Ashley and I, and another team member have begun discipling a group of women every Monday night. These women live in a little neighborhood/village close to our house. In true South Asian form, we never know what to expect with this group. The first time we met with a group of women who had contacted us, including two feisty old ladies :). The second week it was canceled minutes before we left our house, due to no translator and the woman who's house we meet at was not going to be there. This third time, we arrived with our lesson ready, only to find a bunch of little kids there. Can you say Flexibility!? There was a Muslim girl, and couple of Hindu boys and girls. We looked at each other and decided to toss out our original plan and go with telling the story of Jesus healing the paralytic man. (Check it out...Luke 5: 17-26).
As three different languages were being spoken and translations were going back and forth, I was completely distracted. There was an eerie Buddhist chanting being heard outside, loud men shouting back and forth, and rats running around on the rafters above me. For awhile I was fixated on these two rats. (and when I say rats, I really mean guinea pig because that's how big those suckers were). I was watching them as they carried off giant pieces of bread, hoping that they wouldn't fall down into the room where we were sitting. As I sat there with the heebie jeebies from these ceiling dwellers, I had missed almost the whole telling of the story. It's not that I don't know this story...that's not what bothered me. It's the fact that I had gotten so distracted by everything going on around me that I was missing what was going on in front of me. A little Hindu girl was hearing about how Jesus heals for the first time. She was hearing how Jesus is the one who forgives us from our sins. She was fascinated with the story. As I sat there silently praying for these kiddos, I couldn't help but think of how often things come up and I get distracted. How God is doing something so neat right in front of me, but I have become fixated on things or circumstances around me. This has prompted me to pray that He would help me to stay focused on Him. When things are happening around me, I would not get hung up on them because I would be so in tune to His story. And that I would hear His story like the first time again!
(Ashley and the group acting out the story)
As three different languages were being spoken and translations were going back and forth, I was completely distracted. There was an eerie Buddhist chanting being heard outside, loud men shouting back and forth, and rats running around on the rafters above me. For awhile I was fixated on these two rats. (and when I say rats, I really mean guinea pig because that's how big those suckers were). I was watching them as they carried off giant pieces of bread, hoping that they wouldn't fall down into the room where we were sitting. As I sat there with the heebie jeebies from these ceiling dwellers, I had missed almost the whole telling of the story. It's not that I don't know this story...that's not what bothered me. It's the fact that I had gotten so distracted by everything going on around me that I was missing what was going on in front of me. A little Hindu girl was hearing about how Jesus heals for the first time. She was hearing how Jesus is the one who forgives us from our sins. She was fascinated with the story. As I sat there silently praying for these kiddos, I couldn't help but think of how often things come up and I get distracted. How God is doing something so neat right in front of me, but I have become fixated on things or circumstances around me. This has prompted me to pray that He would help me to stay focused on Him. When things are happening around me, I would not get hung up on them because I would be so in tune to His story. And that I would hear His story like the first time again!
(Please be in prayer for this group. Pray that the women would want to further their relationship with Christ and learn more about Him.)
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