I wish I had the words to sum up the love that I have for the country of Nepal.??
I wish I could confidently tell you with honesty that I have been writing every single thing down in my journal, so that I could process this journey in a healthy manner, and so that I could eternalize my time here forever, never to be forgotten, not even a single moment.??
I wish I could say that it will be easy to leave here and move on to our next destination.
??I wish I could say that I didn’t start crying on a crowded Nepalese transit bus this morning, missing someone from back home very much, even though I love it here enough to never want to leave.
??I wish I could say that I’ve been good at reading my Bible every day.??
I wish I could say that I’ve been disciplined in waking early enough to spend quality time with the Lord in the mornings like I was in India, rather than sleeping in until the very last minute.
??I wish I could show all of you the unrivaled beauty that I see every single day and how it catches my breath a thousand times over again.
??I wish that seeing those beautiful mountains didn’t make me miss the pounding sound of the ocean, even though I love their towering heights so deeply. ??
Being human is complicated, you know?? We always want what we can’t have, and we are never fully satisfied, even when we love exactly where we are.
??I don’t pretend to understand the complexities of the human condition when it comes to these matters, but here’s a little bit about Nepal that I can tell you; please bear with me, as I stated before, I have not been externally processing any of this up until this exact moment and it has the potential to come out raw, unkept and without censorship:
– I have never felt the closeness of the Holy Spirit as powerfully as I do here, every single day. The entire atmosphere hums with His presence. God reveals His loving nature to these people in the most mind-blowingly simplest of ways, and being a witness to that is one of the greatest honors I have ever received.
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Nepal is known for its breath-taking population of wildflowers; the hillsides are covered with gardens and greenhouses chock-full of the most stunning arrangement of oranges, blues, reds and purples that I have ever seen. God’s glory is omnipresent throughout all creation.
-Here, your elders are to be respected at all times, but not out of a spirit of exaggerated reverence. There is a sentimental, touching element of familiarity in which all elders are referred to as “auntie” or “uncle” and watching two Nepali people in conversation, one significantly younger than the other, is a refreshing look into how inter-generational communication should be. There is a mutual respect for the youth from the elder, and for the elder from the youth. It’s beautiful to watch.
-I have been taking public transit almost every single day I’ve been here, and I still don’t understand how it works at all. It’s insane, and confusing, and hilarious, and all I can really say on the matter is that you have not truly stared death in the face until you have taken public transit from the center of Kathmandu all the way up a very narrow, steep, insanely curved road to a tiny hillside village. It’s terrifying and exciting all at the same time.
-Here, “Gospel” is an action verb; and I can’t imagine Jesus intending that word to be used as anything but a verb, now that I’ve experienced it in this manner. “We are gospeling the Hindu and Buddhist peoples in Nepal,” is a sentence we hear quite often, and whenever I hear it, a small piece of my heart begins to sing.
-There are castes in Nepal that are devoted entirely to being INSANELY musically gifted, and entirely to being INSANELY good at cooking, and we are smack-dab in the middle of a family with members in both castes. Is this my dream life? Pretty much.
-People here walk as far as they need to, no matter how long it takes, without complaint. Sometimes this looks like 7 miles, maybe even 10, in one day- just to partake in fellowship with one another, worship God together and to live in intentional community. I’ve never walked so much in my life, and my body drinks these challenges in like water.
-Nepalese babies are the most beautiful babies I have ever seen in my entire life, bar none.
-Here, women are deemed more attractive according to their increased devotion to modesty. It’s a refreshing break from the worldview we’re used to, which is quite the opposite.
-This month has been filled with family dinners that touch the deepest corners of my heart. We sit on the floor in a circle, and with some translation, we share stories about our pasts and our families. We look at old photo albums, and we watch old family movies. We drink tea, we eat a lot of rice, we dance, we do family devotions together, we sing silly songs and we laugh nonstop at every meal with this delightfully beautiful family God has placed us into. We are mothered, fathered, teased by our new sisters and brothers, and regarded as much part of their family as their own flesh and blood. Sometimes I look around me during these evenings and I wonder in the stillness of my heart, how on earth I am possibly going to leave them in such a short amount of time?
-I’m learning in the most impactful of manners that God answers our dreams in ways we could never even have begun to imagine. This month, He has answered my dreams of running wild with a real band in real time, finding jars of peanut butter when I didn’t even realize how much I wanted them, living an intentional life with real family dinners every night, literally hiking mountainsides in the jungle of Nepal whilst singing with new friends the entire way, gaining an entire group of younger brothers, living with a family who understands the beauty of a home-cooked meal complete with such sarcastic banter, head-banging to punk rock with the boys on a crowded microbus for the entire hour we were on it, being greeted everywhere we walk by baby goats, sweet puppies and crazy beautiful wildflowers, and not to mention living in a country where brightly colored houses and doors and buses are around every turn. The colors of the rainbow are truly alive here, and every time I step out of my door, I am reminded of God’s unbreakable promise to His people, of faith everlasting.
??So, yes. I have not been faithful or disciplined in writing everything down as it has happened.
As you can see, my thoughts are disorganized and chaotic-,but that’s because I have been too busy trying to soak up every delicious moment as it happens. This month has honestly been such an outpouring of blessing from the Lord onto me.
??Last month, I felt like God took me to India to show me the crazy deep love He has for the people of Manipur, so that I too may love them as He does.??
This month, I feel like God has brought me to Nepal to show me how deeply He loves me, exactly as I am, so that I may begin to love myself the way He does, and this is something that I cannot adequately put into words because there are no words for the beauty this transcends. ??
Thanks for reading my scattered thoughts, and for following along on my ongoing journey. I promise more updates will come.
All my love.
Xx
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