"There's a first time for everything" ... The many new ones we've experienced

When you move to a new country (especially one literally half way around the world), countless new experiences hit you in the face rather abruptly. Some events are exhilarating and others are downright terrifying.  One day a new experience will make you want to stand in a corner and cry, and then the very next day, something new will happen that will make you take a step back and say, “Wow, I live in such a magical, neat place.”

Coming up on a year tomorrow, we look back on our time and say, “That was the first time I’ve ever done ‘that’ … or ‘that’ … or ‘that’.” Needless to say, we have experienced and been stretched so much more in the past year than we have from many years of our lives combined. I say this with the intention of understanding the importance of every year in our life but also recognizing that the amount of new things that have fallen into our unexpected laps is something hardly forgettable.

Cheers to the pictures that remind us of the many “firsts” we’ve experienced in our first year here!

 

The first time to enjoy nightly sunsets from the roof (unfortunately setting into the smog..).

My first time to ride on a bicycle rickshaw. As you can tell by my arm tightly gripped around G's, I was terrified the entire time that I was going to fall off the side.

First time to celebrate a major festival feast with our friends.

First time to share my traveling space with so many creatures!

First time to visit a South Asian carnival. Very scary standard of rules might I add, AKA there are generally no rules or regulations to riding the rides--Imagine people standing on the ends of the swinging pirate ship...

First time to ride a passenger train to visit a friend outside the city for a baby shower. This is the kind of train where you stuff into an uncomfortable train with tons of other people, meet/sit next to men who drop of empty milk cans and pick up full ones at every train stop along the way, and have about a minute and a half to exit the train with the many others pushing on and off too!

First time to celebrate Holi! By throwing water balloons off our balcony and trying to dodge the ones coming at us that are filled with color! (As you can see, G was too busy aiming at our neighbors to worry about getting "colored".

First time not only learning to speak and to understand a language but also to read it! Granted we can only read (and comprehend) at Kindergarten level. Shout out to all the kindergarten kiddos who are working so hard to sound out words and comprehend a story at the same time! How did we ever do that as children?

First time to depend on trains as our main way of traveling to other cities. We have become quite good friends with these sometimes smelly vehicles where you get to know your fellow passengers REALLY well (i.e. wake up on your sleeper bunk to find a man bouncing his baby by your head in "your" bunk..).

First time for G to drive a motorcycle on some of the world's craziest roads. And just recently, my first time to fall off the bike.. in the middle of a busy intersection.. Luckily just fell on my bum when we were going approximately 0.5 mph. No harm done, just another hit with the oh-so-familiar humility hammer.

FIRST TIME TO SEE ONE OF THE WORLD'S WONDERS!

First time to enjoy getting Henna done in a friends home!

First time for me to have my clothes tailor-made. Most of the clothes I own now come from cloth and ribbon I pick out and based on the fitting I tell the tailor. For weddings and other occasions, we both are excited to wear even more cultural clothes.

First time for the both of us to celebrate the 4th of July outside of the U.S.

First time to be inundated by torrential downpours. And learning how to function with so much rain and flooding.

First time to have a friendly neighborhood cow! :) This fellow walked through the park outside our house (with the human in the background alongside him) everyday.

This is a crazy one. First time to have a human dishwasher instead of a machine one. After some time I'm starting to get used to people being used more than machines here, and I kinda like it. It's fun to have a familiar face everyday in your home and get to make a new friend. Luckily our counters were more her height than mine! :)

First time to see the Himalayas. (Look closely at the white capped beauties in the background.)

We are thankful for all the new things we are learning and adjusting to, even when sometimes those very things really challenge us and the people we thought we were. There is still so much for us to learn about our true selves when put in situations so different then what we're accustomed to. Thankfulness to the Lord abounds when we see the ways we've grown when faced with new challenges as well as when we look at the wonderful new experiences in our lives.

-Rachel

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Sheep Among Wolves - Shrewd And Innocent

“I am sending you out as sheep among wolves. Therefore, you must be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves.” – Jesus

These instructions from Jesus didn’t really hit home with me until last week.  We read them that day, after being here in South Asia for almost a year now, and they had so much more meaning than they had before. 

I feel like I have learned a lot about being a sheep among wolves over the past year. 

As for wolves, they are on the prowl, looking for a meal, and looking for a weaker animal to take advantage of.  Many people around us see us as a golden ticket and as people with money growing out of our ears. In a land where resources (food, money, space, etc.) are scarce, we often look like a lone lamb that has wandered from its flock.

Some of the words I have heard as characteristics of sheep are timid, gullible, fearful, needy, and defenseless. They often don’t know where to go or how to take care of themselves. Most, if not all, of those words have described us at some point over the past year. 

