Marbles and the relentless generosity of children

The other day I decided I wanted to give each of the boys at the Iris home a few marbles. At one point they had  one or two to share among all 13 of them, but they had long ago disappeared the way marbles do. The day after I decided to get them marbles Jesus provided a whole jar of them to us for free. Not that marbles are expensive, or out of our ability to purchase, but any provision from the Father is a good thing, and for this we are thankful.

Today we gave each boy four small marbles. They were so excited and thankful over a few cents worth of round glass. They all kept saying "Thank you Uncle, thank you Auntie", and wasted no time starting a number of games around the play area. The smallest ones would just giggle while they chased their rolling marbles around.

About an hour after we gave them to them a five year old named Mahindra came up to me and placed all four of his new marbles in my pocket. Thinking he was being silly I took them out and tried to put them in his shirt pocket. He promptly places both hands over the pocket preventing my deposit and said he wanted to give me the marbles. I played along and thanked him, then a few minutes later I tried again to put them in his shirt pocket. Again he flat out refused. After a few more unsuccessful attempts I ran down to his room and hid them under his pillow. He soon discovered them, chased me down and shoved them in my pocket.

I had to accept it, he wanted me to keep them. This little boy who doesn't have very much, and shares all the toys with the other children, insisted on giving away his new toy that was entirely his own.

Freely we have received and freely we are to give. We can't hold onto anything so tightly that it gets in the way of love. Five year old Mahindra knows more about the kingdom than I do.

-kyle

Transformation

This is Pabitra. She's five years old and one of the newest additions to the Iris Nepal Children's Home. What we know of her story is similar to so many children in Nepal. Her father died and then her mother remarried, however, her mothers new husband didn't want any reminder of his wife's old marriage, so Pabitra's mother abandoned her.

When Pabitra first came to Iris you could see rejection hovering over her. Like many new orphans she would eat huge quantities of food because she was probably uncertain if any more food would come. While the other kids would run around and play on the rooftop terrace of the home she would stand motionless and stare out at the mountains. She would let you pick her up but she would sit lifeless in your arms. Everyone at Iris would just hold her and pray for her, pour as much love into her as we could. Most kids take a few hours to realize that they are in an environment of unconditional love and acceptance, Pabitra took days.

One day we went to the kids home to spend time with them after school and Pabitra was the first child I saw that day. She was a totally different person. She met me with a huge smile, arms flung wide, wanting to be picked up. She now is full of joy, giggling, running around with the other kids. She eats normal portions of food, and sings while she does her homework.

This is the transforming power of the Fathers Love. It demolished the spirit of rejection and poured out acceptance and love, and made a broken little girl into a new creation.

Glory

-kyle

The Narrow Gate

"Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few."
Matthew 7:12-14

This verse kicked me in the pants the other day. "...the way is HARD that leads to life." Wow, that really speaks against a lot of what the Western Church teaches. Following Jesus is the best, most amazing thing one could ever do, but it's so hard as well. I've been having a difficult time adjusting to life here sometimes, but it ok. Doing what Jesus has called you to do is often difficult, it involves suffering, it involves the desires and wants of our flesh (body) to be killed, so that our life in Jesus can grow and blossom. My character is being built and issues that I thought I've dealt with have all been challenged since I've been here. The enemy has also been trying to discourage me and tell me lies, so it's been double the hurt (pruning) and pain sometimes. BUT, Jesus is so so good. He's changed my life! He's making me more like Himself until one day I am face to face with my Saviour - perfected by His glory.

Father, may my life be a sacrifice and offering to You. Thank You that You give me the strength to do this.

- Annie

I met my cousin tn Kathmandu!

That almost sounds like a country song.  After we got back from our outreach my Mum, Aunt AND Uncle all e-mail me and tell me that my cousin Amy, who I've never met, is in Kathmandu doing a DTS with YWAM.  She's an MK and has lived all over the world and I've never had the chance to meet her.  After connecting by e-mail we arranged to meet for lunch.  It was so good to connect and share about what's going on in in our lives.  It was surreal and yet completely comfortable, I mean we have the same grandmother, same cousins and we even have the same space between our toes!  I miss her already.  LOVE YOU AMY!!!

