The 5 W's

Who, why, what, where, when - Our journey to India first began two years ago. I was praying for guidance. I felt like I was supposed to be preparing for something, for somewhere. But where? We had been to many places and definitely had a passion for homeless children and empowering families. I prayed and searched and waited. The Holy Spirit showed me the need in Nepal and the desire of indigenous churches to care for children. Nepal is one of the poorest and least developed countries in the world were more than half the children are malnourished. There are many homeless children vulnerable to trafficking and exploitation. I began to search for more insight and look for doors to open to preparing for Nepal.

It became clear my next step would be to learn how foster care and adoption works in the culture of the Indian Sub-continent. Various doors opened over the next year. God brought to mind Vathsalya Charitable Trust (VCT), the program where Robert was cared for during the three years before he came to us. VCT is a wonderful program twenty-four years old which provides foster care, a small orphanage, domestic and international adoption, care for underweight babies, girls education, and skill training for abandon women. It is the perfect model for me to learn from. When I contacted them with my plans and asked if I could come to VCT to learn from them, they immediately said yes. They had always wanted to import their program to Nepal and were excited about the possibility. I still had to finish a field placement internship for my graduate studies at USC. Although it had never been done before, USC agreed to let me count my time in India as an internship. God was making a way for me to prepare for the work He had for me.

At first Jeff was not excited about the prospect of spending the summer in India. He wanted to go to India but the thought of us all going for three months just seemed like too much. In faith however, he began to look for open doors as well. He found he knew all kinds of people with ties to India. An opportunity came for him to work with the Indian Evangelical Mission (IEM) in administration and Breakthrough Ministries in curriculum development. IEM is the largest indigenous missions’ organization in India and works in everything from Bible translation to healthcare to leadership development. They even send Indian missionaries to places such as Ghana, Thailand and the UK. God also brought him connections through businessmen here in the Upstate to do academic research in India and present at a academic conference. These were important factors as they allowed Jeff to use some of his time in academic work which his employer, Anderson University, would finance.

I shouldn't really have said this journey began two years ago. For two years before that Gabi had been praying for India nightly. Her prayer went something like this, "God send people to teach the Indians about you. And I hope it's me you send." India had been on her heart ever since her brother came when she was four years old. When we told her we were going she said, "Wow, I never thought my prayer would be answered so quickly."

So here we are, ready to leave. Or as ready as we will ever be. Robert has a full-time job this summer and will be holding down the fort. Josiah was not interested in India but does have a heart for Honduras. Last year we had traveled to Honduras to work in an orphanage and he enjoyed it more than he ever imagined he would. Our wonderful friends, the Botkins (see the link to their blog on this page), are now full-time workers there and Josiah chose to go help them for two months. In July he will be travelling to Norwich University for a summer program for two weeks.

This first post has been a long one to explain the background behind this trip but I'd like to end with ways you can pray for us.

·Jeff's visa actually ends 3 days before his flight out of India. He will get this fixed when we are there...if they let him in the country in the first place.

·We have a total of 18 hours of flying time plus 5 hours in airports so we appreciate prayer for easy travel without any mishaps.

·Pray our hearts would be prepared to love the people and their country. It is so easy to become judgmental of another culture.

·As Gabi prays, "That God would give us the knowledge of how to reach people and the right words to say." She is our evangelist and eager for an opportunity to share the Good News.

Ready for a grand adventure, Rebecca