail) showed me their cat, whom they had named “Cat.” They wanted me to take a picture of their skiddish little cat and it was really funny when I tried to call the cat – Here, kitty, kitty, kitty. The children said, “That is cat. What is here, kitty, kitty, kitty?” Apparently the cat didn’t understand English either but I did manage to get its picture. At the birthday party, the parents provided us with orange soft drinks and we talked and visited for a while. The Indians are very particular about their manners and protocol and when Ashley would not take a chair, they insisted. “You sit here!” She said, “I think I’ll sit.” Later she tried to share her drink with the family members and they said, “No.” Then Ashley said, “I think I’ll just drink all of this myself.” (It was very funny). The Indians get highly offended if they think they have not given the very best of everything to their guests. Richard showed us some coin tricks and we watched CSI on black and white TV. Bro. Boopithy showed us a beautiful drawing of the Tabernacle with all the furniture in it that he had made. Then we went back to Shady Grove and checked on Ranjanny (pronounced ron johnnny or rom johmmy maybe?), Bro. Jeff’s foster child. She is 13 but like most of the Indians very small – in America we would think she’s about 8 years old. She had been running a fever for a couple of days and we decided to take her to see a doctor on Monday morning along with another child who also had a fever. I felt really guilty going to bed Sunday night on a comfortable bed while the children were sleeping on mats on concrete floors. I held a conversation with Bro. Jeff about this the next morning at breakfast and he told me that he had said the same thing once to Bro. Guna and volunteered to buy lumber and build the children bunkbeds. He said Bro. Guna laughed at him and told him that the Indian way of sleeping is on the floor. They think we are very strange for sleeping on beds. We do definitely have different cultures, but the same need for Jesus Christ.

Saturday 7/21/07

Saturday morning we continued classes. We had no running water Fri. afternoon and night and Fri. night when I went to bed I stank. I got up Sat. morning – still no water, so I opened my bottle of Aquafina and took a “shower” with it. This was my drinking water and I didn’t bother to ask for another bottle of water to drink until about 4:00 p.m. that day. I had used my drinking water to take a bath with, but I didn’t care – I thought it was worth it. Simon’s little boy, Franklin, followed his “aunties” Karen and Leah all over the compound that day and had the other children all calling us “aunties”. Franklin, who is 5, brought his 2 year old sister, Shella, upstairs to the roof to visit us. We fed them some of our breakfast – I thought Franklin was a bottomless pit! He opened his mouth and looked like a little bird that we would put little pieces of cereal and granola bars into. The roof which is right outside our door has a low protective wall around it and it was really funny when Franklin started pointing at something (actually I don’t think it was anything) in the distance and excitedly telling Shella to look, look! She couldn’t see over the wall and she had her little hands on the top of the wall and her toes dug in to the sides and she was grunting and straining trying to see over the wall. Franklin kept telling her to look, look! She never could get up to see and finally gave up. Then he went down the steep steps and left her. She stood at the top of the stairs and cried for help, so we took her down to her mother. They are quite a pair! That morning Karen and I also got to play frisbee with Deva and Sathish. I think they liked their frisbees and were a little disappointed when they fell on the ground and got scuffed up. Sathish tried to polish his off when he took it back to his room. Karen also taught the women how to play hopscotch and I think they had a lot of fun with that. This was Lee’s day to teach classes since I had taught Thursday and Karen had taught Friday. Lee gave an excellent explanation about diabetes with Karen’s assistance on the nutrition end and I threw in my 2 cents worth about wearing shoes outside and then Lee and I both taught about cancer and diseases common to the area such as typhoid and cholera. That afternoon we said good-bye to the Eureka Children’s Home orphans. We handed out balloons and suckers and jump ropes. They danced again for us and got us to dance a little for them. We all laughed and had a really good time, but I think Grace cried a little bit. Sindersen was leaving the next day for 6 months Bible college. He is to return home just once a month. After the singing and dancing, Bro. Sindersen drove us back to Chettipatty. (Patty means village in Tamil). It was really hard leaving Sathish. I have sponsored him for 5 years and I was so excited to meet him! I felt like I was leaving my child and I might never see him again. It really was a difficult thing to do.
One thing I saw that was really interesting on the way back to Chettipatty was a brick kiln. Suganthi explained to me the way bricks are made. A woman takes an ordinary bread pan and fills it with the red mud mixture and dumps it out to dry in the sun. Then the bricks are stacked on a high pile in a particular fashion that leaves large holes (spaces) between them. Tree branches are pushed into the spaces and the pile is set on fire for 3 days out in the open – not in an oven like I would have imagined. The fire is continually fed with wood. After 3 days the bricks are allowed to cool and dry in the sun, then tarp is wrapped over them until they are ready for shipping. I thought this might be the same way that the Tower of Babel was built way back in Nimrod’s day. We drove through some really remote villages where the houses were thatched huts. It was interesting to see modern day tractors with plows parked beside the huts. I think the houses were probably owned by tenants and the tractors by their landlords – what a contrast! Anyway, we got back safely to Shady Grove and….Praise the Lord! Running water!