We have been those sheep here wandering not knowing where to go, how to do things, how to find the things we need, how to decide which people are our friends and which are our enemies. Often times clinging to the few people that we are only pretty sure are for us and not against us. 

And although I have acknowledged myself as a sheep spiritually and mentally many times, it has driven the point home all the more as we walk as sheep in the physical as well. Praise the Lord though, we have a good Shepherd who has been watching over us guiding, protecting, and providing for us. And what’s more our Shepherd wants all of these wolves (who are really just sheep without a shepherd) to be a part of His flock as well.

SO, I am trying to learn how to be as wise and cunning and shrewd as a snake, yet as gentle and harmless and innocent as a dove. How to be watchful and mindful of the wolves around me. How to make decisions that keep us close to the Shepherd, instead of wandering alone. How, as Matthew Henry says, “to avoid all things which give advantage to our enemies, all meddling with worldly or political concerns, all appearance of evil or selfishness, and all underhand measures.” 

And at the same time, how to steer clear of the arguments and fights that wolves often try to create. How to walk in righteousness instead of retaliation. How to leave my defense and protection in the more than able hands of my Good Shepherd.

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When You Finally Feel the Shirt Tugs

   A few days ago, I saw a man riding a bike by our house with two monkeys sitting on the back. If you paid him money he would stop and make one monkey in a dress dance around and the other do a back flip. As interesting as it was to see, it was more heart wrenching because other people and I didn’t want to stop him to see his show, but we would watch from a distance as someone else asked him to stop, and then rob him of possibly the only income he earns to support his family by not going over to pay him pennies. Yet again, the poverty and desperation here (and sometimes my attitude toward it) overwhelms me.

  When you are in a new place and see people everywhere on the streets putting their hands all up in your space and pulling on you begging you for things and then see people just stare forward and ignore them, your heart breaks. But when this begins to happen to you daily for an extended period of time and when you hear about beggar’s circles and pimps and other REALLY BAD JUNK, you begin to harden your heart not only for protection from heartbreak but also because you begin to believe that your nickel will actually harm them more than help.
 And we know that we can't be the only people who feel like this. In a book I'm reading, Seth Barnes experiences the same thing when he explains, "We can't just do nothing. I'm an American. We are the richest people in the world. We know 'to whom much is given, much is expected.' We labor under the guilt of our abundance. In that moment, paralyzed by ambiguity, uncomfortable that people are grabbing for my wallet, I do nothing. Called to a lifestyle of giving, of activism, I risk becoming a parody of myself, maybe even like Peter, who when he saw Christ, denied him."

  After months of forward-glances and denials, the Lord has begun to break our heart for the poor around us. He has convicted us both separately and then encouraged us to move forward together. My heart broke as I saw the monkey man drive past us and realized that no one just does that for fun (aka train monkeys, and dress them, and ride around giving performances). Kids don’t look grimy and pull at your clothes because there’s nothing else better to do. Mom’s don’t carry their small babies around sitting at Metro entrances because that is the best place to raise them.

  No. There is some seriously hard stuff going on in these people’s lives. The man with the monkey probably doesn’t have ANOTHER job. By no means am I an expert at the inner workings of the poor in this country or know/understand their motives. And people may argue and say that giving money may just encourage the process of begging or that they should get jobs, but I can no longer deny that there is something up when people go to these lengths and when our Savior hung out with the poor and needy and didn’t turn people away when they came to Him, even the really sick like the lepers (Matthew 8:1-4). When people followed Him, He asked them what they really wanted.

  And this is exactly how the Lord spoke to Grayson. He told him that from here on out that he is no longer to ignore the people that come up to us. Whether we give them food, money, prayer, or water, we will ask there name and what they really want. Do the lame men on the ground really want to be healed? Do the kids really want money, or do their bellies ache for food?

  As we recently have been acting on the Lord’s leading, He provided an opportunity immediately to obey (which He usually does). A boy came up to Grayson and his friend at a coffee shop the other day asking for food. After convincing several waiters (trying to shoo the boys away) that they really wanted to talk to the boys, Grayson and his friend were able to talk and pray with the boys, then give them some water (which they quickly gulped down).

  We have learned that we’re on this earth to spread His blessing to everyone we meet, despite our fear, preconceived notions, better judgment, or the influence of the culture around us that so blatantly pushes these people down (quite literally shooing people like dogs). We’ve learned that if we don’t prayerfully live in this new culture, there are going to be other (unrighteous) attitudes that creep into our hearts.

  What blessings are you withholding from people because of culture, self-protection, etc? What do you need to ask Him for forgiveness for and grace to move forward for?

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When you become bicultural. (And not by birth.)

Now, I know we have only been in an Indian culture for a little over four months, but is it fair enough to say that we feel a little more Indian everyday? (And feel it even more when you return to your heart culture.)

