Something that I have been dealing with is the struggle to not feel numb in the overwhelmingness of the everything.   Here is just a partial list of some of the things I and my team have experienced over the past couple weeks: I have seen narrow roads, crumbling sidewalks, sticky amber dirt, heaps of trash, makeshift homes of thatch and other random materials. I have seen the disfigured, the dirty, women in burkas, and babies in beautiful clothing. I have felt the moisture in the air, breathed in the pollution, and noticed the stars over the city from a rooftop.  I have felt the...

A few days ago, we were riding back from a day on Commercial Street- a bumper-to-bumper, shoulder-to-shoulder, smelly, dirty, hectic place-and I was just completely drained-emotionally, spiritually, physically drained. Our auto stopped at an intersection for 100 seconds (the stops are timed, which only adds insanity on the already rushed streets) and two little girls walk up to our auto; they are both carrying babies under one, and they cannot be older than 5 or 6 themselves. Honestly, my first response was dread. I was so tired and didn’t want to deal with this. (Oh so selfish.) Even...

“The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.  When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.  A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.”  John 10:3-5   We had a sixteen hour train ride to our current location and while trekking through the beautiful Indian countryside, I noticed a flock of sheep standing still in a nearby field.  The entire herd was gathered together just standing,...

We have been in India for a little over a week and a half now and are in our second location. We started out getting accustomed to the culture. We now have our Indian attire that we wear everyday. It’s difficult to fully express ourselves when we have to watch our language and when we talk to our daddy we can not close our eyes as we can in America. The atmosphere is much like Slum Dog Millionare: children younger than one year old begging, rick-saw rides, buses with flashing lights, crazy music, and huge crowds, beggars of all ages everywhere, poverty every where you look, public...

The past week and a half that we’ve been in India has been awesome. A lot has gone on mentally, and I have been trying to focus on love through actions and words.   I just want to share something that has been very encouraging for me… While there is so much darkness in India, there is light here, and that brings me great joy. While wandering around in the surrounding community with a teammate, we started speaking with a woman, I’ll call her Charlotte. Charlotte is a believer, and we were able to speak with her for about 2 hours. She welcomed us into her home, and...

So, apparently I have this bubble that I have created around myself. A zone of comfort. Being here in India has certainly popped (and shall I say rather abruptly) that circle of comfortability. I have had to do things that I would never want to do. When we were in B-lore, this man came to teach us how to tell stories. This may sound very strange at first, as strange as it was to my own ears. However, stories are very important to the Indian culture. He taught us how to intertwine our stories with the B-ble. Then the hard part came. He told us that we would be venturing out into Bangalore...