Day 1

I started writing this, this morning and had to stop. I'm going to go ahead and finish telling about our first day and get it posted before I start on today. Get ready for a ton of pictures!

Yesterday began with our constant companions, Chuckoo and Joseph, picking us up and taking us for an Indian breakfast. I'd never eaten that before, and it was really good. Definitely a new experience in India. It was kind of a toss between sandwich bread and pancakes, with gravy instead of syrup. Actually quite tasty.

After that we headed over to the church for the baptism service. We got there too late to hear this girl's testimony, but we were there in time for her actual baptism. I did get to hear a little of her story, and it's just another example of God's ability to meet people where they are and completely transform lives.

We also had the opportunity to spend some time with Pastor G. Samuel and bring him some gifts from home. The bond between he and his grandson Jonathan is so sweet. But this child is terrified of me. He took one look at me on Monday night and burst into tears. He couldn't wait to get as far from me as possible! I even bribed him with a sucker, but at this point I've not broken through. As he ate the sucker he kept both eyes on me and I knew I better not make any sudden moves. My mission is to win this little guy over before Sunday!
After that we loaded up in the church van to head out and visit some of BCH's daughter churches. There are currently 120 churches around the state of Andhra Pradesh in various stages that have been birthed by Baptist Church Hyderabad. 90 of them have their own buildings, while some of those are simply walls, ceiling and floor at this point. Others that have been there longer have had time to paint Scriptures around the walls and add decorations. We learned that usually the congregation will pool their resources and save up to buy the tinsel and things that make the ceiling look brighter. I love walking around and trying to guess what the Scripture references are by their numbers. I'm pretty terrible at it, sad to say!
Jeff and Chuckoo...
This church had recently built a baptistry. It is enormous. If I walked down in it, the concrete would be over the top of my head. Seemed a little intimidating to me, but they are very proud of this addition to their property. I am praying they will have to use it every week!
At each church we would pray for the pastor and his congregation...
The pastor's wife and her sisters were so sweet. One of them said I looked like a man since I was wearing pants. Not exactly the look I was going for, but you have to love the honesty!
Do you know what Scripture reference ends in 25:6? Me neither.
This is the van that miraculously gets us from place to place. I'm quite sure it is filled with the Holy Spirit. That can be the only explanation for why we're not dead yet. :)
The second church we visited was one I had been to before. Last time there was no furniture...

And this is today!

Praying God's blessings over this church...

I am going to pass this on to our church's interior design team. I think this could really jazz up Station Hill!

Our final destination was also a church I had been to before, and this one was incredibly profound for me. If you were with me for my first trip, you'll remember that on one day we drove way out into the wilderness and visited a gypsy village where the congregation met under a tree. This is a picture from that day.

The people that live here are as low in Indian society as you can possibly get. They are gypsieswho have very little to do with the outside world. Their water source is a containment unit that fills up during rainy season. Once it runs out, that's it until it rains again. Most of them are sick and diseased from the filth they live in.

But God put a burden on a pastor's heart for the people of this land. He moved into the village and began to share the Gospel with them. Many have been resistant to him, but God has blessed him with some who have believed. The Word of God never returns void. When a group of people hear the Message, at least someone will believe. Otherwise, how can their be a representative from every tribe and every nation in Heaven for all time?

This pastor is reaching his community by meeting the physical needs of the people, a formula that has worked for centuries. While we were visiting, the pastor was not present. We found out he had gone to buy grain because the village had run out of food. They have learned to trust him and look to him when they are struggling. As they look to him, he can point them to the Truth. Instead of regular grain, they are receiving the Bread of Life. It doesn't get more real than that.

Today the people of this village no longer have to meet under a tree, and the King of Kings is receiving the glory He is due way out in the furthest reaches of Indian wilderness. Impossible not to say Hallelujia!
I mentioned to some of you that I had been asked to speak at the youth meeting last night. It turned out that we took a little longer to return from Indian wilderness than we had planned for, so we didn't make it back in time. Pictures can never adequately show what traffic in India is like, but perhaps this had something to do with our tardiness...
We did get back before the youth meeting was over, so we had a little time to hang out before heading to dinner. By the time we made it back to our room we were more than ready to crash., which is why it took until now for you to get this update.

Today was a full and amazing day too, but my eyes seem to be closing against their will (and I haven't even taken my Ambien yet!

More to come tomorrow. Bye for now.