Friday 7/20/07

Friday morning Karen, with Leah assisting, taught nutrition classes to the local village women while Lee and I sat at the prayer mound and talked. I believe it was during this day's classes that Leah also taught the local village women about massaging tired, achy muscles - a major relief after back-breaking labor. Ashley and Jill had already returned to Shady Grove to teach the children there as it was thought that Jill needed to stay in a more comfortable location. That worked out well because Jill and Ashley were awesome with all those kids at Shady Grove. When we returned, I was really impressed with all that the kids had learned. Many of them are teenagers and I think that it really encouraged the Indian teenagers to meet a Christian American teenager and interact. God moves in mysterious ways and I believe Ashley and Jill were where they were supposed to be at Shady Grove while we were at Eureka Children's Home. Anyway, when Lee and I were finished visiting the prayer mound and touring the field that she hopes to cultivate, we took a walk down the road and visited a family with a 3-week old infant. Right after lunch we took Karen and Leah to see the baby and we found out that the mother had attended Karen’s maternity classes in Dec. while she was pregnant with him. The parents actually asked Karen to name the baby! I was standing beside Karen and she asked What? in disbelief. Did you say you want me to name him? They told her yes that’s what they said and she named him Elijah! Talk about a swelled head! We got pictures of this beautiful little baby boy with the red dot between his eyes and a white slash over the dot – which I believe indicates the caste he belongs to but Karen says it just means he had been blessed that morning with ashes from the temple – I don’t know. Anyway, the baby’s uncle then climbed a coconut tree and the family treated us to fresh coconut. We took pictures of this and the stone mill that they use to grind their grain. While walking back to the orphanage, there was a huge mound like a fireant bed with several large holes in the top by the side of the road that we had walked right by that morning. Brother Simon (the orphanage warden) said, “Sisters, move away from the mound. That’s a snake home.” I jumped about 5 feet sideways but Leah got close enough to take pictures. Simon said the local villagers worship this cobra because they fear it. Ughhh! That afternoon we took the mobile clinic out to the villages. Pastor Borris (Simon’s brother) is very active in this area and he is great with the kids. Karen and Leah helped attract kids with the stick-on vest and candy and Pastor Borris taught them Christian songs and dances. The parents as usual followed their kids. I saw a beautiful little girl there who had goiter. It was strange to see a skinny child with a huge neck. At the 2nd village we attended, Karen was really excited to see Diane running with the children. This was the 15-month old little girl she saw in Dec. who could not walk. Her mother had never fed her solid foods and Karen told her she needed to feed her solids to help her walk. It had obviously worked! I really enjoyed visiting this village also – there was an old woman there with a beautiful countenance who was very attentive to us. She seemed to radiate love and appreciation for our efforts. Also, it was at this village that I learned about the mysterious village people who lived on the mountain top. They were mysterious to me because I looked up the mountain and saw nothing but rocks and trees, but was told that the mountain was full of primitive peoples who spoke different dialects and earned their living mostly by the illegal drug trade. We were told that we would definitely not be going further up the mountain. I think I will always wonder about those invisible mountain people and pray that some day the gospel of Jesus Christ will reach them as well.

