This is a story about our experience with our partners in Kathmandu – less about what we did with them than who they are, which is a tremendous family and power for the kingdom. If you feel moved to support them (or the orphanage we reference), please reach out. We can contact either group very easily and would love to make that connection.
Sharing in Kathmandu:
All of debrief and training culminated in the first couple hours with our ministry partner in Kathmandu. We’ll call him Grace (because he calls himself grace ha). Grace’s family is wonderful. They run a church with a few campuses. That probably leads you to believe its something like Saddleback, or North Coast, or the Rock – any of the multi-campus, multi-venue, internet-streaming mega churches. Super wrong, and genuinely, I don’t think those churches have anything on the Grace family.
The church staff is only 8 people (names changed a little because they’re active ministers):
Dad: senior pastor; founded the church 30 something years ago
Mom: seems to be like a social director; makes fun of Austin a lot
Sam: 28, worship leader; famous musician (we actually saw one of his music videos on the bus from China before we even met him!)
Opal: 26, pastor
Grace: 23, lead pastor; hype man
Elizabeth: 20, worship musician
Gracie: 13, children’s ministry; not really, she’s just the baby of the family and plays with all the little kids to allow the parents to attend services
Gramma: 73, thug; not really sure what Gramma does, but she can cook up a storm, is super crafty, and led us on a hike the easy way so “…isn’t too hard for the Americans”.
As individuals, this family is among the most Spirit led people I’ve ever encountered and I’m pretty confident to say they’re probably the most Spirit led you’ve ever encountered also. But they don’t work as individuals, which makes the FAMILY the most Spirit led anyone has ever met. Boom. Fact. They are humble servants of God with incredible reach in the community. They support additional churches that struggle with community programs, they support an orphanage to ensure the kids are loved and know Jesus, and they support the community in ways it doesn’t know it needs.
– tangent – Grace plays in a band and had a gig downtown one night so we all joined him. He invited a few of us on stage and we played an impromptu worship set to anyone in the downtown Kathmandu area that was in ear shot. He says he loves doing that because it inevitably starts conversations about Jesus and at a minimum, shouts His Glory to anyone around us.
What I think is really cool about their church is that they tend to new believers. They are exceptional at reaching lost children of God and bringing them to know Jesus Christ. It’s unbelievable. This is their vision for the next couple years: The church in Gorkha is run by the parents, who are citizens in that district while the “kids” run the church in Kathmandu and continue their education. They have a house in the city of Gorkha, but built a two room hut in a small village of 25 people on land they’ve been passed down through the generations. Why? Because the village needs them. The family was able to speak to the village and it is now full of believers (throw that in the win column for sure) but it isn’t enough. Check this out: the only school in the district is a two and a half hour hike over the ridge each direction. We did that hike (that Gramma led). It’s no joke, which means most children in the outlying area of Gorkha just don’t go to school. The older kids in the family have 3 of 5 teaching credentials required to start their own school. With government recognized, legitimate teachers, no one can say anything about them opening a Bible school on private land in an area where school and Jesus are desperately needed. They’re amazing.
Anyway, on day one, Grace looked at us and said they have a service for new believers and he was excited to do prophetic words with them! I remember thinking “wow that’s amazing, heavy-hand it for them!” then he shared his plan to have US split up one-on-one to prophecy in a more intimate environment. He also let us know the congregation was super excited to meet the Americans and learn from them. No backing out. We started to pray immediately that God would meet us, allow us to open our hearts and silence our minds, and that he may speak through us. Long story short, Victoria got them to start sharing their testimonies, which allowed us to feel a connection with any one of them and then break off into one-on-ones. Each of us had a tremendous experience as the Spirit filled that place and God spoke through us. After each meeting, the Nepali returned to the group room and shared how the prophetic messages they received from the Americans reflected what they were struggling with, things they’ve not shared with others, or dreams they waited in anticipation of God to fulfill. It was beautiful to be a part of, but as a team we celebrated God’s work and recognized that there wasn’t anything any of us could have done without God in that service.
Lesson learned: any of the gifts I spoke about in the first section are available to us, but pure hearts to serve God is what will allow His work to flow through us.
