It’s our last day in India. It has definitely been a wonderful time and God has blessed everyone involved. So often I ask myself, why does God do things like this? Why does He send 7 people from Korea to minister to those in India? His Spirit and Presence are just as real in both places.
And that’s part of the answer, I think. His Church is worldwide. He has true believers filled with His Spirit all over the globe. But all of these believers are truly citizens of Heaven. Oh, they might be citizens of America or Korea or India on paper, but that is not where their life truly is. Their life is in Heaven, and when we travel like this and put aside those things which are superficial and could divide us but shouldn’t, we make Heaven more evident on Earth. The Eternal reality becomes more clear to us here. Were people blessed by what we shared? Sure. Were we blessed by who they were and what they were doing in India? Absolutely. But the greatest blessing came as we shared the same Spirit that seals us for adoption, regardless of skin color or styles of dress or Earthly heritages. For all of us the blessing came as our vision was lifted higher and Christ was lifted up. Because then we are drawn closer to Him. That is an unspeakable blessing.
Well, we finally went shopping (from the spiritual to the material, heh?). First we went ack tothe mall to buy some Indian pants suits. I’m not sure what they’re called, but they are pretty common. There’s a longer shirt with a pair of loose pants underneath and a matching scarf. Then we went down a block or two away from the mall and bought some sarees, traditional Indian dresses.
Then we went back to the mall and ate a meal that wasn’t very good, but we needed to eat. Then I bought some shoes, we got some jewelry, then scoped out the supermarket again and went back to the hotel with all of our booty.
I have to say the saree place was pretty interesting. You picked out what you wanted, you got the bill, then they ran it downstairs to where you paid. Then they packed your stuff up and gave it to you.
We made our way back to the hotel to rest and to pack some of our stuff up for a few minutes before going back out to another Mercy Home.
Around 4:30pm, we were picked up by Jose and taken back to Pastor Daniel’s house. We had tea with him (he showed the girls how to make it) and then walked down to the only Christian bookstore in town. Yes! They actually have one. I wanted some Indian praise music. Most of it was on mp3 though, which was fine with me ’cause I was just gonna put it on the ipod anyway. They sell most of their music on mp3 CDs. I bought 3 CDs of Indian praise music, a VCD about Wesley and two books for under $20. I had to get out of there before I spent more money. The books were brand new and super cheap. Many were in English and Malayalam.
We made it out to the Mercy Home around 5:30pm. They had recently renovated this one. Running a Mercy Home is a lifetime commitment. You are essentially becoming parents of 10 children. This one was also a girl’s home, but the couple running it had two beautiful children of their own, a boy and a girl. The girls loved Micah, of course. We visited with them and saw the renovations. They had added an extra room for the girls on the side and a large 2nd floor as one large room to accomodate the growing church that met there which now has 60 members. They had just purchased the adjacent property to build a separate building for the church. It just keeps growing!
The girls were sweet, and we spoke with them outside after touring the house and the renovations, making ourselves a spectacle with the neighborhood. They sang for us and we for them. There was one girl, Raji, who was very shy but wanted to be a preacher when she grew up. She practically glowed with God. Laura Forner gave out some games her students made with paper and Becky showed the kids how to play the game. You choose this number and then fold it that many times and eventually read something … which in this case was a scripture. The kids enjoyed it.
We prayed with them and over the pastor of the Mercy Home and his wife.
There seemed to be some concern in the car ride home, but no one openly mentioned it until we got to the hotel. A couple of us noticed lice on the kids. We prayed we wouldn’t get it but still shared wisdom how to handle it. Even if we did get it, it was worth it to visit the 2nd Mercy Home.
Jose dropped us at the hotel where we thought we would say goodbye to him. We went up to our rooms to shower and finish packing. As Becca and the girls finished packing and bringing the stuff downstairs, I gathered the money and went to pay the bill. We had plenty of money for it. For the 7 of us, 3 rooms and either dinner in the restaurant or room service once a day for 6 or 7 days, it all cost about $900 total or a little more. I handed Pastor Daniel some of the money left over, about another $200. We also gave some money to Jose. He earned it!
When Pastor Daniel arrived at the hotel to see us off, I gave him a T-shirt that said, “religion sucks – Jesus rules” on it in Korean and English. One of Larry Trammell’s favorite T-shirts said that and we had some made in Korea. They don’t wear T-shirts often in India, but I thought he needed one.
We embraced Pastor Daniel as we left, told him we’d keep in touch and got in the car to go to the airport. We were supposed to have another hired van, but something happened to that one, so Jose drove our luggage to the airport while another driver took the 7 of us.
Since it was about an hour to the airport, we took the opportunity to reminisce about the week. I asked most of the questions. Since I was the “leader”, I wanted to see things I might be able to look out for in the future if I ever lead another trip, which I hope to do. What was your favorite moment? What was the most challenging? Things like that.
We arrived at the airport in record time. This turned out for the good because the line for immigration took forever. We got on the flight in time, of course, and we slept our way to Singapore.
Unfortunately, we were pressed for time at the Singapore airport. We needed to get new boarding passes and exchange money and get some snacks and water and other things. We barely made the plane, but it all worked out.