There are many superstitions among these people. The women believe that wearing a black bra causes breast cancer – a harmless superstition I guess, but they also believe that eating purple grapes will cause a mother to deliver a blue baby, and this is a belief that needs changing – also pregnant mothers who eat eggplant give birth to dark babies. We were supposed to be teaching against superstition and ignorance, but I’m afraid we brought our own bad habits to share. On the way home, Brother Sindersen (a pharmacist who travels with the mobile clinic to the mountain villages and , along with his wife, Grace, runs the Eureka Children’s Home) nearly hit a chicken and we teased him about finding a good one to hit for supper. (It was really interesting that at one time we ran over a huge stack of corn in the road. It’s piled in the road deliberately to be run over so the kernels will be separated from the cob. When I was little I shelled corn by hand for the chickens. I wish I'd known I could have just put it out in the road and let the cars run over it!) Anyway, after dodging chickens in the road, Karen and Leah taught Sindersen the American game of playing chicken on the road with oncoming traffic. Sindersen humored Karen and Leah (who both thought it was great!) while Lee and I (I guess because we’re older) just kind of put our heads down and refused to look. That earned Bro. Sindersen the name “The Crazy Doc” and I thought to myself that he would fit in very well with some of Tift Regional’s doctors. After dinner they sang and danced for us at the orphanage. Simon is an excellent dancer and some of the older boys are, too. Grace pushed a reluctant Sindersen out on the floor and he danced a little. Afterwards we gave Sathish and Deva and Leah’s foster child the gifts we had brought for them. Sathish and Deva received caps and family pictures and frisbees. I also met my sister and her husband’s foster child – Chandramohan (pronounced Chondra morgan). I told my sister she should just call him Morgan. He is a very sweet child and small-built for his age like most of the children of India - compared to American children that is.

Thursday 7/19/07

Thursday morning we loaded up our overnight travel bags and headed out for Eureka Children’s Home in Veppamarathur (Vep a mare a tur, I think) to lay the foundation stone for the new maternity clinic. Eureka Children’s Home was the original orphanage and it is smaller and not as modern as Shady Grove at R. C. Chettipatty. We usually had either electricity or water at Veppamarathur but hardly ever both. Even so, I really loved the Eureka Children’s Home! It is smaller than Shady Grove and the children for the most part are younger. This is where Deva and Sathish, our foster children for 5 years, live. We had the dedication ceremony and Jill, who is just 15 years old and hypoglycemic, fainted from the heat. 2 of the men took her up to her room and we took her blood sugar and blood pressure and gave her water with propel added to it to replenishment her electrolytes. Karen stayed with her and fed her until she recovered. It was a very hot day. After the ceremony, Sister Lee and the men went with an agricultural official to look at a field where they plan to start cultivation and Karen stayed with Jill in their room. That left Leah, Ashley, and me to start teaching the classes. I taught first aid and CPR with Leah and Ashley’s assistance and Jody translating. Then I went through my alcohol spiel and followed up with a short lecture from some of Lee’s notes on treating bites and stings. Afterwards we had lunch and I walked out to the prayer mound on the other side of where the new clinic will be to see what the girls were up to. The prayer mound is a place on the far end of the property that has a beautiful old tree and a granite bench to sit on. It is quiet and peaceable and a great place to go for meditation. Later that afternoon we had mobile clinic in a local village. The people came mainly for joint pains which they have an abundance of. I felt really sorry for these hard-working people because many of them really needed surgery - more help than we could give them with our limited facilities. We tried to encourage them not to perform repitious tasks without changing positions often and resting. We also gave lots of diet advice for diabetes and hypertension like we did at Thinipatty and treated some children with fevers. We then drove to a dedication for a new “before and after” school program for Hindu children. So far there are 27 children participating. The children have little to eat, so this program provides them 2 meals a day (7 days a week) and English classes. They are taught English from the Bible and they go home and tell their parents what they learned. Many of the parents then ask if they can get a Bible of their own in the Tamil language. This was the first service held at this location and Lee and I got to dish out the first plates of food to the children! It was a very awesome and humbling experience.

