Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Wrapping up in Ahmadabad



Today is the last full day of training here in Ahmadabad. It has been a worthwhile time of practicing how to the study the bible and hearing the message Paul has for us in his letter to the Philippines. Last time I had 15 women and this time I have two plus our interpreter. There has been a lot of sickness, and physical struggles of both the women and their family members. So I accept the ones God has given me as being those he has moved mountains for to get them here! One woman said she spent two days getting here, sleeping on the train in this unbelievable heat! Still the words of Paul teaches us that whatever our circumstance or struggle may be, in it He strengthens us and provides all we need according to His riches in glory. The secret is to learn to be content while experiencing these things. I believe the women are making incremental progress with their skills in studying the bible. My interpreter told me that they are not taught to think about what they read. She said this as a compliment; that they are learning to do this through Pathways (our bible training program). She has never said anything like this to me before so I am taking it to be a sign that the Holy Spirit is giving her insight for new things in God's word. Teaching isn't my natural bent so I have no reason to put confidence in my flesh but instead in God who gives understanding and the power to be transformed. I believe the Spirit is at work. Certainly, I am learning and seeing new things that are affecting my own thinking and hopefully my walk with God. 

We have a new driver. We were sorry to hear the driver that we have had for years has become blind due to brain cancer. He has had two operations but it is hard to say how he is doing now. Our new driver is slower and more cautious. He still doesn't have quite the hang of the stick and clutch. We have had several times when I thought we would hit someone or someone would hit us. So far so good! We had quite an amazing sight of a gigantic elephant moving his way fearlessly through traffic. I sure wish I had a video of that; it would have been a hit on YouTube.
 
We have had a trial in getting our credit card and ATM card to work. We found out both are automatically blocked by our companies. Then add in mistakes, and it simply amounts to a satanic attack to frustrate us as we have more important things to do. Alan handles these things and just doesn't have the time. Pray we can resolve this by tomorrow somehow before we have to leave for our next leg of the trip. Also our plane was canceled on the 17th so we now have reservations on two trains, one that is nice but we need one more seat. The other is a sleeper car compartment and we are not too sure how this will work, but there were three "seats" available. This will be an adventure I am sure. It is a major festival this week, so we expect it to be crowded.

We briefly met the couple we will be with over the next couple of days.  Together we will be exploring new possibilities for training. I am looking forward to getting to know the woman, I liked her right away. Class is getting ready to start so I will have to write more later.

Thank you for your prayers and love for us,

Edie

No comments: