This is my LiveJournal blog where I do a lot of my writing. Check it out for lots of different stuff: thoughts; reviews; quasi-political material; poor attempts at remembering/retelling dreams, etc.
Here are some castle ruins near Lipova, Romania that I climbed all over in September. Remember how we don't have castle ruins in America? Yeah, those rocks have been there since before America was a country. Pretty crazy to think about.
Here are some extra video clips from my time in Moldova. Note that I am wearing the Green Sweater in one of the clips. A Thoughts from Places video from Moldova is forthcoming.
I wore this sweater for the ENTIRE month of Moldova. Literally. I slept in it, worked in it, ate in it, the whole nine yards. And now, I put it in its final resting place - the Bucharest Airport in Romania.
Funny thing was that Nepal ended up being way colder than I thought it would be and I bought a knock-off North Face jacket (Or "North Farce" as we liked to call it). Oh, well. Rest in peace, Deushland Sweater.
I’m writing this blog from the my room in Indianapolis. I can look out the window and see leafless trees and mud and the rain-soaked wooden play structure that has stood forlornly in our backyard for near fifteen years. It’s not the same as looking out the window and seeing an exotic river delta or a bustling city street covered in street vendors or a barren Moldavian road waiting for another horse and buggy or funeral procession.
This is America. This is the state of Indiana, and it’s winter time, a season of less snow than just general dreariness.
Of course, I have a bit of explaining to do, because I am pretty sure that y’all were expecting me to be in Tanzania at this point, and this blog was supposed to be me apologizing for another near month of blog silence with some prayer requests or a silly anecdote for living in East Africa seen through the eyes of an ingenuous Midwestern twenty-something.
But the truth is that I’m home. And the truth is that in the spring of 2008, I was diagnosed with depression, and then I took some medication and things got better, and then I went off my medication because the truth is that I’m a stubborn, prideful mule who thinks he can make himself better by sheer force of will. And the truth is that for the past three years, I thought I could outrun my condition just by trying hard and thinking happy thoughts.
India was a bad month for me. If you’ve ever struggled with depression, you know that it is a medical condition that makes enjoying anything practically impossible. Your brain betrays your body and makes you think weird thoughts and loathe every bit of stimuli you encounter. Depression was tough enough when I lived in America and controlled how much I slept, how much I ate, how much I engaged the outside world. In India and East Africa, it was almost literally a demon.
And that’s why I’m home: because I have a medical condition, because I was afraid of my brain entertaining unhealthy thoughts like hopping out the back of a speeding taxi in order to sustain non-life-threatening road burn that would require an American hospital to treat, or like walking too close to an irate water buffalo in the sick hope that it would kick me in the leg and snap my shin in half, making international travel next to impossible and leaving as the only solution a slow recovery in a fluffy bed in Indianapolis.
I don’t mean to hyperbolize or scare anyone or paint a caricatured picture of what it’s like to have depression; this is pretty much what my last six weeks have felt like. And I would be a fool to think that just going back home to a shower and an $.89 crunchy taco and a pill that keeps serotonin in my brain longer is going to cure me. But I would also be a fool to think it wise to wander around the bush of Africa, begging for opportunities to injure myself so that I could be forced to go home.
So that’s why I’m here. And I feel like God has opportunities for me here. And I believe that God has healing and relief for me here. And I know that God has a purpose for the places he has taken me and the destinations I’ve yet to visit.
One quick story: I was in a village this past month in the Indian state of Andra Pradhesh, and I met a thirteen year old autistic boy with a brain tumor. We prayed for him, and saw his mother accept Jesus. And as he sat and smiled at us, seemingly oblivious to the situation, I felt our translator, Agape, tap me on the shoulder.
Agape himself was only fourteen, and despite speaking excellent English, was still learning the same lessons we all learn at fourteen. He told me that he felt a special connection to this boy, that he wished there was something more that he could do to help, that he didn’t get why this boy so much like him had to be this way. And I told him, “Agape, God made this boy exactly the way he is. God has a purpose for him. He crafted him perfectly in his big, strong hands, and has never left him from the moment he was born.”
I decry any claims that God is cruel, or that he didn’t intend this, or that something is wrong with me. God does not make mistakes. And I needed to hear myself reassure Agape of God’s goodness, because, honestly, sometimes it’s hard to remember.
I had a Bible teacher in high school, Josh McEwen, who was from Australia. He used to say, “God can hit a straight shot with a crooked stick.” I understood cognitively that he meant, “God makes good things from crappy things.” But until I spent time in India, when I watched a lot of cricket for the first time, I didn’t catch the full meaning of what it meant. A cricket bat is long and flat and smooth, different from the cylindrical barrel of an American baseball bat. Any imperfections in the craftsmanship of that cricket bat will impair the batsman’s ability to place the ball exactly where he wants.
But God is the Immaculate Batsman. He can take a cricket bat warped and covered in pock marks and gouges and hit a clean, straight shot right out of the park (that’s worth six runs!). What’s more, he choosesto do so. One could have a certain sense of awe for a batsman who makes do with what he’s got and succeeds; but if the batsman intentionally uses a flawed instrument to accomplish his purpose, well, that’s just pretty darn special. He’s pretty much showing off. And it is a testament to just how freaking good God is at cricket.
I am a crooked stick. Depression warps my body, and the enemy wants to use it to bring me low and make me feel useless. But God raises us up out of the depths and makes us objects of great worth.
So my apologies to all y’all who were expecting me to be bringing you some stories from Africa. God decided to take me to another pitch and hit straight shots there. And as tough as it was to leave, and as much as it hurts to admit that I have a disease that I can’t overcome by my own power, I know that I have a purpose, one that God wants to accomplish with a broken, melancholy young man that has no other option but to lean on Him.
Blessings to everyone who has prayed for me, supported me financially or otherwise, and encouraged me on this journey. It’s not over – I left the World Race, but I’m still on the RACE, and I keep running it wherever God takes me, in order that I might receive the prize at the end.
*Stay tuned for some photos and videos from the rest of the Race that I had heretofore been unable to post.
Here is a fun video I made from Moldova. We were at the top of a mountain in the northernmost town in the country, a sleepy little place called Naslavcea. There was a rehabilitation center run by our contact for the month, Andrei. Andrei and a previous World Race team took a cross to the top of this mountain and set it up there as a place to go an worship and meditate (after a pretty tough twenty minute hike!).
First of all, I must apologize to you, the faithful readers of my blog, for my infrequent updates as of late. The internet abroad is difficult to find and harder to actually use when found. You would think that through all of the “We should reset the modem” and “I wonder if it would help if I jiggled the ethernet cable” moments I would have learned something more about the internet, that great series of tubes. Alas, I have not, and to this day it remains a mystery on par with Bigfoot and how they get those little chunks of fruit to float in the Jello Snack Packs.
For my first in a slew of updates to come, I would like to share with you some prayer requests that I have and humbly ask you to consider joining me in prayer.
We are getting into the thick of the World Race. We have left the relative safety and comparative cultural familiarity of Eastern Europe (and, to some extent, tourist-friendly Katmandu) and are diving straight into cultures and peoples almost completely foreign to us. Pray for patience as we seek understanding with our hosts and continually give up our rights to operating within our own societal norms.
Additionally, health has been a big issue as of late. Several squad members have been experiencing illnesses of varying degrees, and all diminish the quality of our ministry. I myself was afflicted with what I affectionately refer to as “Captain Trips” after eating some strangely delicious but dubiously manufactured Nepalese candies. Pray that we would be able to stay strong and overcome the health perils of oversea travel: contaminated water and food; exposure to unfamiliar viruses and bacteria; and inadequate means of sanitation.
Pray for spiritual and emotional strength for my squad mates and me. We are in tough places, places where the enemy doesn’t want us. Spiritual attacks are common. Apathy and frustration are more difficult to overcome. Spiritual exhaustion is near-guaranteed. But God is our provider and he equips us with the energy and zeal we need to complete the mission he has for us.
In support news, my final deadline is February 1, 2012. By then I need to have raised about $3500 more to be fully funded. This Christmas season is coming up, and I would humbly ask you to consider supporting my missions overseas this holiday. You can help by telling your friends to make a donation in your name in lieu of gifts, or by pitching in a s a family to make a one time donation. Anything that you are willing to give is appreciated beyond the ability to convey in words and goes directly into the hands of men and women serving Jesus Christ all around the world.
Stay tuned for more updates – a wrap-up of Nepal is coming as is some thoughts on my first week in India. Also, I know that I keep saying I will post more videos, and I have about five ready to go up as soon as there is adequate bandwidth. Anytime I find it, there is the likelihood I will have to share it with at the very least five other people – you understand how these things go.
I love you all and am so grateful for you prayers and support. As they say in India (and other parts of the world), Happy Christmas!
A couple blogs ago I wrote about Asha Nepal and the work we were doing there, their mission for giving freedom to enslaved women and children in Nepal. After working there for about a week, my team and I headed out into the countryside south of Katmandu to a village called Khokana. We took a bus to a station at the north part of the village and hiked down into the valley to the church at which we were staying.
Ministry in Nepal after Asha was difficult; I had gotten used to playing with kids and running Homework Time and singing during devotion time. In the villages, the best way for foreigners to reach non-believers in Nepal is through handing out tracts.
My team and I were not ecstatic about this prospect as individuals in America who hand out tracts are sometimes viewed with skepticism and often have a distinct stigma attached to their image. Compounding the problem was the fact that all the tracts were in Nepali and we had no clue what they said beyond their titles (curious descriptions like a Nepali man smiling toothily underneath the caption “The Way to Happiness!” or Jesus floating above a crowd of people, ascending toward Nepali alphabet characters spelling out “Strange but True!”).
I read a book by Skye Jethani called “The Divine Commodity” while in Nepal. I read the final chapter the night before beginning our first day of ministry in the villages. In it, Jethani relates Vincent van Gogh’s painting of the sower and Jesus’ parable of the same subject to the mystery of the gospel. When the sower casts his seed, he has no clue where it’s going to land. It’s not up to him whether or not it lands on good soil or rocky ground, nor is it his responsibility to facilitate the mystery of the sprouting and growth of that seed.
Instead, God controls the mystery. We are commanded to sow and reap; the Lord takes care of the rest. And it was hard to swallow that as I knew I would be heading into the jaws of the most uncomfortable ministry I had done yet. In my bustling Midwest suburban culture, you hardly make eye contact with the people you pass on the street or in the market, let alone walk up to them, hand them something, and then smile expectantly hoping they speak some English. Yet that was what we were doing. We knew enough Nepali to hand something to a person, refer to them respectfully as brother or father or grandmother, and retreat politely, hoping they read what we gave them.
I can’t tell you how often we handed a tract to someone and they asked us, “Are you Christian?” We responded in the affirmative and they responded with a blunt, “I am Hindu.” Often that was the end of the conversation. What do you say to that? You just thank them for their time and hope they read the gospel you’ve placed in their hands.
But it was a daily exercise in trust. Do I trust that God will take the seed I sowed and make it grow in the way he wants? Do I trust that God can save even the most stubborn Hindu or Buddhist? Do I trust that God overcomes my inadequacy with his Spirit?
It was humbling to realize my relative unimportance in the process of the Spirit growing the seed inside someone. I sow. Hopefully, one day, someone will reap. The rest is up to God. I believe that a proverb illustrating this might be, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” This is true, but I prefer the agrarian model: you can stick a seed in the ground, but nothing you do will make it sprout.
I have spent the last ten days at the most beautiful place in the world (so far as I’ve seen): a home for women and children rescued from the sex trade and from the streets called Asha Nepal. The cool Nepali air chills my bones pleasantly as I wake up every morning and head to the roof to read my Bible and take tea. On a clear morning, I can see the Himalayas from up there. But there is more to see than just the landscape.
Asha is the Nepali word for “hope,” and that is exactly what Asha Nepal is providing for these people. Most of these children have no parents – they were killed in the recent civil war or simply abandoned their kids. But you would never know it from looking at these little balls of fire. They go to school, they speak amazing English, they are frustratingly sneaky soccer players, they play jokes on us and teach us Nepali words for the food we’re eating. They’re happy; they’re blessed.
It is amazing to see such grace and humility from people who, in the eyes of our western, affluent culture, have little about which to be happy. But they’re teaching me so much about being gracious, about community, and about the faithfulness of the Lord.
We have devotions with the children almost every day, and they sing children’s worship songs in English and Nepali. When they sing “This is the day that the Lord has made,” I have never heard a song sung in so many different keys simultaneously, and I have never seen anyone as excited about lifting their voices to the Lord as they are.
Everyone loves playing soccer here, and I have come to love the game as much as anyone else. They always ask me to play keeper (probably because they have become aware that it is the only position I’m any good at), and they like the I can throw the ball forty yards down the field directly in front of the opponent’s goal. While I play goalie, these three little kids stand behind me and chatter in Nepali, throwing in recognizable phrases like “American football” and “rugby,” most likely describing that my unique (read: “hideously unorthodox”) style of play is not something they’re used to.
We went on a field trip of sorts yesterday to what is referred to as the “Monkey Temple” by tourists. It is literally a Buddhist temple filledwith monkeys. Also, shrines, but those didn’t seem to be the main attraction. I wandered around, hoping to feel something, but realized that nothing about that place felt sacred. Man can’t make a place sacred. But what was sacred about that place was the presence of the little boy hanging on my right arm and the little girl hanging on my left arm the entire time we were there. There was more of God’s sacredness and holiness in the spirit of those little ones than there was in any incense-covered shrine.
