Joy to India, the World, and God Willing America Too!

A month ago today I got back from an amazing and life changing two week trip to India.  India was one of the places in the world I said I "never" wanted to go to and I meant it with all sincerity.  The pictures I had seen of crowded streets, bustling cities and trains overflowing with people was enough to make me declare my intentions of never going, but I have learned that anytime I say the word "never" God takes that as a challenge with me.  I suppose He wants to keep me humble?  I am not sure, but much to my surprise my heart changed about going to India.  Perhaps it was in having some wonderful friends that I have made from there.  I also heard amazing stories from some of the ladies that went there from my church a couple years ago and I had heard the leader Suresh Kumar of Harvest India speak at a church and could feel his passion and heart for the people there and entertaining stories (which can be read in his book Compelled available on Amazon for a shameless plug).  When a lady at my church, who started a ministry called Daughters of the King, asked me if I was interested in going I had no excuse to give.  I knew instantly I was going!  God had changed me.  I will need to be more careful in my use of the word "never" from now on.

I had been on some mission trips before.  A few weekend trips to Mexico and a month long trip to Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea.  Those trips were instrumental in giving me a wider world view and understanding of how fortunate we are in the United States.  I came home with more gratitude and I would like to think more compassion for others.  So this time I was positive that I would have no trouble with two weeks in India.  It would be an adventure and I would go with many prayers behind me.  I must say that I did feel prayers sustaining me, and it was certainly an adventure!  But to say that I had "no trouble" isn't entirely true.  I found after two days of Indian food I was literally crying.  I am used to spicy Mexican food here in Southern California, but for some reason the spices were so unusual and I really was losing any taste for them and I felt like it would be too rude not to eat the food being presented to us and I actually cried hard.  Then to top it off, I could see how amazingly generous they were being to us in giving us such generous portions.  As we went to villages and handed out such simple things, such as an piece of bread, one hardboiled egg and a banana to have these children so overjoyed by this and I was crying over spicy food because I just didn't like it?  Not being able to throw toilet paper into the toilet was another issue I struggled with as well as a lack of hot showers.  I really suffered from some "first world problems" which was a bit eye opening.

But the thing that really changed me the most from this trip was joy.  I think in my mind I always knew that joy can be elusive.  As I look around me here in America it is rare to see true joy.  Sure there are some selfies posted with a smile and there is a sense in which people are happy when something good happens in their lives, but joy is something so much deeper and lasting than fleeting happiness.  While in India we served hot meals at the new church to 250 people that suffer from leprosy.  This is a disease that is preventable and totally curable with the right medical care.  Instead of being resentful and upset I saw something different in their eyes, pure joy and even contentment with their situation in life and gratitude for the simple things.  As I spoke at the conference we held for 500 women, mostly pastor's wives in small village churches, some of which had never even sat in a real chair or even had a meal that I was told would be one of the finest that they had ever been served (a meal with a selection of three different curries was what Harvest India provided) I saw pure joy in their eyes and they even danced for joy that we were there with them.  They gladly slept on the hard concrete floors during the three nights there.  I could not help but think that I would not be so content.  In fact, I already knew that I wasn't content with the meal of three different curries and even my soft mat in an air conditioned room (a true luxury in India) was not the comfort I was used to.    

The Bible speaks in 1 Timothy 6:6 of how "Godliness with contentment is great gain."  This is a verse I have contemplated many times in my life.   It is something I try to ponder when I am feeling discontent, which can be a common occurrence, I think more so in a hedonistic society that bombards us with messages of how we need to dress a certain way, drive a new car and entertain ourselves constantly.  But in India I saw what true contentment can bring.  They had very little but were content with that. Christmas is only a week away as I write this and it makes me think of the people in "Whoville" that were so content, even when the Grinch tried to steal Christmas from them.  In a way the Christians I met in India who have been "stolen" from by the neglect of their government or even the world at large, are joyful.  They sing praises to God and God is blessing them for that.  They are far richer in His presence than we are here.  They have learned the truth that His presence is better than any presents!   It is my prayer that we can have even a taste of the kind of joy I experienced there.

