India Part 4 – Sharpened

Friday night’s service was something I’ll remember always. The faces, the sounds, the tears, the joy and the unyielding confidence that rose from being where I was meant to be. This was not a special service for them in that, they have a service every Friday night. The assumption was, that there wouldn’t be as many visitors. There were many visitors though. One woman had brought 11 friends with her. Wow! I can’t even think of 11 people to invite to church. Even the heathens I do invite “already have a church.”

As I mentioned I learned late in the game what I was supposed to speak on. The topic was prayer and that’s all they gave us. I was free to talk about what it is, how it’s done or anything else. I had an instant desire to talk about the power of prayer. I told our little crowd that I wanted to share something with them that could give them influence where they don’t have position, it can give them favor where they don’t have relationships, it can give them confidence when they don’t have strength, wisdom when they don’t have information and help them acquire things they cannot afford. I told them that the best things in my life, the greatest success and the deepest joys have all begun with prayer. I explained that prayer is communing and interacting with God, and then, that it is only possible to have the deep communion if you know God’s son. Prayer does not have power without Jesus in your heart. We talked about what Jesus did for us and an invitation was given. I handed the service over to the pastor and she led the people in prayer.

To be honest, I couldn’t tell what was going on after that. I just did what our interpreter, Pastor Joseph, told us to do. He said pray for the people, so we prayed for the people. Then Pastor Joseph poured a little anointing oil in each of our hands and told us that they were coming to the alter for healing. He told us to just touch their foreheads and pray. They came toward us aggressively. Some of them went from one of us to another, to another. We just prayed until we couldn’t reach anymore of them. At one point I had prayed for everyone in front of me and I looked over and one of the ladies on my team was sitting in a chair near me weeping. I went to her and gave a hug and all she could say was “I can’t believe God used me.” She had prayed for the woman who owned the house we were in and the woman fell out (slain in the Spirit…whatever you want to call it) immediately. Deborah was shocked I think, but overcome with emotion when the woman tried to get up and then fell again. She later told Deborah that she could hear out of her ear again and that her eyes were clearing up. She had a cloudy covering on her eyes, glaucoma maybe? It was humbling to see God use us yes, but to see the faith of these women was deeply moving.

How strange it seems to stand in a whirl of emotion and action, weeping, singing, laughter and dancing and take it in and wonder how it is you are so honored to witness God at work. I felt like I was almost too aware of it all, as if I couldn’t get caught up in it because I was too busy observing it. I felt like if I closed my eyes and lifted my face I would be as elated and moved as the little crowd around me, but I didn’t want to take my eyes off of it. I wanted to take it in, to simply attest to it’s existence around me and ponder it even where I stood.

I rode back to dinner and our team with a lot on my mind. I had been mulling over the blog post I had written that Sunday morning about why we were going and I saw something new on Friday night that in some ways answered that question. I saw myself as not just present and available, I saw myself as usable. It took me back to my years of traveling with Images (for those unfamiliar, I traveled for five years with a Christian comedy and drama team in my early 20s) in a lot of ways. It’s been a long time since I felt that useful for the kingdom and it was very refreshing.

I realized that many of those people were there that night simply to see the white people. My questions from that Sunday’s blog were on target in many ways. They didn’t need us. I didn’t say anything that that wonderful pastor couldn’t have said herself. None of us did anything with those kids all week that wasn’t already being done by the incredible staff at that church. I was right about all of that. However, having a little island of white people in a sea of brown will draw a crowd and that church will monopolize on that for a good while.

I saw us as a special tool box that God brought to India for this purpose. Every tool in the box was usable, but some made the choice to only be used in certain ways. Others, had taken many opportunities to be sharpened, cleaned, prepared and used beforehand and when unexpected opportunities came about, they were not just something to set on display and draw a crowd, they found themselves comfortable in the hand of the Carpenter and ready to do whatever He asked. I saw this in so many of my teammates. They were people I wanted to be around, I wanted to soak in their peaceful presence and I watched God use them to convict and to comfort the people God placed in their path.

A few pictures of the view behind our hotel from my room:

Pictures of kids…and one of me:

To be continued.