Wednesday 7/18/07

Wednesday morning we wore our salvahs to the minister’s meeting. Bro. Sake Matteo (Sockey Mut ta o - an Andra Pradesh minister) told of his experience in coming to Christ. Like many of the India ministers, he is a former Hindu. While in college, he fed the Christian students’ lunches to the animals while they were in worship services because he hated them. He had dedicated a Hindu temple in his village and provided rare jewels for the god’s eyes. One night a beggar spent the night with him. The next morning the jewels were missing from the eye sockets. Sake Matteo searched all thru his village looking for the jewels. The local Christian minister told him that he had a very small god if he could not even protect his eyes. That got him started thinking about the kind of god he served and he eventually became Christian! He was ostracized for following Christ but today all 3 of his sons and his daughter are Christian. In Andra Pradesh he has established 25 churches and ordained 30 ministers. He is a recent convert to sovereign grace. After Sake Matteo’s speech, Bro. Jeff continued preaching thru Colossians chapter 1. He gave a really interesting account of the Roman celebration of victory compared with what will take place at the end of time and the final judgment. I would love to hear him repeat what he said because it was well worth remembering.
Wed. afternoon Bro. Jeff preached from Col. 2 and gave an outstanding message concerning blotting out our sins. He told us that the Roman court would write the charges in ink. If found innocent, the charge was blotted out with ink and the person could not be charged with that crime again. If found guilty, the charges were nailed above the prisoner’s cross – as when Christ was charged with being the King of the Jews. Wed. afternoon was the end of the ministers’ meeting and we said our good-byes to the visitors including the Andra Pradesh brethren. We met out on the boys’ playing field where some of the visitors’ buses were parked and played volleyball and I played some soccer with Sebastin. That was the gift I brought him and that was the soccer ball the congregation passed around the campfire the night before. Karen taught the smaller boys to play tic tac toe on the ground. We got some good pictures of us out on the field although we were chided for playing in our saris. Saris can be very expensive (unlike the 2 cheap salvahs I bought) and the Indians take meticulous care of them, but we kept having to wait to get our pictures made in them and meanwhile the boys wanted us to play. Wed. night we drove to Thinipatty, a neighboring village about 1 hour away. I could not believe my eyes when I thought I saw a man walking down the road with a bear! Later I confirmed with Leah that it was indeed a bear! Local superstition says that childhood fevers are relieved by something about the bear (I could not quite understand what they said – maybe something about the fur or the collar on the bear?) so the man earned his living going from village to village with the bear to cure childhood fevers. Bro. Judson proudly showed us the local church in Thinipatty which he had helped build as a child. When he was 8 years old, he carried foundation stones down the mountain on his head. His family was the first Christians in the village, and today 50% of the village is Christian! The building has psalm verses written on the walls and a 25-year-old thatched roof which currently needs replacing. I asked and was told it would cost approx. $250 U.S. dollars to replace the roof. Bro. Nelson is the pastor there and there is an assistant pastor who has helped establish 15 different meeting places in surrounding villages. This faithful assistant pastor visits all 15 locations every day! That’s dedication. At Thinipatty we finally got to work in the medical clinic. Karen was great about gathering the local children and showing them her stick-on vest with the different internal organs. The children were fascinated with sticking the different organs where they belonged on the vest. The adults followed their kids and we had singing and scripture reading. Then we did some health teaching. Sister Lee taught first aid and CPR and I gave my first lecture on alcoholism. Bro. Nelson was very helpful in passing around the laminated pictures I had showing its effects on the liver and pancreas and the results of fetal alcohol syndrome. Bro. Nixon’s wife Jody who has a masters in nursing and had just returned from a year’s work in Saudi Arabia translated for me. Then we treated illnesses. Everyone crowded around and it was pretty thick and suffocating as I took blood pressures and someone else took blood sugars. We had several high blood pressures and sugars that Karen counseled nutrition-wise and we told them to follow-up with their doctor. It was really funny that one woman who seemed to be drug-seeking (yes, they have them in India, too!) sat down in the examining chair and would not move for anyone else. She stated that she could not walk and she needed extra pain medicines. What was so funny to me was that she actually thought we would believe her after she walked in with ease and sat right down in the chair! Sister Grace (herself a nurse and Bro. Nelson’s wife) got really angry with the woman and told her she needed to move. She finally got up (once again, with ease). It was quite an experience! When we finished, we packed up to go and Bro. Nelson turned our car around in the very narrow little street. He tried several times to get it turned and actually hit a water pipe. Ouch! The streets in the villages are designed more for just motorcycles – not cars – and all over south India entire families of 4 can be seen all piled on a single motorcycle.