   

I knew that I might come back from India with a different perspective and I have.  As I walk the malls and the grocery stores and I see the luxury and abundance all around me but the faces of people seem stressed and unhappy it is a jarring observation that we need joy here.  We might have wealth, fleeting happiness on occasion but what we need is the joy that knowing Jesus can bring.  There are so many different messages.  We have been taught "the power is within" but really all that is within us is sin, pain and suffering.  The power is not in us at all.  The true "power" to change our hearts comes from a small baby that was born in a little town called Bethlehem.  He was God come to earth.  He came to walk with us, feel our pain and sorrow and then take our sin, the sin that keeps us from experiencing true joy, upon himself.  He paid the ultimate price for those sins on a cross for us.  Because of Jesus we have the only reason to sing, in America, in India, and everywhere,  Joy to the World the Lord has come!  

Jesus, the Ultimate Jewish Repairman

 

My washing machine broke this weekend.  It has been one of those seasons where it seems like things are constantly breaking.   My microwave stopped working a couple of months ago, my dryer needed a new belt a few weeks ago and this time it was my washing machine.  If only all of my appliances could break on the same day it would make life easier.  Or better yet, if they never broke at all!  But unfortunately it seems like it is just one of the annoyances we have to deal with in life.  

The repair man arrived, a friendly looking man in his late 50's with fly away blond hair and an earring on one ear.  He looked more like a rock star than a washer repair man but I was just happy someone had arrived to fix my machine.  He loved my dogs which was great because one of my dogs came from a shelter.  The shelter said that he was a Italian Greyhound mix.  The part the shelter left out was that it was mixed with Pit Bull.  He can be very aggressive and it makes me nervous any time I introduce him to people.  But both of my dogs really liked the washing machine repairman. If my dogs like him that is proof he must be a good fellow.  He was also very chatty and he had a noticeable accent that sounded Russian to me.  I asked where he was from and he said he was from the Ukraine.  I mentioned I had taken a Russian class once after my husband returned from a month long mission trip to Russia.  This of course intrigued him. 

After showing him my washing machine he quickly jumped in to work on it.  He seemed very happy to chat while he was working and it appeared he could multitask so I obliged and chatted with him while he was working.  He wanted to know more about my husband's trip to Russia.  I said that it was in 1991.   He responded, "Oh, the early 90's.  That was a good time to go.  Russia was pretty democratic at that point."   I said that my husband spent a month there and was handing out Bibles and starting churches.  I mentioned that people were even having fist fights over Bibles when they were being handed out.  This didn't surprise him at all. I learned that he had to leave Russia before the 90's because of religious persecution.  He was Jewish and he said I would not believe some of the things he had seen.  He did not appear to want to go into details, but from what I learned he had family members that had suffered through the Holocaust, and because of Stalin many of the their freedoms were taken from them and many family members were killed for their Jewish faith.  I agreed and said that there was no way I could ever really understand.  Unless you have gone through that kind of thing personally there is no way to really understand.  I said I could try to sympathize but that was really all I could do. 

He said that he was thankful to be in America now but that he was not a fan of Obama though.  He greatly lamented that he had some Jewish friends that voted for him.  He quoted Winston Churchill and said, “Show me a young Conservative and I'll show you someone with no heart. Show me an old Liberal and I'll show you someone with no brains.”  I laughed out loud at this and said that there was much truth in that!  I mentioned that he seemed very intelligent and he said that he had two college degrees. I said he should be teaching classes instead of repairing washing machines but he said that he had four grandchildren at home he spent time teaching.  I was still curious why someone with the life experience and depth of knowledge he appeared to have would be content with the mundane job of just fixing broken washing machines but the conversation moved on to other things. 

At this point he was fully aware of my Christian beliefs.  It isn't something I hide of course.  So he offered several interesting points to me.  One was that he believed in God and that he believed it really didn't matter what God you believed in or prayed to and that most religions have the basis of the Old Testament, specifically the 10 commandments, as the moral foundation for their beliefs.  I said there was definitely similarities in many religions. 

