Nothing Stays the Same

Control.

The very word makes me quiver with uneasiness and delight. I relish the thought of being able to control my surroundings, to make everything just to the ends of my own comfort. To take charge of life and determine what happens when and where. To know what comes next. Master of my fate, captain of my ship. Unfortunately when I do this, I am excellent at finding the nearest shoal and turning my ship into splinters. Why is it then every time I find God asking me to give up more control to him that everything around me starts to point out things I could do better. Better job, better income, better security.

I look at my life and honestly there isn't much to show for it at the moment unless you start counting pages in a passport stamped, number of tropical diseases you have had, times you've missed a family member's birthday, Christmas for that matter. I don't have an extensive portfolio, tho to be fair not many people do these days. My savings account has read $0.26 for awhile now and even with current interest rates I do not see that skyrocketing any time soon.

Can I be really honest here? The past week I came very close to giving it all up. Mission work, ministry, churchy stuff. It would be so nice to walk away from it all, take up a normal job, get a decent car, date a nice girl and go to the movies once a month. One night I almost did all of that and the physical pain of typing it out surprised me. I felt like I was selling my birthright, selling out on myself and everything that God has done for me.

I spent the rest of the week wondering how much can a man's soul take until he breaks.

I have yet to find that point.

A Little Ways From Home

Some days I have to stop and question the course of my life. The lack of stability, the irregularity of it all. It is in these moments that I most long for home, a word that we all too often take for granted, I more than most.

In Nepal I am called a bideshi, (beh-desh-ee), which translates to something like gringo in Texas. There are constant reminders to let me know that this is not my home country. Higher prices, people making snide comments about how stupid I must be when they think I don't understand the language, and every taxi driver trying to figure out how much he can rip me off. What they don't understand is that this whole place belongs to my Father, and I am not just talking about the Himalayas. I realized this thinking about home, the ache in my heart slowing me down to ponder about it all. Then it hit me-

We are all bideshis.

None of us are actually home. We might all have beautiful families that we love and cherish, friends who can enhance the quality of our lives, but at the end of it all something still yearns for, 'home.'

For me Nepal is the closet place I have lived in to home. The people actually understand my sense of humor, the food, the constant walking, the consistent tardiness of everyone (not just me for once in my life!) the intensity of living every day and relying on God to help you survive it. In the span of the past week I had a good friend of mine die. He had been training with Robby Rai, my ministry partner there who I am accountable to on a daily basis, and was beginning to show signs of the potential leadership that Nepal so desperately needs. In the same week 3 young girls were rescued from a 'Dance Bar' and 5 more expressed their heart to be rescued as well. The reality of this place is that there is a resistance happening and people are being rescued even as some are falling. I am reminded of a lyric that cries out, "God is the only one who can save our nation now."



At the moment I am now in Texas.
I already miss Nepal.

However I am very excited to meet with those of you that I can, share stories, enjoy pictures (both mine and please yours!) and the extravagant taste of coffee! Please please email me if you would like to get together, for those of you who know me, my memory is fairly faulty so I have to have hard copies of meeting dates and times. Even with all of this I still plan on leaving early for engagements as I am a master at becoming lost. It is a spiritual gift, right after prophesy!

Dreaming about the Kingdom,
Scotty

Paper Plates

So out of all the amazing things to share here is the short list;

1. We now have no power for 108 hours out of every week. I love candles.

2. The Prime Ministers car is sweet, his driver gave me and my friend, Nelson Sherpa, a ride the other night home as we were delivering food to some families in our church who don't have anything.

3. Made paper-plate tamborines with the sunday school kids. I didn't think much of it at the time, bought some plates, some glue, glitter, beans, voila! Later when we were visiting a family they wanted to show me the new decorations, beautiful paper-plate tamborines handing on their walls, it was the only color in their house. I had to focus to not weep infront of them as they were so proud and I had early so quickly dismissed such a simple small thing. I am a broken man.

4. Peope are starving for teaching filled with love. The vast majority of the teaching in sermons is huge list of dont's. I have had a few oppurtunities to preach and find people coming aftewards to ask if I could preach "that" in their churches. I don't know exactly what, "that" is but I think it has to do with love.

Stay warm!

Brief Moments of Light

I never ceased to be confused and filled with wonder. Sometimes it is along the lines of something a girl says to me that I totally misunderstand and walk away scratching my head (both a good and bad result I suppose) and other times it is in those moments that I expect one result and then encounter God in an amazing way and walk away with stars in my eyes. I figured to start the new year I would share a few of these moments with you!

