During our Training Camp, which was about 6 weeks prior to the launch of our World Race, my squadmates and I were told of a new opportunity we would have to invite our parents to join us on the mission field 8 or 9 months into our race and share in our experience for a week. In that moment, I knew I would invite both of my parents and that the Lord had great things in store for us during that time. However, I had no idea what exactly He had in mind until I experienced the Parent Vision Trip first hand. I asked both of my parents to write about their experiences so I could share them with you on my blog, and this is what my mom wrote about the week we shared in India together:
Exhausting, emotional, humbling, amazing. India was the last place I’d ever wanted to go.
Once I’d made up my mind, or I should say once my daughter and husband insisted I was going I still nearly didn’t make it as FedEx managed to lose my passport with approved India visa. I thought the time constraints of obtaining a new passport and visa would be insurmountable but I was mistaken. As I now know I was about many things. I thought I knew my daughter, but I was mistaken. Our second day in India she confessed to my husband and me the terrible demons she’d been struggling with for the past several years; most if not all that I was completely unaware of. How could this be? I’d loved her unconditionally, raised her to be an independent, responsible, good person, made sure she had a church family to support her, prayed for her and protected her as parents do. But how did I fail her so miserably? How did I not know what was really going on in her life?
I come from a generation where children and parents don’t reveal their inner secrets. Somehow she found the courage to open up to us and expose the unspeakable pain of her sin that she was only now able to cast off because she’d finally come to realize and trust in the unending, incomparable love of our Lord. That He has always loved her and forgiven her and that she is truly precious to Him. The stab in the heart pain then huge weight lifted off me as she spoke; I felt broken and drained, but at the same time lifted up and comforted.
Throughout the week watching my daughter and her teammates and even the other parents, I felt inadequate in my faith. I’ve always believed in God, gone to church, prayed fervently, though not freely, openly and with such passion as I experienced every single moment of each day in India. I have a difficult time speaking in public, much less praying out loud in front of and for others. The prayers in my heart don’t get past my lips. To see my daughter praying over families in a garbage dump and sharing the word of God so easily and eloquently was extremely humbling. She is definitely His daughter. I was so grateful to meet her teammates and the parents who have been faithfully praying for her; some without ever having met her.
India was everything I’d expected and nothing I’d expected. The weather was sunny, breezy and beautiful. The people were soft-spoken, gracious and kind. The children were precious. The food was abundant, wonderful and interesting. The bed bugs were annoying and squatty potties I won’t miss. The traffic was crazy and like nothing I’ve ever before experienced. All these cars, motorcycles, bicycles, tuk-tuks and people converging and navigating in an inexplicably small amount of space with nary a scratch or dent on any of the vehicles I saw…save one; a car parked on the edge of the road with a dent in the side and a sign on the roof that said Driver Education. There were rice patties and cotton fields, water buffalo swimming in a river, monkeys on a roof, cows walking unattended in the middle of the road, a roadside vendor with huge piles of fresh bright red hot peppers mounded on a tarp, a man climbing a 100 foot tall palm tree with only a strap and his feet to propel him to the top for a couple of coconuts, gorgeous women and girls in silk saris, a huge building shaped like a fish.
God sent me half way around the world to India to discover my daughter anew, to know her as He does and always has. To see firsthand what a wonderful young woman she has become. To confirm to me that He is the Father who ultimately loves us, protects us, forgives us, comforts and cares for us; works in progress though we are.
India was amazing. Wan-De-Nah-Lu (Praise the Lord!)
