While we stayed in Kathmandu, our host Brian shared an interesting philosophy on ministry, especially short term ministry. The philosophy was this: when we come we have three avenues of ministry, outreach, reaching out, and reaching in.
OUTREACH is what most people think about doing on missions trips – spreading the gospel, rescuing women at risk, rescuing street kids, etc. REACHING OUT is the idea that God uses multiple people and organizations to reach his kingdom in every city and it is important for those to reach out to each other and work together for God’s glory. REACHING IN means investing in those that are doing the ministry – encouraging those who do God’s work day after day.
Our teams were blessed to reach Kathmandu using all three avenues over the last few weeks in Nepal.
The Agape Mission team is very intentional in their outreach to children and women at risk and we were able to join with them. In the mornings we would split up to serve at either the school for slum children or the women’s center. Then in the afternoons we would again split up and go out to meet street kids, women in dance bars or people in the slums. The afternoon ministry was hard, because we had to fully rely on our Nepali team members to translate, but it was good to go to the hard places and see what life is really like for those at the bottom.
We were also blessed this month to meet people working with other organizations to do ministry in Nepal. As I shared in an earlier blog, the international church near us is home to people from all over the world doing a variety of ministry all over Kathmandu. It really was a blessing to meet so many other Christians – to come together and know that we are all working toward one goal: glorifying God.
However, I think our biggest ministry this month was reaching in and blessing the Agape Mission team. Even though we knew them only a few short weeks, they became like family. We ate with them, we laughed with them, we served with them and we even cried with them. The thing about reaching in is this: we leave after one month; they continue on in country for hopefully years to come. Only God knows how far a little encouragement and service can go.
So this month in Kathmandu, we ministered in a lot of little ways to the Agape Mission team and out of that time came my favorite moments. We shared our testimonies and words of encouragement from the Bible (yes, even me!). We helped give our hosts Brian and Ruth a needed home make-over. For four of the younger Nepali women on the team, we befriended them and treated them to an American-style dinner and ice cream on our terrace. Most important, we listened to them. We learned who they were, where they were from, what they had overcome in life to get to a place of ministry and what their current struggles are. We got to see their heart for the Lord and their heart for the lost people of their city. We gave them part of our hearts, and because of that we will never forget them.
I was not ready to say goodbye to Nepal. One of the young girls on the Agape team told me this as we went our separate ways last Thursday: “In Nepal we do not say goodbye – we say see you next time.” I hope someday this will come true – that I can return to the beautiful Nepal and the beautiful people of the Agape Mission team. Please keep this country and this ministry in your prayers!
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Location Update:
On a side note, in case you don’t already know, I am now in Hyderabad, India for a few days at a debrief – a time of rest and reflection. After that we head to Ongole. The whole squad of 44 people will be staying together all month to help establish the culture of our group. However, our teams will still be doing ministry individually. Team Gladiators will be working with a children’s development center.