He did not give me any more time to talk and then jumped in with a story about how some Jehovah's Witnesses came to his door a while back.  I said, "They have some strange ideas."  He said, "Yeah right!?"  Then he said that the first time they came he pretended that he only spoke Russian.  A few weeks later some Jehovah's Witnesses that spoke Russian showed up at his door.  I laughed out loud at that!  He then said it was frustrating because they said that the Jews were God's chosen people.  So he said, "Then if we are chosen why do we need to become Jehovah's Witnesses?"  Of course I laughed at this.  His logic made sense to me.  I said that as Christians we do believe that the Jews are God's chosen people and that because of that I believe much of the persecution that the Jews have had to endure is in part because Satan hates them because of that and there is a giant target on their back, so to speak.  The repairman heartily agreed with me on this one. 

At this point I took the opportunity to mention that I had friends that are Jewish.  Although I anticipated what his response would be, I said "I have a very good friend that is a Messianic Jew!"  Just as I expected his response was a heated and frustrated, "Oh. Messianic Jews!"  Then he had to tell me the story when he was growing up his family was extremely angry at him over buying a "Jesus Christ Superstar" record.  He went on to explain how you can't really be Jewish and accept Jesus.

Then I said I had a question, a question I have had for a while.  Why is it that someone who is Jewish can accept basically anything?  They can dabble in Kabbalah, the occult, there are even atheist Jews, basically they can believe anything at all but accept Jesus.  Is it because of the experience that Jews have had with Christians?  He said that was it.  He said that during the Holocaust the Christians, primarily Catholics, did not help. I said that there were some Christians that did help though.  He agreed but said that 95% did not.  I said that just because the "church" did not help does not mean that Jesus still is not the Messiah.  Even the Old Testament prophesied that the promised Messiah had to have been born and lived at the time that Jesus Christ was on earth.  Even Jesus suffered at the hands of the church and was crucified. 

He thought for a brief moment.  He said, well if I accepted Jesus my father would probably kill me.  Then he thought for a moment and said, "It isn't like I do everything just because my father wants me to though."  Ah.  The wheels were turning.  I smiled and said, just something to think about.  He finished my washing machine.  I gladly paid him. He said, "Merry Christmas."  I said, "Happy Hanukkah."  I said I really enjoyed chatting with him.  I really did.  What a wonderfully intelligent and interesting man.  I do know God has a special place in his heart for the Jews.  Many have had to endure so much.  I would love to think that they could come "full circle" as I see it and understand who the promised Messiah is here on earth before they get to the other side, but I do feel like he was not rejecting Jesus.  He was just not sure yet.  He loved God, that I could see and I am so thankful that God does look at our hearts.  I will indeed pray that my Jewish repairman will at some point meet Jesus, the ultimate Jewish repairman!   There is plenty of things in this world that need to be fixed and we have the God given ability to do so, but we cannot fix our own souls.  Thankfully we can call on Jesus anytime :  the repairman for our souls and lost and broken world!

Seeing with Spiritual Eyes

Having spent many hours in debates on message boards, specifically with many atheists, I have come to the conclusion that much of what I have said and debated has fallen on deaf ears or "blind eyes."  There are some things that can only be seen with spiritual eyes.  The Bible even tells us that we were "once blind but now we see."  It should come as no surprise that when I am sharing truth from the Bible I have found that it will be perceived as foolishness to those that are not open to the things of God.  The question then leads me to ponder if these discussions are completely pointless or not.

Take some excerpts from my last discussion for example: 

Atheist: You seem to have blind faith in the bible and there is absolutely no way to know the accuracy of what was written in it.  Every religion has their own holy book, what makes your Bible valid and theirs invalid?

Me:  I have blind faith?  You may see it that way.  What is strange, and even supernatural, is that the Bible says that God will "Open the eyes of the blind."  In reality a person cannot see things spiritually until this happens.  Many people have said that the Bible did not make sense to them until they accepted Jesus and then it was like they could "see" things that they never saw before.  Although these experiences are not that common in my life, there have been some times in my life where I have "seen" sins that a person is struggling with the sole purpose of praying for that person.  I have seen visions.  I have also seen some people that I recognized were demon possessed just by feeling their presence in the room and then looked that direction and it was obvious that they "saw" me too!  A bit creepy but at the same time it just proved to me that I can see things in a spiritual way that many cannot.  The Bible is even said to be "foolish" to those that do not have the eyes to see. Instead of judging others for not seeing I really should not expect them to be able to.