Tuesday 7/17/07

Tuesday morning services began the ministers’ meeting. We sang “How Firm a Foundation” and received roses, robes, and flowered leias. Bro. Jeff preached from Colossians during the ministers’ meeting. He mentioned the 4 prison gospels: Ephesians (possessions in Christ), Philippians (joy in Christ), Philemon (forgiveness thru Christ), and Colossians (preeminence of Christ). He started in Colossians chapter 1 – intro to Christ’s preeminence. He said chapter 2 is a defence of the preeminence and chapter 3 and 4 is preeminence demonstrated. Once again the sermon was translated into 3 languages and it was an awesome message. Tuesday afternoon we were taken to Salem to shop by Bro. Nelson and Bro. Nixon. It was kind of funny that as we were driving into town 2 of the orphan boys had left the orphanage and were walking down the road toward town. The look on their faces when Bro. Nelson drove up beside them and rolled down his window was priceless. Talk about busted! He firmly but gently told them to go back to the orphanage. They tried to explain what they were doing when Bro. Nelson, more firmly, told them to go home. They turned around without a further word and high-tailed it back to the orphanage. The children at the orphanages are well-behaved, but they are children just the same and I admire the tremendous amount of hard-work and dedication it takes to care for so many of them. We drove on into Salem and stopped off at the printers (I think) and then went to Spencer’s grocery store and bought a few things. Spencer’s was a nice little store with groceries and a few clothing items – sort of like a mini-Wal Mart. Then we went and bought saris and salvahs (loose-fitting pants with a tunic and shawl over them). The others bought some of both, but I just bought 2 salvahs since we brought the 2 saris with us that Karen had bought in Dec. My 2 salvahs cost 560 rupees or about $14 U.S. money for the 2 of them since about 40 rupees is a dollar. Suganthi ( a young woman who is the daughter of a Pentecostal minister) went with us and translated and she was an excellent help in getting us what we needed. We then hurried home since it was pouring down rain – no more shopping. Tuesday night was the campfire talent show under the brush arbor. Bro. Judson and Bro. Boopithy actually did a fire-breathing show for us that was awesome! Then Bro. Nelson read the first chapter of Genesis that was very powerful. He has a very commanding and reverent voice! Different groups sang and performed skits. 3 of the older orphan boys were hilarious. One pretended to be Bro. Guna, one pretended to be Bro. Jeff, and one pretended to be Bro. Sake Pasate. They were mimicking speaking in the 3 different languages and making fun of “hang-ups” in the translation. Eventually they started speaking gibberish to sound important because they could not understand each other. The whole crowd was laughing so hard we were crying. Then Bro. Nelson had written out different ideas for skits on little pieces of paper. He put them in a chair up front. Music started playing and we passed a soccer ball around from person to person. When the music stopped, whoever had the ball last had to come forward and draw a piece of paper and perform whatever was written on the paper. It was a lot of fun.

