Untouchable No More: An update on our plans.

7.27.2008

An update on our plans.

We had a plan and we were kind of excited about it. Friday leave on the midnight train for Bangalore where we would spend the rest of our time in India. There is a school for special needs children and there is a children’s home for AIDS orphans where we were invited to serve. Also some really good friends of Lori’s that she has known since the 70’s. But God is after something else. When we arrived back on Friday from a tearful goodbye with the kids and teachers we were greeted with the news of bus stop bombings in Bangalore. Our hosts here were very reluctant to let us travel there until things settled down. So we had a great Saturday doing a few tourist things. Then we were told that there were 17 bombings in a neighboring state and the police found yet another bomb in Bangalore. We are being asked to wait to travel until the situation could be assessed.

We see this as God leading us into something else rather than stopping us. Like a detour rather than a roadblock. And we are asking Him to show us what that is.

Today, Sunday, we get to worship with other believers and we are looking forward to that. By this afternoon we will know if we proceed with our Bangalore plan or stay here for the rest of the week. We’ll let you know!

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Prayer

Here is how you can be praying for us.

- Pray for the Freedom of those oppressed by the Hindu caste in India.

- Pray for the continued support of the school. It is growing rapidly and despite all the expansion they've seen in facilities they're quickly outgrowing their facilities. They have big dreams to expand, pray for the support and funding to make it happen. It won't be on their own, they'll need a lot of help, but God has been faithful to provide thus far.

- Pray for the continued advance of the Gospel in an ever increasingly oppressed land.

Praise

Here is what we are praising God for

- We came together as a team. Held together by our Creator, we became a close-knit bunch.

- The school continues to grow! And there is no student in India who is getting a better education. (We may be a little biased but after seeing it first hand, I wouldn't doubt if it were true.) They continue to add students and teachers and have been able to expand the opportunities to teach and educate. And their dreams for the future are big!

- The Gospel is advancing!

much more to come...

Who we are

We are a group of adults and students from Nebraska who have been introduced to the idea that we are involved in an invisible world called the kingdom of God. Jesus Christ invited us to join Him on this narrow road that leads to a greater joy and fruit. Consequently being ruined for 'normal' living!

In 2003 we learned that there were millions of Indian Dalit who were cutting social and religious ties with Hinduism. The Christian Church offered what help they could. 'Educate our children' was the request. 'Even if our world-view is Biblical?' was asked. 'Yes!' was the response. So a group of Christian organizations committed themselves to operating schools for Dalit children. Our group knows a good challenge when we hear one. And this was big. More than 200 high school and college kids raised the money to build a school in 4 months!

The following summer it was decided we should go see where the school would be built and become acquainted with the teachers and students who were studying in a rented cattle barn. Hearing the teachers and leaders tell us that we were the first Americans they had met who 'followed' their money made us see this relationship differently. God had prompted us to send some money, but He was also very interested in us having our own lives change.

Each year we have taken a team of 10 or so to be in the school for a week. We plant ourselves in the classrooms to watch the teachers creatively educate these swarms of beautiful and unruly children with very few props. To watch the children grow and become brilliant and bilingual!

We return from our time there with our value system tweaked. We are more grateful for what we have, less consumer-oriented. We find that we are really impatient with ourselves for being petty or self-absorbed. India haunts us because we find that the same Spirit that is growing us up in Him here is at work there wrestling people away from death and slavery.