I guess the thing that I would mention, in regards to your inference that the Bible is not true or it is just our "truth" is the question of why are so many people hostile to it?  If it wasn't so revolutionary why is it still banned in some places of the world?  Why has the Bible changed people's lives so much?  Why have people been willing to give up their lives for the truth in it, especially if it was not important?  Sure there are other religions that people give their lives for willingly, however, the one thing that separates Christianity from all other religions is that Christianity is the only religion that is not about earning our way to God.  In fact, it is all about realizing that there is no possible way to earn salvation at all.  It is about realizing that we are in need of help.  It takes humility and an open heart that prays and ask God to forgive us and "open our eyes" if you will to see things from God's perspective.  Then God, out of His great love, comes in and helps us to see not only ourselves, but others in a different way.  He helps us to love ourselves and others. He helps us to forgive, have joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, self-control.  He then gives us the gift of His Spirit in our hearts and then we are able to do good things because of His love, not because we are trying to earn our salvation but because we are so thankful for what He has done for us.  

Atheist: The placebo effect can be a very powerful thing.  A good example is those balance wristbands that say their holograms will make you have better posture, better at sports,  and so on.   But they actually are nothing but a piece of foil and some rubber, but the people wearing them believe in it so much that their brains make it true to them.  I'm not sure what you mean by saying that the possessed people "saw" you too, but 2 people looking at each other proves nothing supernatural.

People are hostile to any religion other than theirs in a lot of cases, or a specific religion because of the one they believe in, culture, etc.  In some places any religion except for the one of the state is banned, so does that mean every religion is valid?  The bible has changed people because they read it and thought they could be changed, coming back to the placebo effect.

Me:  I am not able to comment on everything right now but I do have a quick story to share regarding "seeing" people that are possessed.

What is strange is that I can feel their presence without seeing them first.  Then when I look the direction that the person is in they are often glaring at me with a sinister look.   My husband has a story that is more compelling though.  When he was in college he had a part-time job at an auto-parts store.  There was a strange guy that would come in on occasion and talk about Nostradamus and my husband noticed that he was possessed.  There was a very weird and dark spirit about him.  One day he was at work and he felt this guy's presence even though the guy was not in the store at the time.  My husband then commented to his co-workers "That Nostradamus guy is back."  The guy wasn't there so they said, "Where?"  My husband then sensed him near the 7-11 store next door and then pointed.  He sensed the guy walking and as his finger moved to where the guy was he was directly pointing at him when his figure appeared in the window walking by the store front.  His co-workers started freaking out and asking him how he knew that.  My husband just said it was easy.  He could "see" him or "sense" his evil or dark presence.  Having had this same experience I totally get it and understand it.  But it is something we can only "see" with our spiritual eyes.

And so the discussion has ended for now.  The atheist did not have a comment after I shared my husband's story (yet anyways.)  I figure the most important thing to do really is just pray.  Pray that the person reading the words will have a small desire, or even a curiosity in seeking more.  Really it takes God's Spirit to draw us to Him.  There is nothing brilliant enough that I could say to convince anyone otherwise.  So often these discussions lean towards "evolution and intelligent design" where I am treated as completely ignorant for even thinking that intelligent design was a possibility.  It seems to steer towards the question of if there was a God, why would He allow suffering and that is not the kind of God they would want to serve anyways.  Of course I explain that Christ suffered greatly too for us and that we have the free will to choose to love or harm others. But all of these discussions seem quite empty and most often end with no resolution.   Maybe a seed has been sown.  Maybe somewhere down the road a simple thing stated will cause them to ponder who God is in their lives.  I often try to intertwine personal stories because it is hard to argue with something that really happened to me, but even then I have to be a little thick skinned and not take an attack personally.  I suppose I need to consider it a compliment if I am hated for anything I say in defense of God's word.  I am in good company as I study the Bible for being laughed at and ridiculed.  So I continue to pray that I will see things through "spiritual eyes" and have the words to say that can open the eyes of the blind and lead them from darkness into light and that God's light will continue to shine brightly in and through me.