Too tired to blog tonight, but I'll try to first thing in the morning. But for now, if I had to choose one picture that would adequately represent today, it would have to be this. Please don't miss the bumper. There is NOTHING like driving in India!

We Made It

As my GPS loves to say, we have reached our final destination! And it is so good to be here.

Our time in the Delhi airport will certainly not be our fondest memory of the trip, but it could have been worse. The breakfast that was supposed to be out at 4:30 a.m. in the lounge finally arrived close to 5:30, so we scarfed down a few bites before heading to our gate where we were supposed to board at 5:55. As we came down the escalator, we were really surprised to not see what we think of as traditional gates, more like several different sections of winding waiting lines. When we arrived at "Gate" 10, the sign said that it was already boarding. We presented our passes at the front of the line and were ushered out the door to a shuttle bus that was going to take us to the plane, presumably out on the runway.

This might not strike you as funny as it did us after traveling for 30+ hours, but this is the picture Jeff took when we arrived at the plane, literally 20 yards away from where we got on the bus. We were cracking up. I can see the logic in not wanting all these people crossing a pretty busy little area, but it would have been far less busy without all the shuttle busses. It made us think of the Andy Griffith episode where Barney escorts Jim Lindsey via siren and police car two doors down from where they started. We could not stop laughing for a while.

Shortly after we boarded the flight attendants began shutting the overhead compartments and we were really surprised because the plane was less than a third full. It turned out to be right though and we were able to spread out a little bit. It was a nice way to end the journey. This is the view taking off from Delhi.When we arrived, our friends Chuckoo, Joseph and Ramesh were waiting for us. They took one look at us and suggested that we go straight to the hotel to get some rest. We couldn't have agreed more with that one, although I hated to let them go so soon after reuniting. But it gave us some time to get unpacked, grab some breakfast and showers. Jeff and I both crashed for a little over three hours, which I'm hoping will not turn out to have been a mistake. Mistake or not, it couldn't be helped.

The time passed quickly and we were back in the van headed to church. Things have changed a little at Baptist Church Hyderabad in the form of a fresh paint job. As Chuckoo says, it's now easy to see from the road!

The first picture I posted shows a better shot of the banner Chuckoo put together to advertise the youth conference. The graphics are amazing and I am so impressed with all of the details I've seen so far that have gone into putting this together. I am eager to see the final result.

Speaking of banners, here's one Jeff and I made it on to. We're special guests. :) (And it goes to show that pictures you put on Facebook may not stay on Facebook!)

We were so happy to be able to participate in the English service tonight. It always amazes me to realize that 2 1/2 hours have passed by the time we are finished. Great worship, prayer and time in the Word. Our friend Moses preached the sermon tonight and did a fantastic job. I was really impressed with him.

Here's the youth choir singing one of the numbers they've been rehearsing for Saturday. They have been practicing so hard. In fact, they have an all-day rehearsal tomorrow that I'm hoping to get to sit in for part of. If you know me, you know it's hard for me to sit and listen to a choir doing praise and worship without jumping up there with them, but I practiced restraint. We'll see how long that lasts though. ;)
Jeff and I couldn't help but think about the 9:30 service happening at Station Hill right around the time that we were wrapping up evening worship. The choir was making its debut as a regular Sunday worship choir, and I can't wait to hear how that went. We were with you in spirit!

After church we were treated to a lovely dinner by the youth leaders who have been on the committee for the conference this year. Four beautiful girls whose names I badly butchered verbally and won't even attempt to reproduce in written form. They were so gracious, though, and we had a great meal before returning to our hotel.

All right, my Ambien is starting to kick in so I better move over to the bed. Here's to a full night's sleep in prone position. That sounds like heaven.

Love from India...

Almost There

We have made it to New Delhi. We actually arrived around 8:30 p.m. India time, but the next few hours were pretty long and tedious. Getting through Customs was a breeze, but getting our luggage took a lot longer. Then we had to go through the process of figuring out we needed to board a shuttle bus that would take us to an entirely different airport for our connecting flight to Hyderabad. Bizarre, but that's what happened.

We arrived at this airport a little before 10. Since we didn't have a boarding pass, we couldn't come in the main airport but had to go to a ticketing room. She said she couldn't give us a boarding pass, but she printed up an itinerary so security would let us in to the main section. When we presented that to him, he said we couldn't come in until 12, because that's when the ticket counter would open. So we went back to the room where you buy tickets and hung out for two hours. This is not a place designed for lengthy waiting. This is us.