We landed a little over a week ago back on American soil, and, honestly, we have new gut reactions to do things. Turning out onto an empty road in a car sends quick panic signals to our brain to figure out which side of the road is the appropriate one to drive on. My first thought when I hold my glass under the tap and then take a drink is that I’m going to be sick the next day.

As we stay here, we find more things that are so different from our new culture. Everything feels so opposite here. Water is dependable. There are so many wide-open spaces. There is rhyme and reason to the roads. People don’t stare at you for long periods of time. There are churches—very large ones—on every corner. The streets are clean. The only animals we see wandering around are occasional deer. We see a lot more defined parts of ladies’ bodies. Guys and girls touch. The language we hear is not unintelligible background noise. There’s no such thing as bargaining. People generally don’t cut you in line when you only leave a foot of space. Fruit and veggies can just be rinsed under a faucet.

All these things were normal to us once, but now there is a new normal. And it comes from a culture situated in the opposite hemisphere. We cannot even fathom what even one more year will do to our cultural ties.

Many people have asked us, “Does it feel really weird to be back?” And at first the answer was: Yes. But after the first day or two, the answer became, “The weirdest part of being back is that it doesn’t feel weird to be back.” We have found ourselves slipping not only back into more American clothes but also our former way of living. We hope that we are able to slide back into our Asian culture just as easily. But isn’t that a strange thing? Feeling like two opposing cultures are both your own? Does anyone else share these feelings?

We remember that Jesus was bicultural too, being both fully a member of heaven and a member of this earth. Our experiences give us a small taste of what Jesus must have felt like when He came to this earth, being naturally from a different way of life, yet fitting into this world because that was what He was made to do. And then going back to His homeland, taking with Him the memories of this earth and the life He shared on it. It fills me with joy that He did and that “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”

Our prayer is that we are also able to bless the people in this new culture that we have stepped in to, even as it changes us in the process. May He use us to magnify His name in all that we do as a bicultural family.

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Man Shall Not Live On Bread Alone...

What does fasting look like in our day and age? Have you ever fasted? From what? Food, media, people? In the past few weeks, I’ve felt like God was calling me to fast. I have fasted from food only once before, one year ago, and it was for several days with a community of people.

BUT, Let me be honest. The first time I fasted in this country, it did not go over very well. I was tired, HUNGRY, weak, and kind of out of it. I intended to drink only water and juice all day and to break fast in the morning. But as the day progressed, my stomach groaned louder, and my head began to spin more, I gave into the temptation to eat and had a late dinner.

Do I say this with a defeatist attitude? Of course not! Through the struggle for control over my mind and body, I learned some valuable lessons and drew into the Lord even more.

1.     Food is made for the body and not the body for food. If you have ever tried to fast from food, was one of the first struggles you faced fighting your urge to eat a certain food for emotional reasons? Did it feel like eating just one thing would make you feel happier and more emotionally at rest? Let me tell you, I was genuinely surprised that this was going to be an issue. Praise Him, by the end of the day, I found that food no longer controlled my emotions. Drinking a cup of coffee, eating my favorite snack, starting the meal out with a good breakfast no longer set the tone of my mood for the day.

2.     God intended to challenge us to a dependence on Him when He modeled His 40 days of fasting in the desert. I would challenge you to consider fasting from food, for often we depend more on food for strength rather than the Lord. Didn’t Jesus say in Matthew 4, “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Do you think Jesus only fasted from media, people, certain coffee shops, FB, and whatnot? Maybe there’s some truth in the challenge and difficulty of fasting from food. During my day of fasting, I found myself calling out to Him a whole lot more than normal. Times when before I would not even think His name.

3.     Culture can sometimes get in the way of fasting. With our Western (especially Southern) culture’s dependence on mealtime as social time and meal time as a good highlight to look forward (and back) to during your day, it makes skipping a lunch a little more challenging. While this is not always bad, it does throw a kink into someone’s “normal day” while fasting. I have no insight into this fasting from food feeling, but to say that prayer time with the Lord becomes a lot more real and social when you replace mealtime with it.

4.     You will probably want to quit a million times. The evil one doesn’t really want us to walk in the footsteps of our Lord, and our bodies are trained to expect food at certain times of the day. That’s all I have to say on that. If you’ve fasted before, you know what I mean.

5.     Fasting is a journey. After my first difficult experience with fasting a month ago, I felt like God revealed to me (in no exact words), “Rachel, this experience is just the beginning of your time with fasting. There’s more I want to show you in this discipline.” I learned failing one time is not the end of the road. God does not see your unmet goal as a roadblock but a pothole (probably not even that).

There are so many reasons people will fast: to hear God for more discernment, to know God better through following what He did, to spend more time with God, to break bad habits, to mourn for tragic events, to humble themselves, as an act of repentance, or to take part in religious culture. If you are interested in knowing more about Biblical fasting and what this food fast stuff is all about, check out Celebration of Disciplines by Richard Foster who encourages taking baby steps into fasting, first fasting from 2 meals, then increasing the number of meals on a week by week basis.