Monday 7/16/07

Monday morning we got “all saried up” for the big event. Deborah was so good to us the entire time to help us dress and fix us up for the various events. We took pictures of us all getting dressed and then of all of us in our saries later in the day. I thought we looked like Roman or Greek queens if I do say so myself. I really liked my burnt orange and green sari. Karen looked really good in her burgundy sari, too. She had helped Sister Mary (Bro. Guna’s wife) pick out saris for each of us the night before and I thought they did an excellent job of matching colors to people. Poor Leah had on a beautiful blue sari but she got sick and couldn’t attend the services. It was very hot in the room where we dressed and her breakfast had not agreed with her. She spent the morning in her room while we participated in the 10th anniversary meeting. As I said, there were about 1000 people including all the orphans (nearly 300 orphans now) and ministers and visitors from the community. It was held under a brush arbor and it reminded me of growing up and attending Old Baptist association meetings outside when the church was too small to hold all the people. Children from each orphanage sang and danced and I really enjoyed the singing and clapping performed by the 17 Andra Pradesh brethren. Bro. Guna’s son Richard sang beautifully also. Ashley, Karen, Jill and I sang Amazing Grace, Amazing Love. (I really missed Leah at this time because she and Ashley have such beautiful singing voices. They complement each other very well.) Two of Bro. Guna’s white-headed brothers attended the meeting and they spoke to the people. I believe they are Pentecostal – which is a very popular Christian denomination in the area. One of the brothers has an orphanage nearby that he runs. Bro. Guna was presented with several robes – their way of honoring someone. It was funny that with each one he wore it briefly and laid it aside. In the background, Karen and Ashley were laughing under their breath. They told me later they were counting silently 1, 2, 3 – and snap, off it went! Bro. Guna did not seem real interested in personal honors. Bro. Jeff has said what makes him so special is that he is a man of prayer and integrity – a very powerful combination indeed! They had printed a special 10th anniversary booklet and I received the first copy. Then Ashley received the first copy of her Dad’s book on Philippians translated into Tamil. Bro. Jeff preached on “The Day of Small Things” from Zech 4:10 and Matt 18:10. It was an excellent sermon geared toward the small, seemingly insignificant orphans. After the services I finally got to meet Sathish! I spotted him immediately when the Eureka Children’s Home orphans marched in. I knew that was “my boy” the first time I saw him. We took pictures of the two of us as well as Karen with her foster child – Deva who is also from Eureka Children’s Home. We have sponsored these 2 boys for 5 years almost to the day that we met them in person. I can’t describe the feeling of meeting a child for the first time that you’ve known for 5 years as your own, but thought you would never see. It was a tearful time even for someone like me who hardly ever cries. After the services, the Indians all lined up to eat. They had special rice dishes which the Indians eat with their hands – they have a sauce on top of rice and they mash it all together with their fingers and eat it. We ate in the dining room the whole time we were there - separate from the Indians. I think this worked better since we talked in English and had different customs – we were provided silverware and less spicy foods! Megala (Rosie) and Sudia were 2 of the orphans who were very attentive to see that we were fed and taken care of each meal. They were real sweethearts! We were scheduled to go somewhere Monday night, but because all the ministers were at R.C. Chettipatty, we held services there. It was really interesting to hear a sermon preached and translated in 3 languages – English, Tamil and Telugu – the language of Andra Pradesh! Bro. Jeff preached from I John 4:7 why Christians love – because it is their God-given nature. Bro. Guna then translated into Tamil and an Andra Pradesh brother, Sake Pasate (Sockey Pos ot) who speaks several languages, translated into Telugu. I really admired Bro. Jeff keeping his train of thought while waiting for the multiple translations.