I have ceased taking taxis, except on days when the pollution is particularly bad and I am particularly cold, in large part because they would drive me all around the area I was trying to go in an effort to raise the fare up. My Nepali is progressing nicely but I still have yet to learn how to say, "Now look here you rotten son of a...." This lack of learning might have a little do with my supposed goodness from my faith and probably in large part to my position as ambassador to a people in a dark kingdom. Therefore I take the bus. Buses here are awesome! Generally they are packed to the point that you can see the tires relax a bit when the people all pile off to let the one person in the back get off. Normally I ride on the outside of the bus hanging on slim window lining. I promise it is only to exercise my climbing muscles and in no way related to my enjoyment of the wind blowing my hair and rocking out to some P.O.D. (A energetic rock band for those of you not familiar with them.) Most people here would sell their friends bike from underneath them if they thought they could get away with it and the price was right. So I am riding home the other day, inside the bus (you can relax Mom!) and the man in front of me drops a one hundred rupee note. Now I have seen people fight over 5 rupees so my jaw about dropped out when the man next to me leaned over, picked up the money and handed it to the guy who dropped it. I walked away from that ride beaming.

My room is currently on the way up of a large hill. The bus is always kind enough to stop at the bottom of the hill to let me off. As I walk up there are numerous shops with all sorts of Knik-Knacks and snacks ect. There is one particular shop that is a semi bakery. I say semi bakery because located directly next door is a motorcycle repair shop. I am fairly confident the donuts are cooked in the left over grease from the motorcycles, I guess something got lost in translation. Anyhow, there are two beautiful little girls there. One day when I was snapping pictures left and right, I managed to take a picture of each of them and then do close ups with their mother's encouragement. I returned a few days later with the printed photos and gave it to them as a gift. Ever day I walk by now those two little gals holler over at me and commence to waving so fast that you can't see their hand or arms, just a little blur of happiness. It always makes me smile to walk by them.

Near where I live there is a Tibetan refugee camp. For those of you reading my emails you already know that I am disciplining a Muslim guy through the book of Luke. The other day during one of our times we decided to sit out in the sunlight, much warmer and life giving. As we sat talking, smiling and laughing a group began to gather around us. The people were curious what we were reading, I was curious what God was up to. As we explained to them they asked if I had extra bibles. I suppose if I had nothing better to do....ABSOLUTELY! The next day I dropped off a stack of bibles with my Muslim friend who is now handing them out to the Tibetan refugees. Even still when I think about the situation I have to giggle, only God would have a whitey ministering to a Muslim who is handing out the Word of God to Tibetan's.

On another and last humorous note, there are quite a few pickpockets throughout the tourist section of Kathmandu and especially on the bus. I think I have a good solution. With the recent cold spell, I often have a runny nose and go through kleenex like Nepali's do hot peppers. I now stuff my pockets normally targeted with used up kleenex and keep all my valuables hidden safely away. Maybe they will learn, then again with the current economic situation here they probably don't have a choice...

Sunlight

I used to despise sunlight. It was too bright, too hot. I would always have to squint my eyes up and that made my cheeks and eyebrows uncomfortable, heavy. Nowadays it seems that any patch of sunlight is prime real estate. On my walk to Nepali Language class I have been taking a longer route to avoid a pack of dogs that would always attack me. Numerous countries, washed countless times, hopped over endless fences and a freakin pack of dogs tears em up. The bad part of this walk is that it is completely in the shade. I think from now on I am just going to walk the route with sunshine and carry a brick. A big brick.

So the entire power structure of Nepal is built upon hydroelectric dams. This is awesome to think about when you consider that there are tons of rivers with huge water flows all over the country. Numerous foreign nations are pumping hundreds of millions of dollars into building these massive structures and even more to pay all the government officials to do it. It is awesome to think about until you consider that Nepal is one of the highest nations in the world and also one of the coldest. All the river water that pumps these huge turbines slow down drastically during the winter months because the snow is not melting. Right now we are down to 12 hours of electricity a day, government mandate. Those 12 hours are also scattered throughout the day. I have yet to find the schedule. Within the next month there is the very real possibility that the power outage will increase to over 16 hours a day. The entire landscape of this place changes when the power goes out. It is absolutely bizarre. During the day the streets of Jawalikhel are jam packed with people walking everywhere, vehicles going any which way, dogs everywhere, food cooking, ect.

Then the sun goes down.

