Off on Another Adventure!

Wednesday: After hours of effort, I think we now have all our credit card issues resolved. The problem is that there is so much fraud in India that most credit card companies block their use in the country. We are thankful because we have to have cash to pay for some of our expenses and we got it just in time.  

We just finished our last session here. Because another group was using our usual room we met in a smaller hotter room. Outside the window they were cooking for the large group, using wood.  The smoke got so strong in the room, our eyes were burning. Thankfully it was only a half day. As usual I learned a lot about how to best train and prepare students for training. This will help us in future places where we go.  

We leave this afternoon for the next location. We are off on another adventure! Who know what God will do.

Al

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

Good Training Continues despite Challenges

It was a good day today as we had the students begin making presentations. Habakkuk is not easy for any of us but they are learning. It has been hot, over 100 degrees, but not too bad in our training hall with the ceiling fans going. Edie has struggled a little with the women because they are so unresponsive. It is difficult to say why; low education, shyness in such a small group or lack of experience in Bible study. But she keeps plugging away. I have the benefit of a great training partner in Tom Hein from Adel, IA who has trained with us in Africa. He is doing a great job. Pray for Edie, as she has no break all day, working without a partner.

It has been a bit frustrating in that our hotel internet has been down for almost 2 days, one of our flights later in the week was abruptly cancelled, and for some reason the bank cancelled my debit card (even though we informed them that we would be in India) so we cannot get cash. But we assume the Lord will somehow help us solve all these problems. We may have our first experience with an Indian train ride to make up for the cancelled flight because there may not be another option. Tomorrow is another day!

Edie and I have noticed that we are not struggling with the Indian food as much this time. Perhaps we are getting used to it a bit after about 10 trips here. Praise the Lord! Every little bit helps.

Al

NW India, October 2014

Saturday, October 11:  Yesterday was our first day of training in NW India. Our travel here from the US was uneventful, just the usual marathon trip. 

Several of the men we train were not in attendance this time because of illness and one because his wife is giving birth. During our introductory time, we discovered that the men were not well prepared for the workshop this time. We are having them preach through the book of Habakkuk in this workshop, and they all had prepared a sermon but not done any of the other preparations we required. They were supposed to break the book into preaching sections and summarize the message of the whole book. As usual, these challenges offered an opportunity to gain some insight into their study and preaching habits. We were able to give them some help in these areas and learned some things about our approach to training as well. We will need to incorporate more training on progressively building study habits into our curriculum. The development of good habits is as essential as learning the tools of study, for without good habits they do not use the tools well. We learned that only one of the men was preaching through a book, something we strongly encourage them to do. I was able to encourage them to begin working on the book of Colossians, which is the book for the next workshop. For their preparations, I asked them to start preaching through the book ahead of time, which I hope will help them prepare better and that they will begin learning the value of preaching through books.  

In spite of this, all the pastors in the training network are making substantial progress in preaching the Word of God more effectively. The leader said that one outcome of this was that the churches were now growing for the first time. In the past, many people would come to Christ in the course of a year and come to the church but just as many would leave. The result was that the churches would never grow. I think that is because in the past the pastors had a limited bank of sermon topics that they could preach and after a couple of rounds of the same thing over and again people would choose to move on. Now that they are attempting to preach the text and not just topics, the people are choosing to stay.  

Edie has only three women to work with and one of them speaks a language the other two do not understand so everything that is said must be translated twice. These women have been with Edie before but are of limited education so the learning is slow. The more educated lady that came last time had to stay home to take care of her mother who broke her hip. It is very hot here and especially so in Edie’s small room, but in spite of all these things Edie was pleased with the progress of her group.

Thanks for your prayers,

Al