Sunday July 15, 2007

Sunday morning we started our devotions – each morning we studied portions of Ps 119. We would get up early and all 5 of us girls would shower and get ready. It will forever remain a mystery what the “Indian Rooster” was, but every morning we were at Shady Grove, the most annoying bird would start singing around 3:30 – 4:00 a.m. just outside our window. There was an ordinary rooster that had better manners. He didn’t crow until 6:00 a.m. We tried and tried to catch a glimpse of our EARLY morning wake-up call bird but never could spot him. Good thing for him because we intended to throw a rock at him. Morning devotions were 0700 – 0800 followed by breakfast. One morning when we were talking about prayer Bro. Jeff mentioned that the original Hebrew word for prayer meant “to stroke the face” as when a child strokes its father’s face. I thought that was awesome. Sunday morning service started at 0900 with the children singing and formal worship service started at 0930 when the adults arrived. The children were very good to arrive in church and start singing out with no prompting from the adults. (Just think: 110 kids dressed, fed and ready for church by 0900 in the morning!) That morning the congregation sang Holy, Holy, Holy and Showers of Blessings. We sang Blessed Assurance. Bro. Jeff and Ashley sang Amazing Grace, Amazing Love. Sister Lee Morrow acted out Jesus calling his apostles from their fishing and their forsaking their nets to follow Him. Then Bro. Jeff preached from John 11 “Love’s Delay” (Raising of Lazarus) with Brother Nelson translating into Tamil. Every one of the Indian ministers has a fascinating history and Bro. Nelson is no exception! Of Syrian descent, he completed 4 years college in banking and then 3 years training for the Catholic priesthood when he was assigned to visit orphanages as a final phase before becoming a priest. He was so impressed with the orphanages founded by Bro. Guna because the children were taught about Jesus Christ. He left school and is now Bro. Guna’s “right-hand man” when it comes to overseeing the orphans and their needs. (Our girls fondly nicknamed Bro. Guna and Bro. Nelson “Papa G” and “Guna Junior” – I don’t think they minded). Anyway, that Sunday morning Bro. Jeff spoke of the 7 miracles of Christ recorded in John: 1. Water into Wine. 2. Healing of the Nobleman’s Son 3. Healing of the Impotent Man 4. Feeding the 5000 5. Walking on Water 6. Healing the Man Born Blind 7. Raising of Lazarus. He spoke of love existing in delays, disappointments, and sorrows, even though sometimes hidden. It was an awesome message! There were no church services Sunday night as everyone was so busy getting ready for Monday morning’s 10th anniversary celebration. Indian visitors were coming in from as far as AndraPradesh, the province to the north of Tamil Nadu. Those brethren slept in the boy’s dorm. We heard the preparation outside our window as they cooked and laughed and talked all night long, preparing to host and feed 1000 people.