Gone, as if nobody lives here. I normally end up walking home around this time if I miss the last bus, bundle up as best as possible and start walking and singing. Some nights there is so much pollution that even the stars are filtered out, the occasional motorcycle comes flying by, lights illuminating a dirt storm and thin beam in front of it. The other night as I was walking home, listening to the quietness, I watched as my shadow grew tall with a motorcycle coming up from behind me. At the last possible second as the driver went by my shadow broke into two different people. Now it takes a bit to shake me up, but another man following me for who knows how long without making any sounds made me a little nervous. I spun around to see his eyes watching me and stared at him for what must have been one hour, (actually 5 seconds but just count to 5 and you will understand) just waiting for him to decide and then he walked over to the other side of the road and disappeared into the shadows.

Already I am starting to hear of people dying from the cold. I can believe it too. There are too many people who have to try and brave the elements at night, try to make what little fires they can with what burnable trash they can come up with. The smells are something else too. It makes you choke and your eyes water. People huddled as close as they can get, their clothes singing just a bit. So I sit in my room, power out again, reading by candlelight until the flame starts to flicker because it has run out of wick. I was chatting with a good Nepali friend the other day who almost shuddered as he thought of the upcoming increase of power shortage. "It will bring the hell out of the souls of the people," he said. It is hard to argue with. So for now I wait for the morning light, share my candle with a friend or two.

With the mornign comes the light.

Amazing

I had the most amazing moth of December, but before you jump to conclusions keep in mind that the word: amazing, has a much broader definition than what is generally assumed.

Three nights before Christmas I was spending time with my Muslim friend from Kashmir in his rug shop. We often meet there to just shoot the breeze or talk about life and what were hoping to get out of it. He spotted my bible I had carried with me for the day and began to flip through it. My jaw about dropped as he began reading from the book of Luke, the same book I had been studying. As he read he would occasionally ask me questions on the pronunciations of particular words or particular meanings. After about 20 minutes of dialogue he asked me to teach him to speak 'more better' English and we agreed him reading out loud from the book of Luke with me guiding him would be the best way to do so. We now are meeting on a weekly basis to study "English" with a cup of tea on the side. So amazing to think some American guy is teaching a Muslim man how to speak more clearly from the bible in the middle of the heart of Hinduism.

The following day, two nights before Christmas, Robby and I receive a phone call concerning a young girl in our congregation. Apparently she was falsely accused without any evidence that she stole some jewelry. . . . three months ago. The police, being the crack outfit that they are, arrested her, took her downtown, stripped her, beat her up and then threatened to throw her in with the general male populace. We have a team of lawyers working on her behalf and thanks be to God that right now she is safe. Oh, the accusers were a couple from England. Amazing.

The night before Christmas I was honored to be invited to spend the day with my church at a nearby leper colony. Walking around, smiling, laughing with people who had amazing deformities, holding their hands, holding the, not wanting to let go as they would lean in close to hear my heartbeat but knowing there was someone else waiting to be held. As we left they just kept saying, 'thank you, thank you.' Came to find out later that many of these people had not been touched in 5 and sometimes 10 years.

I woke up the next morning aching in my heart and set off to find some errands, anything to distract my thoughts, the very cold morning making me draw my scarf a little closer, fog my glasses and turn around a corner to see three little girls not more than nine years old. Their hair was sheared close by dull scissors, you can tell by the way the ends stick out every way, in order to keep lice to a minimum, dirt caked faces you could draw landscapes in with just long enough covering to skirt the tops of their knees, sifting through the morning trash for a quick bite to eat. The word amazing is quickly becoming a word I abhor.

So it is evening now. I am sitting what feels like a million miles away staring at Mt. Everest on a veranda drinking an Irish Coffee. I had to run away from the pollution, the intensity of every day, the poverty that nips at my heels as I step over dying bodies lying in the middle of sidewalks on the way to the grocery store. I don't feel particularly amazing, more numb and not quite sure where to begin unraveling this big ball of hurt.

On the bus ride back to the city in the morning I watch the valley come up way too quickly I had been living in a land where the clouds hid the reality of what was happening on the ground. The cold air quickly freezing my fingers as I hold on tightly as the bus screams around another blind corner and I asked God.

I asked god where was He. In the middle of it all, the dirt, disease, brokenness and overwhelimingness of it all. This is what He told me;

"Every time you stop to talk to someone, give a banana to a street kid and peel it for him so he can't take it to a shop vendor for money, every time you hold a leper's held so close to your heart letting him know he has a family and that he isn't just a 'leper' but a person of value, every time you whisper a prayer for a situation that has gone beyond ridiculous and into the realm of obscene, ever time you laugh with people, pray with them, walk with them, share the story of Jesus, I am right there with you Scotty."

Amazing.