We eat our meals with the women and children, and in Nepali culture, it is considered a sign of very high praise and love to eat a meal with someone. I love that simply by doing something I love doing (eating delicious food!) that I can bless these women and children. There is such stigma against women rescued from the sex trade. To say, “I came from Mumbai,” almost literally means that the individual will be shunned and treated as an outcast. But when we sit to eat with these women, we affirm them and say, “You are worthy and blessed and special enough for me to share the same food you are eating.” If “You are from Mumbai” means “You are tainted,” then “Let me share this meal with you” means “I love you like a sister.”
Asha Nepal is a beautiful place; be in prayer for its leaders as they seek to work with the government to obtain proper citizenship papers for the women and children. Be in prayer for their ministry, and be in prayer for the amazing American missionaries, Richard and Mary Faber (richardnmaryfaber.wordpress.org) that have been working here for the last two months.
The assistant director of the home, and our contact, a man named Bhuvan, is trying to change what the idea of leadership in Nepal is like. Culturally, the leaders are to be served. But Bhuvan told me strongly, “We are not here to be served. If you want to be a leader and you believe you are to be served, then you are notqualified for leadership.” He told me that his job is to serve the youngest little baby here, Angelica, to the oldest resident, an eighty-year-old man they affectionately refer to as “Papa.” “From Angelica to Papa,” Bhuvan said. “We must serve them, and not insist they serve us.”
Our Lord Jesus Christ loves these women. Let us love them, too. Let us pray for them and petition our God on their behalf, that he would provide abundantly for them.
As I stood on the tired concrete porch of a cramped house on the property of a home for women rescued from the sex trade near Kathmandu, Nepal, my thoughts drifted to this time almost exactly one year ago. What was I doing?
Most likely, I was in a high school classroom teaching freshman algebra to rowdy fourteen-year-olds. Last fall, I had been without a job for nearly six months after graduation. I had been trying to get some days as a substitute teacher at my high school, and on a Thursday, as I sat watching a bunch of juniors teach each other the Physics lessons I had forgotten in the last six years, my algebra teacher approached me.
“Peter, you did pretty well in algebra, didn’t you?”
Yes, I had done pretty well in algebra. Honestly, it was the only math class I ever felt like I was good at. Something equals something else, and there are some x’s and y’s thrown in there for good measure. No functions, no parabolas, no proofs. Just good ol’ fashioned arithmetic. But me being good at 2x + 7 = 21 eight years ago couldn’t possibly be enough to land me a job, could it?
But it was, and in a week, I found myself covering for an indefinite period time as my algebra teacher took leave from work. I had frantically read through the previous chapters in the textbook, trying to recall all the information that I hoped was still rattling around somewhere in the brain that had convinced itself it was a theologian/philosopher and had no need for any math beyond calculating how much change to hand the cashier at Taco Bell.
Long story short, I remembered a lot, I had a good amount of help from the other math teachers, the kids learned math, and no one died. Through those six weeks, however, I learned that I was pretty sure I didn’t want to pursue a career in teaching, and it opened me up to a multitude of other possibilities – it was a major step in bringing me to the World Race. And for the longest time I thought, “Man, I’m really glad God made me teach algebra so he could lead me to the World Race.”
But back on the porch in Nepal, I had suddenly learned that there was more for me to learn from my crash course in the American education system. Because I stood over a confused Nepali sixth grader, taking in the string of numbers and letters separated by a division sign.
Any time during college, I think I would have shrugged and apologized, willing but unable to help But because I learned some math that was “useless” for my career plans as a college professor of ethics, I reached for the young boy’s pen and walked him, step by step, through the math problem.
I felt like I had gleaned everything I needed to from my teaching experience, but God had more in store. And it is just another example of how he has been faithful in showing me the worth of those times when I felt like I was spinning my wheels, like there was nothing good happening. His plan is perfect – he doesn’t just work in big ideas like “I am breaking you of your prefabricated plans to do what you want with your life and replacing them with my plans.” He works in specifics, like “You need to relearn algebra so that a year from now, you can help a Nepali orphan with his math homework on the tired concrete porch of a tiny house in Kathmandu, Nepal.
And now, every time I hear a kid say of his math homework, “When are we ever going to usethis?” I’ll chuckle to myself and assure him or her that there is a reason for every trial we go through we go through, big or small.
