Tuesday, 10/22: It has been a good
second day of training. I so enjoy the men here. They have such
open hearts and a real passion for passing the training on to many others.
Today they were talking about how they are strategizing about how to take
the training to many groups in S. India over the course of the next several
years. They had such vision and need only a little advice and help in
organization to carry our ministry far beyond us in this needy land.
We are studying the
Psalms in our current workshop and today spent some time thinking through
lament psalms, the most common type of psalm. They begin with a complaint
or problem and eventually end up with a statement of hope in God, often in the
absence of all earthly evidence but in the face of His word. We talked
about how this kind of lament was part of the worship experience of Israel but
is often so foreign to our cultures, both the Indian and the American. We
often feel that such things as showing doubt, fear, frustration or hurt
publicly or in the congregation is taboo. But as I said this is the most
common form of the psalms and was meant to be sung and contemplated by the
congregation of God's people. Perhaps that is a great loss to us in
helping one another know how to take our hurts and troubles to the Lord in
authentic ways, but also in ways that lead to real hope.
We looked at Psalm 42/43
today in which the author shares his struggle of being in trouble, we are not
sure exactly the nature of his trouble, but how those around him harass him
with ridicule saying "where is your God?" The psalm records his
progress in understanding as he repeatedly preaches to his own soul about
hoping in God, that he will once again praise Him. That is a good model
for us. Face trouble honestly, sharing our feelings with God but then
preaching to ourselves that in spite of the evidence around us, God is
faithful. We can know that because the Word says so.
We also spent
considerable time over the past couple of days studying the theology of
salvation, but not by studying a systematic theology book but by studying a
passage of scripture. We looked at Ephesians 1 where we are told that all
of the blessings of salvation, and everything else, are found in Christ. It was a fruitful time to help these dear men begin to build their
theology around the Word of God and especially around the concept of "in
Christ" which is so prominent in this passage. I was encouraged
myself looking once again at these great verses and their wonderful, rich
message. We are fully blessed, in Christ.
As good as our day was,
our night was not so good. Edie and I are still struggling with jet lag,
having a worse adjustment than normal. Sometimes it is just like this, we
have no idea why. Last night we had electricity problems. That is
nothing new here in one sense. The electricity goes off for awhile
everyday. It appears that the city has not kept up with the power supply
as city has grown. There simply is not enough to go around for everyone
at the same time. At our hotel this is usually not a great problem
because within a few seconds a massive generator kicks in a supplies power until
the city power returns. Our brothers here are not as fortunate. We
ate with another pastor last night, again we ate while they watched, but we did
so by candle light because they had no power. They apologized for the
sparse meal, fried chicken, chapati and dahl. I am not sure how you spell
that, it is a soupy type sauce made from lentils that you pick up with pieces
of the chapati, which are much like corn tortillas. We are getting pretty
used to eating with no utensils as the Indians nearly always do. We thought
the meal was great.
Back in the hotel we had
electricity and felt bad for them, for awhile. At 12:30 am Edie awoke to
a loud buzzing noise coming from the switch plate where you put the key card to
keep the electricity going in the room. I had not heard it because I wear
ear plugs. I woke to see her fumbling around in the dark flipping
switches and pounding on the switch plate trying to make the noise stop.
I had no idea what she was doing until I took out my earplugs and heard
the loud buzzing.
We also had no idea how
to stop it so we called down to the front desk. They came up, after we
quickly put on a few clothes and finally said that the problem was that the
city's electric supply was coming in with very low voltage and had ruined the key
switch. They suggested we move to another room across the hall, which we
ended up doing. One bright note was that the room was larger and better
arranged for us to get around our suit cases, etc. Anyway, we had to wait
awhile for the voltage to get straight so the air conditioner would work, of
course it was hot in the room because the air conditioner had not been running
since no one was staying there. We finally got back to bed around 2 and
then woke up around 4. I went back to bed around 6:30 and was back up at
7:30 and Edie then took her turn until around 8:30. What fun. Needless to say I dragged a little today but I remembered that the 3rd or
4th day was usually a down one so I am hopeful for tomorrow. I am sure
it will be better, but if not, I am thankful for the Lord's provision of
strength, and for my caffeine pills.
Al
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