David and Abigail

I'm reading through the Bible in a year for 2011.  I took a friend's suggestion to have the daily passage sent to my email through oneyearbibleonline.com.  I'm happy to report that I have not missed a day with this method!  That may just be a sad statement on how much time I spend on my computer, but at least I'm reading the Bible!

Today's passage included the story of David and Abigail in 1 Samuel 25.  I think this is one of my favorite stories in the Bible.  For those not familiar, here's a quick recap.

David and his army of outcasts from Israel are hiding from King Saul in the wilderness.  They're hungry and so they send a request to Nabal, a rich man shearing his sheep, to let them share in the time of feasting which accompanies the sheep-shearing. They consider this a return of a good deed, since they protected Nabal's shepherds and flocks from marauders while they were grazing near their hideout.

Nabal refuses, insulting David and his men in the process.  David becomes angry and sets out with 400 of his men to take revenge and wipe out Nabal and every male who works for him.

Meanwhile, Nabal's shepherds who overheard the exchange, tell Nabal's wife, Abigail, what happened and implore her to do something to avert disaster.  She wisely loads up donkeys with provisions and gifts and heads out herself to intercept David. When she encounters him on the way to their estate, she bows at his feet, saying:

“Please forgive your servant’s presumption. The LORD your God will certainly make a lasting dynasty for my lord, because you fight the LORD’s battles, and no wrongdoing will be found in you as long as you live. Even though someone is pursuing you to take your life, the life of my lord will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the LORD your God, but the lives of your enemies he will hurl away as from the pocket of a sling. When the LORD has fulfilled for my lord every good thing he promised concerning him and has appointed him ruler over Israel, my lord will not have on his conscience the staggering burden of needless bloodshed or of having avenged himself. And when the LORD your God has brought my lord success, remember your servant.” 

Abigail spoke with respect and with wisdom.  She knew David would regret this revengeful action if he carried it out.  She skillfully turned his attention back to the LORD and his purpose for David's life without causing offense. She also expressed faith in God's word that David would someday be king, even though the circumstances didn't look like it at the time.  She was God's instrument to turn David away from a wrongful action and David recognized it. 

I am impressed with her character, her faith in a difficult circumstance, and her skillful appeal to the future king.  Lord, grant me the grace to be like Abigail.

Voice Ministries, Elkhart, IN

My daughter, Jackie, and I have the privilege of visiting Voice Ministries in Elkhart, IN, for two weeks.  Voice is a group of ministries that includes a 12+hr/day prayer & worship room, a food bank that feeds 500-700 households a week, a Tuesday night interchurch community worship gathering, healing & prophetic teams, a Theophostic inner healing ministry, and a Sunday morning fellowship.  I love sitting in the prayer room and soaking in the presence of the Lord as the singers and instrumentalists continually worship, interspersed with readings of Scripture and intercessory prayer.  If you want a taste of it, here's a link to a live feed from the Kansas City IHOP (International House of Prayer), a parent organization to this one.

Somebody referred to this place as a spiritual "hospital".  Here's what they say about themselves:

Voice began in the mid 90s as a “meeting place” for those who were burnt out, tired, messed up and needed something different and refreshing. What people found was a vibrant bunch of passionate worshippers and messages of hope and healing and encouragement. It was, as many would come to say, “a cool drink of water in a dry land.” 

We are not a typical ministry. We don’t care about a name or numbers, we just know that God has put us here, in the middle of Michiana, to be a VOICE. A Voice of hope. A Voice of healing. A Voice of worship. A Voice that shouts the message that all of this is about Jesus, and that Jesus is coming back!

We are staying at what they call "the camp", which is really a private estate that was turned into something like a retreat center.  This was the original location of the IHOP, International House of Prayer, so it's a special place. Much prayer and worship has gone up from this location.

I am enjoying the peaceful grounds and especially the daffodils beginning to sprout everywhere, a nice change from the still snow-covered ground in Cascade.

I went out and sat in this gazebo for a while today.  It overlooks a creek.

The stately oak trees have not yet sprouted foliage for spring.  I marveled at one clump of leaves (left of center above) that has held on all winter and was not budging even today in a pretty brisk wind.

 

Yes, I am still alive.

It's much harder to find time to blog now that Steve is home.  Just thought I'd let you know that.

Winter's Beauty

I'm embarrassed to admit it sometimes, but I still love snow...even after living here for two winters now.

We had hardly any (an inch here and there) between New Years and mid-February, and I really missed it.  We still had a foot or so of snow on the ground, but it hardens and gets dirty.  The trees are bare.  There's no motivation to go out cross-country skiing...so I'm thankful the snow has returned.  We've gotten about a foot of new snow over the last week or so.

Here's some of my favorite photos from the winter so far...

One day I was sitting in my bedroom talking on the phone to Jackie, when I looked out the window and 10 of the "town deer" were looking for food on the hillside.  I couldn't capture them all in one photo, unfortunately.

Here they are starting to traipse through my front yard.

Then some dogs started barking at them, so they turned around and ran the other direction.

Icicles on the back of the grocery store. Be careful where you walk.

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Icicles on my bedroom window

Hoarfrost on the trees one morning as I was walking to the post office.

 Marina (my housemate while Steve's been gone) and Sam in front of one of the snow sculptures at the McCall Winter Carnival.

 McCall is celebrating it's 100th birthday.

The "outhouse" snow sculpture...won 2nd place and most photogenic.  Notice the empty stall for photo ops.

The grocery cart drill team from Paul's Market in the Mardi Gras parade at the carnival. Brought back memories of Fred Meyer.  They had candy in their carts, hence the outstretched arms.

 

Sam poses with "Housecall" in front of the McCall hospital.

And...my favorite.  The idyllic view from my front deck.