Saturday 7/14/07

Well, at midnight Chennai time, we picked up our luggage and headed out of Chennai around 2:00 a.m. for the 6 hour drive to Omalur. Bro. Judson and a hired taxi driver drove my group. It was eerie seeing the little plastic lit up elephant god the Hindu taxi driver had on his dashboard. I was so thankful that I was not depending on a piece of plastic for safe passage. The mountains of southern India are part of the Himalayas and they are absolutely gorgeous – lush vegetation with palm trees on mountains – very beautiful. We stopped on the way at TamilNadu Hotel and had tea. There was a poster on the wall showing a gorgeous waterfall nearby in Combeloire but I did not get the name of it. I think the drive to R.C. Chettipatty (formerly Roman Catholic Chettipatty) with the Hindu taxi driver was the worst of the entire trip. I suppose since he was a taxi driver and accustomed to risk-taking that our Indian brethren didn’t take with driving – although their driving could by no means be called tame! At one time we passed a bus and there was a woman standing in the middle of the passing lane with a waterpot on her head. We blew the horn and she just turned around with a blank stare and looked at us. There was a bus coming from the other direction and it was God’s grace that we did not hit the woman and wreck with both buses. The oncoming bus drove off the road while the woman never budged an inch. The look on her face was one of total hopelessness and nonchalance. It will forever be etched in my memory. Finally, on Saturday July 14, 2007 Tamil Nadu time, we arrived at R. C. Chettipatty and slept the afternoon in our room at Shady Grove. Bro. Guna has built a nice place for visitors including upstairs bedrooms, bathroom and sitting room and downstairs kitchen, dining room, bathroom, and office. Very nice accommodations indeed for anyone planning a visit to India. That night we were welcomed at the church. The boys sang songs including Lord I Lift Your Name on High, one of my favorites. The girls performed welcome dances and we acted out Daniel in the Lions Den. Ashley told the story, Bro Jeff was the lion, Leah was the king, Karen was Daniel, and Jill and I were the guards who arrested Daniel and then we were the princes cast into the lions den and devoured. The children squealed and giggled as Bro. Jeff roared and pretended to go after them. The children held posters with the letters for WELCOME written on them. They danced forward and gave us flowers. Bro. Guna introduced each one of us and it was really funny that he introduced Sister Leah as having a special talent for speech. Everyone who knows Leah knows that she is one of the friendliest and most talkative people you’ll ever meet, as most friendly people are. Ashley was funny when she got up to be introduced. She was hesitant to get up after Leah’s introduction. She told Bro. Guna, “I don’t know what you’re saying – so be nice.” I got to meet my newest foster child – Sebastin. He’s a very sweet, quiet child – 11 years old.

Friday 07/13/07

At Chennai we met up with Bro. Guna and some of our Indian brethren – including Bro. Judson and Bro. Sindersen, but our luggage was delayed for 12 hours, so we rented rooms on the St. Thomas Mtn. to rest for a while and then tour the mountain. I got my first feel for Indian driving on the way to St. Thomas Mtn. There was a man walking in the road talking on his cellphone. Our mirror actually clipped the guy! He had a startled look on his face and jumped off the road into a mud puddle! Indian driving has a way of getting your attention! St. Thomas Mtn. is the site where the Apostle Thomas was historically martyred. He was pierced through with a spear by a Brahmin. It is a beautiful place on the side of a mountain. A Catholic shrine is on the site at the present time.

Thursday 7/12/07

At 2:00 a.m. Georgia time on July 12, 2007, we saw the sunrise over Europe and it was soooo beautiful! We were flying above the clouds and the sunrise reflecting off the clouds is an awesome sight! Well, when we arrived in Frankfurt 5:00 a.m. our time, we had missed our flight to Chennai, so we re-scheduled to fly into Bombay instead. In one of the many answers to prayer, there were exactly 6 seats left on the flight to Bombay and we took it, arriving there at 1300 on July 12, 2007. The luggage for Bro. Jeff, Karen and me did not arrive in Bombay and we prayed it would be in Chennai – God graciously answered our prayers and we were told the luggage would be in the Chennai airport upon our arrival. So we took a bus over to the other Bombay airport and boarded a plane for Chennai.

Wednesday 07/11/07

The Wed. morning of July 11, 2007 Karen and I arose early and left home at 6:40 a.m. heading for the Atlanta airport. We met Keith at I-Hop exit 233 for brunch. Keith had taken the morning off from work to wish us farewell. We visited and ate brunch, then Karen rode with Keith to the airport while I followed behind. We met the rest of our “Super 6” team at the airport at 10:30 a.m. – Jeff Harris, his daughter Ashley Harris, Leah Tyson, and 15 year-old Jill Watts and their families and everyone wished their loved ones a fond farewell. Because of bad weather, our U.S. Airways flight was delayed and we were changed to Delta. We did not leave the airport until 8:00 p.m. that day – headed for Frankfurt, Germany.