When we first met her, we thought her name was Bonita, and we proceeded to tell her that "Bonita" means beautiful in Spanish. While we were incorrect about her name, which is actually Benita, the word beautiful still applies, but not just in a physical sense.
"Beauty is fleeting and charm is deceptive but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised."
Although she is outwardly beautiful, it is her beautiful heart that captured my attention and lead me to sharing her story for my "Women of the World" series of blogs.
Benita is a Proverbs 31 woman. (If you don't know what that means, I highly recommend reading it and doing more research on it.) Her heart for the Lord is evident in everything she does.
"She gets up while it is still night, and provides food for her family"
Every morning, before the sun came up, Benita was up, getting ready for the day. By the time we got up each day, she had tea ready for us and breakfast on its way.
"She watches over the affairs of her household, and does not eat the bread of idlness."
Benita works incredibly hard and manages her household with grace. She always seemed to know what was going on. Every time our plates were near empty, she was ready to pour out more food onto them. Everytime our water bottles were running low, she was there to fill them up. Everytime we started to do our laundry, she would come up to us and help us wash our clothes. She did all of this for us while still helping her family.
"She makes linen garments and sells them"
Benita open a tailoring shop while we were staying with her. In fact, we were a last minute addition to her already busy schedule, but she opened her house to us with only a few days notice and still managed to open her shop. Why did she want to open a shop?
"She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy."
Benita's husband is an assistant pastor and only makes a small stipend. Benita, who desires to help everyone she meets, wanted to open the shop in order to better serve her community. She wanted to be able to give more money to the poor and needy.
She has made sure we had plenty of food 🙂
This beautiful woman has had a difficult life, but the Lord has used it to strengthen her character- the very character that was such an encouragement to our team. When Benita was just five years old, her mother passed away. Her father quickly remarried and over a few short years, Benita had many siblings. Be one of the oldest, it became Benita's responsibilty to take care of her brothers and sisters. Because of this responsibilty, Benita's education fell by the wayside.
But the Lord saw Benita. At 14 years old, she moved to Kathmandu to receive a better education, but ended up receiving Jesus Christ as her savior. In Kathmandu, she lived with her aunt and uncle (who is a pastor) who were able to encourage her in her new walk. To this day, they remain some of her greatest supporters. Benita was baptized and then when to the "Ladies Professional Training Center" where she learned to sew. But rather going to work right away, Benita decided to have her own gospel program and began evangelizing.
At the age of 19, Benita married her wonderful husband Simon. Unfortunately, they faced a lot of problems early in their marriage because of Simon's father, who struggled with alcoholism. Things got so bad that Simon's father even tried to kill Simon and Benita when Benita was pregnant with their first child. They told Benita's aunt and uncle of the problem, and were immediately welcomed into their home. One of Simon and Benita's first ministries as a new family was working in an orphanage- they thoroughly enjoyed their time there and grew a lot.
Now, Benita and Simon minister to lepers. The first floor of their home serves as a church for the local leper colony. Every friday morning there is a church service and we had the priveledge of attending. During our time in this community, we could see the fruit of Simon and Benita's ministry- men and women who had been shunned by their culture were finding hope and love in Jesus.
Benita shared with me some crazy stories from their evangelism trips. They once traveled to a hindu village and began preaching the gospel. Benita overheard some people planning to beat them, so the group quickly left the village but were chased by the men, so they ran all night long to safety.
Benita showed our team what it means to have a christ-like heart. There was such joy in her everytime she served us. We found out on our last day of ministry that we were a last minute surprise- there was a miscommunication on the number of teams that would be in Nepal, but Benita was willing to open her home to us with only a few days notice. We were incredibly blessed by her.
Our team with Benita and our transaltor, Ashish
I asked Benita to describe who God was to her, and this is what she said: "Father, Guide, Shepherd. Nothing is impossible for God."
This beautiful woman's favorite bibe verse is a testimony of how she lives her life for Christ.
"Let everything that has breath sing praises to the Lord! Praise the Lord!" –Psalm 150:6