Kits for Kids

One of the things Steve got to participate in with the DTS in Varanasi was a hygiene class.  It was actually out in a village outside the city.  They took an auto rickshaw (motorized) to get there.

Jessica, Hosanna, and Joe...all students in the DTS.

This is the second year the DTS students taught hygiene classes in the slums and villages.  In addition to sharing essential health information and giving out hygiene kits to the children, the classes open many doors that might not otherwise be open to Christians in a Hindu society.

Jessica holds visuals while Hosanna talks about how many people die every year from drinking dirty water.  Her words were translated sentence by sentence by Anand on the left.

In this video clip, they put glitter on the kids' heads to illustrate how easily germs spread and how hard they are to get rid of.

 

Here Hosanna demonstrates while Jessica teaches how and why to brush your teeth.

 

Women and children listen with rapt attention to the foreigners, even the grandmas in the back.

At last comes the moment when each child receives his /her very own hygiene kit with comb, toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, shampoo and nail clippers.  For all of you who contributed to Kits for Kids, thank you for impacting the life a  village child in India!

The Ganges of Varanasi, India

Today I will return to sharing some of Steve's photos from N India.  After Josiah & Binu's wedding, Steve spent 4 more days in Varanasi with the students and staff from the DTS and the SOAP.

One of the things they did together was to take an evening boat tour of the Ganges river.  Varanasi is a holy city to Hindus.  One of the reasons is because it sits on the holy river, the Ganges.

Wikipedia says, "Many Hindus also believe life is incomplete without taking a bath in the Ganges at least once in their lives. Many Hindu families keep a vial of water from the Ganges in their house. This is done because it is auspicious to have water of the Holy Ganges in the house, and also so that if someone is dying, that person will be able to drink its water. Many Hindus believe that the water from the Ganges can cleanse a person's soul of all past sins, and that it can also cure the ill.

Here they are boarding the boat.  The tour was led by J, a long-time Varanasi YWAMer.  

That's Wesley and Isaac, the twins, and their parents, Joe and Carrie, on the left.  Carrie is holding baby Will.  You can barely see his face peeking out. 

 

One of the first things they saw were the famed burning ghats (ghat is the name for stair steps leading down to the river), where Hindus cremate their dead and throw the ashes into the river.  Remember, this is the same river that people bathe in and drink from.  Wikipedia again, "Also, people scatter ashes of loved ones here. George Harrison of The Beatles had his ashes scattered in the Ganges by his family in a private ceremony soon after his death... the city assumes special significance as the cremation ground for devout Hindus."

Next, they pulled up to watch a Hindu ceremony (performed for tourists) called The Ceremony of Light (Hindu - aarti), a public rendition of a Hindu religious ritual in which priests worship using symbols for the elements of earth, water, wind, fire and space.  And Wikipedia was helpful again: " In the traditional aarti ceremony, the flower represents the earth (solidity), the water and accompanying handkerchief correspond with the water element (liquidity), the lamp or candle represents the fire component (heat), the peacock fan conveys the precious quality of air (movement), and the yak-tail fan represents the subtle form of ether (space). The incense represents a purified state of mind, and one’s "intelligence" is offered through the adherence to rules of timing and order of offerings. Thus, one’s entire existence and all facets of material creation are symbolically offered to the Lord via the aarti ceremony."

I borrowed this one picture from the Wikipedia page to give a better close-up view.  The rest are all Steve's pictures.

I thought this statement from Wikipedia was interesting: "The idea here is that aarti represents our daily activities, which revolves around God, a center of our life. Looking at God while performing aarti reminds the performer (and the attendees of the aarti) to keep God at the center of all activities and reinforces the understanding that routine worldly activities are secondary in importance." 

Hopefully, God is THE center of our life, not just A center.  Nevertheless, we also need a reminder to keep God at the center of all our activities.

 

I hope you will forgive me for using Wikipedia for some of my information :).  I wasn't there to hear the tour firsthand and I wanted to help you (and myself) understand the photos a little better. I haven't had the privilege yet of hearing Steve's explanation of the photos he sent home on Carrie's computer.  Carrie helped explain a little bit, too.

More photos to come...

DTS Graduation

Everyone keeps asking me how I'm doing being alone with Steve gone for 6 weeks in Asia.  I'm not really alone.  Marina, one of our single staff, moved in with us Jan. 6th, before Steve left.  She will be with us probably until May, when some of our other single female staff return.  And this week I had 5 more house guests in addition to Marina.

That's because the DTS (Discipleship Training School) outreach teams returned from India last Monday for their debrief week and graduation. It's been fun to hear all their stories of how God worked in and through them.  It took a couple days for them to become coherent during the daytime.

This is known as jet lag.  Hosanna was out like this for several hours in the middle of the day with activity going on all around her.  

The team spent Thursday and Friday debriefing their experiences both individually and as a group.  I had the privilege of sitting in on individual sessions with the girls and praying for them as they now transition back to their homes and families and into a new season of life.  They are different people than they were when they arrived six months ago.  Often it's hard to adjust back to family, friends and churches at home when you've been in a place like India for 2 1/2 months and other people can't really understand what you've seen and experienced.

Graduation was Saturday evening.  The gathering began with worship.

There was a slideshow, then each student shared a memorable experience from outreach.

Steve called from the Maldives to encourage and bless the students.  I put the phone up to a microphone so they could hear him.

Marty, director of YWAM Idaho, challenged them to live out the changes God has made in their lives.  Then we gathered round to pray for them.

Here they are, students and staff of Frontier-Focused DTS Fall/Winter 2010/11. The girls were beautiful in their saris.  We are excited that Christina and Jessica (front row, left, in the maroon and red) are returning to join our staff after some time sharing and support-raising at home.