To bring it all back around. I’ve been fasting from lunch every Sunday, praying and asking the Lord for His sovereignty to reign over a certain situation. It has been a time of remembering my dependence on the Lord and growing my faith in Him. At first it was good, then fasting became a means to an end. Never fun to realize that, but super helpful of the Spirit to set us straight when we turn our well-intended devotions into self-fulfilling acts. Again, Fasting is a journey. At this point, I think it’s time for me to explore a new area of food fasting. I’m looking forward to how this journey will play out.

Is there anyone who wants to join me on this journey of fasting once a week? If so, let me know. I’d love to hear how it goes for you and why you chose to fast. It is always great to learn from one another.

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Have you ever fasted? If so, how did it go? Any tips or advice? If you have not fasted, what has been your reason not to fast?

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6 adjustments one makes in the first 24 hours of moving to a foreign country

1. Stoplights are optional.

As we rode in a taxi from the airport to our apartment at two in the morning, we watched our driver float between lanes, most of the time preferring to straddle the car on the dotted lines. Then as we pulled up to a stoplight and sat there for about a minute, another car came zooming past us through the stoplight. That’s when our driver decided the stoplight was no longer useful. So sure enough, we pulled right through it too.

2. Tapwater is no good.

We’ve been living with our friends, who have been so awesome and been teaching us all we need to know about living here. After traveling for over 24 hours, one tends to feel pretty dirty and longs to brush one’s teeth. So upon arrival, we quickly find out that sink water is good for almost nothing. Including brushing your teeth. This means, every time we want to brush our teeth or wash our hands, a cup of purified water must be used to get the job done. Anyone used a water bottle to brush your teeth? Maybe you can agree with me that it’s a little strange.

3. There’s no such thing as a shower stall.

Another thing to adjust to is showering. In America, you step into a tub, close the shower curtain or door, and you are basically in a little room. Here, imagine, walking into a bathroom, and the sink is on the right wall. Take another step and there is a shower head sticking out from the same wall. Another step and there’s a shower curtain blocking the toilet that sits at the end of the narrow room. With a drain in the floor underneath the sink, this means that your shower takes place in the middle of the bathroom. Also another interesting experience.

4. Ditches have two purposes: Water drainage and urinals.

Within one hour of walking down the streets on the first day, we pass markets and streets full of people out and about doing there business. LITERALLY. We saw at least five men using the bathroom on the side of the street. Talk about awkward. (But I think only for us evidently.)

5. Electricity is a luxury.

With all of the power outages recently, we were so thankful to move into an apartment that had A.C. Unfortunately, we lost power 3-4 times in one day. Fortunately, we never lost it for more than thirty minutes. Unfortunately, this will become normal.

6. There are no such things as sidewalks.

Lastly, we discovered upon our first walk through the market that a (dirt) street that is a smidge wider than a one lane road is a sidewalk, urinal, water drainage ditch, front of a market, and a driving area for both directions of traffic, full of cars, trucks, bicycles, and motorbikes. (Granted, I think this was a smaller market area, and it was the only one we have seen so far. So crossing my fingers, maybe we will discover a sidewalk somewhere else?)

All together, needless to say, it’s going to be an interesting few months adjusting to huge changes in our lifestyle. He is good and faithful and is with us every step up of the way, so we put our hope in that. And our hope in that one day all of this will seem a little more normal than it does right now.

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Taking It All In: A "5 Sense" Tour of Houston

As we prepare to leave Houston, I look back at some of the pictures of our experiences here. Wanna take a quick tour of Houston with me?

Normally when you go to a baseball game, you dress to sweat. So did we, and boy were we surprised when we stepped into an INDOOR baseball stadium, air-conditioned and everything! It was the best and most surprising FEELING at a baseball game. We had a fun time with our team and a few interns.

Visiting with good Iraqi friends, we always come away with full bellies of TASTY biryani.

Standing on top of a parking garage looking out over the complexes in our neighborhood, praying for the people who live there, we look directly below us to SEE a Burmese refugee trying to crawl underneath the fence. As we watch her path and direction, she walks along the sewage drainage area looking for who knows what? Maybe a fish for dinner? Or plants to use as herbs?

Every Monday, we HEAR repetition of "1/3 cup, 1/3 cup,” as we partnered with Houston Refuge to serve refugees in the area as English teachers. One of our interns, Meghann, led the classes fantastically.

After listening to and observing a Hindu Aarti ceremony, we walk into the gift shop and SMELL India immediately, with all of it’s tasty treasures awaiting us, that are blessed by the gods.

I hope that you've enjoyed getting a "sense" of what life has been like here in Houston!

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