I’m well in to month two of my race which blows my mind! I spend a few days in Kathmandu for a debrief, a time of rest, fun, and reflection. I sat in a coffee shop drinking what they call milk tea wishing I was back in India drinking the chi tea. I started to think about my time in India and how I could put my experiences into a blog for you to understand. I wasn’t even sure I had words for my time in India.
So India was a whirlwind of things, I love India and hated it all at the same time. Our ministry was amazing, I couldn’t of asked for a better ministry. The Lord really worked on my heart in India too and it wasn’t something I was fully aware till I really sat and thought about it. The Lord was shifting my heart into a place where I was able to understand dependence on Him just a little more. I wouldn’t say I’ve grasped that concept fully by any means, but I understand it a little more.
Ministry in India didn’t look how I thought it would at all. We were so eager to come in to serve their ministry but they did nothing but serve us and love us well. So my “World Race Standards” of ministry were continually crushed and completely erased. I thought our ministry would be doing more church work, or praying over people in the church. I knew ministry would look different, but my expectations were completely different than what the Lord had planned for us. I learned ministry can look different day to day, person to person, it can look how ever you make it. Your ministry looks how you allow the Lord to move. Which is a big statement I know, but it was proven to me time and time again.
Ministry can look like going out to near by villages and setting up medical camps. People would come to get check ups and we prayed for healing for them. Sometimes praying for them meant praying even though they can’t understand you. Sometimes it means meeting a girl at one of the medical camps and her bringing back her family because she wants more of the Lord; her neighbor getting healed and we all standing there in amazement. Maybe it looks like going into an all Muslim community, not being allowed to speak about Jesus or religion, but going anyways. It means walking out of that Muslim school where they had never seen white people, feeling more loved than I could imagine. Or maybe it’s when your doing medical prep and they ask you to pray over the part of the hospital that’s still under construction. Your team is tired and we pray over a few rooms and you guys realize that you aren’t being authentic, so you just sit and let the Lord move. Not only does He move not how we expected but moves in a way that was better than our unauthentic prayers. Or maybe it’s becoming best friends with a little puppy named Milo and playing with him everyday. Then you start to build a relationship with his family and you love them through your love for their puppy. Maybe it looks like cooking with the kitchen crew and them teaching me how to make tortillas.
Ministry is such a wide range of thing and it can come up in your everyday life. You just have to leave the space for the Lord to move, and He will. My expectations of ministry have been wiped away and now the Lord has room to move and blow my mind. I’m thankful that He did it month one so now I have 10 more months to give Him space to move.
Thank you to all my supporters! I am beyond grateful that you all helped me get here and experience these things. You all have a very special place in my heart.
-TaylorB