Village Outreach recap

Panwhalla in Janakpur

 Its been a few weeks since we returned from our village outreach in Janakpur and Pokhara. It was great to get out of the Kathmandu Valley and into other parts Nepal. Janakpur feels almost exactly like North India, the heat, the food, the people, the way the city is laid out, all of it. It made us miss our time in India a little.

In the three days we were there we ministered in one church and three small Dalit villages, one of which had never heard the name of Jesus before. We would gather and worship for a while to welcome the presence of God, this also tends to gather most of the village around us. One of the Nepali's on our team would then preach, and then we would pray for the sick. Because of the rigorous farming work in the rural areas almost everyone had some sort of body pain amongst other ailments. At lease 5-10 deaf people were totally healed, some heard their children's voice for the first time. Overall the vast majority of people prayed for were healed, many also accepted Jesus into their hearts, and received the love of the Father.


We had to pray for a few hours just to get through all the people. It gave me a better understanding how Jesus got tired at the end of a day praying for people. I kept getting to a place of feeling totally empty yet there are still people waiting in line, or bypassing it all together to receive prayer. I often had to pray as an act of will rather than a place of faith, but that didn't matter much, when we are faithless Jesus is faithful. The people were so hungry, hopeful and full of faith. They often had more determination than we did. If they weren't healed they wouldn't get discouraged, they would just receive more prayer until they were.

In spite of all that the Holy Spirit was doing I don't believe that was the primary purpose for us going on this outreach. It was a very trying and challenging time for both of us. The Lord was testing our hunger for Him and His Kingdom, testing our reliance on His grace and presence. Can we faithfully lay hold of His promises when our hearts or circumstances seem contrary? Though difficult these things were actually answers to things we have been praying about for some months now.


After Janakpur we headed over to beautiful Pokhara, had a day of rest, then hiked up into the surrounding mountains to some more villages. Because of an encroaching storm, and a navigational blunder that turned a two hour hike into a seven hour one, we never got a chance to do any direct ministry in the villages around there. Instead we all enjoyed the spectacular views and had an intense time of prayer for the area and the Nation.

-kyle

Village Outreach with Fire and Fragrance

In a few hours we're leaving for a 10 day village outreach with a team from Fire & Fragrance (a ministry under YWAM). We'll be splitting our time between Janakpur (map)  in the south and Pokhara (map) to the west. We'll be based in the two cities but spend most of our time in the surrounding villages of the Dalit (untouchable) cast. These people are shunned by the general public and can often only find work doing the jobs no one else will do.

Our hope is that the people we meet encounter the love of the Father and that Holy Spirit crashes in. That heaven would invade earth in a place where many have never heard the name of Jesus.

We'll write more when we get back.
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ
-kyle & annie

In Transit

Everything we've taken with us

The past two weeks have been a whirlwind of packing and travel. We had planned on sorting out all the packing weeks prior to leaving but things piled up and we ended up doing it the day before. Our large suitcase was hopelessly overweight, we tried swapping its contents with other bags but it was still coming in 20 pounds over! Finally in the wee hours of the morning as we resigned to just pay the overweight charge I checked in online only to find that we had an extra free checked bag than what our travel agent told us! Thank God for hidden blessings. So the morning of our flight we managed to get it all under weight with the help of the extra bag.

We were incredibly blessed to spend four days in London on the way over to Nepal. We spent a bit of time seeing the sights but we were mostly there to see some beloved friends from Harvest School in Mozambique. It was a great time to catch up, pray, worship, and be mutually encouraged by each other's faith. They are all inspiring people who's heart is set on the kingdom and its exciting to see where Jesus is leading them.

We arrived in Kathmandu on the 13th and are settling into our temporary lodgings and fighting off jet lag. Today as we ran some errands I was incredibly happy to be back. Nepal already feels like home even though I don't yet speak the language or know how to take the bus. The hills around Kathmandu are stunning and with monsoon approaching in a month or so everything is becoming vibrantly green. It almost inspires me to become a landscape photographer.

-Kyle