Since sleep wasn't really happening, we gave it up and played a game of Scrabble on the iPad. At 12:01 we got up and came back to the main section where the guy finally let us in, but it turns out Jet Airways ticket counter still wasn't open. More sitting in uncomfortable black chairs. Finally we started seeing activity around 12:30 and we were able to get in line for our boarding passes. The best part about this was getting rid of our three checked bags so we could stop hauling all this stuff around.

This airport has a lounge that you can pay to get into, so that's where we've ended up parking. We had to get some Wi-Fi because time for kickoff in the Alabama/Arkansas game was quickly approaching. This is Jeff now... much happier!

All in all, our flight from Chicago was pretty unadventurous. Jeff and I both slept for a few hours, so it made it seem a little quicker. I think our flight time ended up only being 13 1/2 hours, so that's way better than the original 16 we thought we were in for.

I opened my window a couple of hours outside of New Delhi as sunset was approaching. We were flying right over Kabul, Afghanistan at the time, which is a little disconcerting in and of itself. But the view of the mountains was breathtaking. This picture is horrible, but I hope you can at least get a glimpse of what we were looking at.

At this point, I just kept breathing Psalm 24:1, "The earth is the LORD's, and everything in it; the world and all who live in it." Truly a glory moment for God the Creator.

As the sun began to set, the image was majestic. Again, forgive the quality of a cell picture, but I found it amazing that you can almost see the curvature of the earth as the sun disappears from sight. It was so beautiful.

So now it is 1:30 a.m. Delhi time and we have five hours until our next flight. I'm going to try and get some sleep if I can get Jeff to keep quiet while watching the game. Yeah. :)

If all goes well, next post will be from Hyderabad. Keep praying!

On Our Way...

Apparently it takes international travel to get me to dust the blog off these days. Just as video killed the radio star, Facebook seems to have done the same thing to Blogger. I confess to taking the quick and easy way out most of the time. But what we're up to these days deserves a little more cyberspace.

Today, Jeff and I are heading back to Hyderabad, India! It has been 20 months since our last journey, and that is far too long. I am itching to get back and be among so many people that I love and the land that God has etched into my heart. The purpose of our trip this time is to help our friends at Baptist Church Hyderabad with their annual youth conference on October 2nd. It is an event that brings over 5,000 people from all over the state of Andhra Pradesh, and we are thrilled to have the opportunity to participate this year. This week we will be hanging out with our friends and helping in their preparations for the conference. I also anticipate sweet time with the almost 60 girls living in the orphanage on the church property. I miss their gorgeous faces!

Since our church isn't actively pursuing a partnership with BCH anymore, Jeff and I prayed about it and decided it was time to just head out on our own. We know God has put this church and city in our path for a reason, and until He shuts the door for us, we intend to do whatever we can to foster that relationship. As much as we have loved time spent with past team members, we're actually really excited about going on our own this time and the freedom that will bring. We were discussing earlier how God made us for international travel, and we are so grateful that He did and has given us the resources to pursue that passion. So the above picture is our "team" picture for Hyderabad 2010. Thanks, Dad! :)

As I write, we are waiting out a 4-hr layover at Chicago O'Hare. Due to much past experience with Chicago, we didn't want to risk the later flight out of Nashville. This city is normally my traveling nemesis, but everything has been beautiful so far today. We actually arrived a few minutes early! The air is crisp and clear and I think it's only 62 degrees out there. Quite a shock from the mid-90's we've been used to as we quickly walked through the breezeway upon exiting the plane.

This is the view from my window. Look closely and you can see the Chicago skyline in the background. It really is a spectacular day!
We are unbelievably grateful to all of you who have supported us on this journey. I need to give a big shout out to all of the caregivers taking care of the three little Swords over the next ten days, Uncle Marc and Aunt Gigi, Mimi and Poppa G, the Abbotts, Uncle Bill and Aunt Krenan, the Weimers, Meem and Granddaddy Reid. It truly takes a village to make this possible! You have all been nothing but encouraging to us as we follow God's direction, and we don't take that for granted. You are such a blessing to our lives!

Once we leave here tonight (7:30 Central time), we should be in the air for about 16 hours until we arrive in Delhi. We have a 10-hour layover there, so I'll try to update at that point. We should be arriving there around 8:00 p.m. Saturday, which is 6:30 a.m. back home.

Please keep us in your prayers. We can feel them! Love to all...