Month five of eleven of my World Race I spent in a small village in Nepal called Kothe. When we first arrived our pastor’s son, Samuel, told us their family was one of two in the whole village that were believers. That was so crazy to me, but something that sadly seems to be true in many of the countries we’ve been in so far.
Our main mission for the month was helping in an Anti-Human Trafficking Program the church was putting on to raise awareness in small “near by” villages (which meant anywhere from an hour to TWO hours hiking up a mountain). In addition, we helped with a youth rally that’s goal was to teach the youth how to lead the children in church and Sunday school. However, all other ministry was very limited due to the fact that we just happened to be there during an election time. We went over a week without transportation because they shut down all roads, and if you risked going out on the roads you were likely to have your vehicle stoned.
Because of that we had many days without ministry. We went out a few of those days to pray for people, and even a sick cow, but most days were spent the six of us in our cozy home in the church sanctuary. At first I was curious why God would bring us to this place during this time, limiting us on what we could really do to further His Kingdom in the area. However, half way through the month God really opened my eyes to the true ministry He had for us for this month.
Our team.
At the start of this month, after our second debrief, we had team changes. My team changed only a few girls. We still have Shelby, Emily, and Susan. We did however loose three of our beloved members – Sarah C, Lacey, and Kara K. God has blessed us with two new members – Kelsey G and Tina. Our team name has changed from Unfading Adornment to Asha – meaning humble strength. (Also hope in Nepali which I learned one of our last nights there – that’s awesome!)
The first week or so we all plugged in to movies, tv series, new books, and other things, and let time pass without really digging deep with each other. We have since really opened up and started going deeper emotionally with each other, but with lots of room for improvement still.
As we began to talk as a team about the blessing of time God has given us this month we began to talk about ideas of ministries we could do ourselves during our free days. It didn’t take much time looking around the church, that was built five years ago, to notice the stained and discolored walls. We checked the team budget and found we had just enough to purchase paint and supplies.
So it was settled. Our ministry would also consist of us painting the church walls. When we asked the Pastor he had Samuel tell us they had actually been planning to paint but didn’t have the funds, and how they were so grateful God sent us to do that for them. I cannot explain the joy it has been for us to be able to bless them as they have so greatly blessed us with love, hospitality and generosity.
So what began as a month of confusion and not feeling useful has turned to a month where we could bless a family that has blessed many past World Race teams, widows, youth, as well as their local community. So I thank God for this month, and the time he has blessed us with.
