Living in the Clouds

The last few days have been spent in a village about 35 mins from Darjeerling, in a cloudy place called Rangbull. Each of us wake up to a sunny day in the mountains where the view is enough to keep us quiet. The little community is quick to pick out the visitors, and each person makes an effort to get to know you. The common questions are: Where are you from? What are you doing? Where are you going? In that order. Answering these questions seems to then make you a friend after passing by the next time. The thing they don't understand is that we seem to be working... Why would a foreigner work? It seems that people seem to think that we foreigners don't understand the concept of work. We some how swim past all the bills of life. Each day as we walk to the church in our work clothes often carrying tool or material for our fixing job the people look at us with a puzzled expression. The bottom level of this church building is in serious need of repair, so we have taken it upon ourselves to make an attempt of making some improvements. (We have no idea what we are doing) But as I said before we look like we do. No need to worry once it is painted it should at least look better. The couple we are staying with here has been so generous to us. They have opened their home to us and fed us so well. We are so thankful for their warm welcome and our individual beds. Each day with them has been so much fun. They have introduced us to so many of the people in the village. In the short time we have been here we have been invited to two birthday parties, to many homes for tea, and even a momo cooking party. (which is like the chinese version of perogies) We were also asked to share in church this weekend as well. I shared for the Sunday School, Jordan shared with the youth and Daniel was the pastor for the adults. We have enjoyed our time and our time here, and we are expecting to continue staying with these people until Tuesday, by which time we expect our renovation project to be complete unless there is more momo's on the menu. Kenton

Movements

The life of a traveling bum is all about moving. Here in India movements are always delayed but always quick. Walking down the street I still jump every time I hear the ear piercing horns inches behind me. It doesn't matter how far off the road I am the horns always continue to blare! And one must always be aware of the vicious monkeys. I am always a big fan of a fury animal, it reminds me of myself but when too many surround me I move fast cause rabies doesn't interest me too much. And of coarse there are the quick and sudden movements that come as a result of the curry...And then of coarse the need to move on from here. Today we venture down the mountain a little way to see what we can find with an awesome couple from Argentina. Sometimes I long to get nice and cozy comfortable in a place but it seems that every time we find any comfort at all we must keep on moving. But really there is a movement going on that is much bigger than us. The movements of a faithful God. Coming to India I so desperately wanted to see what and how God was and is at work. In only a short time we have seen the fingerprints of a father who loves His children here in India. Going to the deaf and dumb school with a ywam team last week we saw 11 young guys give their hearts to Jesus. Then later that week we heard from that same team who reported that they had been in the home of a Hindu family when a lady suddenly dies in their arms (literally) after a while when no pulse was found they began to pray to the one and only true God of heaven and then, Bam! they heard a gasp and she was back to life, True store happened just this last week!, that same team saw another 10 kids and 2 teachers in a school give their lives to Christ as well. There must be something real in all this I think to myself and daily I continue to pray that God would increase my faith. For us the movements we see are a daily faithfulness and a deep encouragement. As I sat in church the other day between a Hindu man and a Buddhist man both earnestly praying to God I was humbled and reminded again that the God I serve is indeed making His movements across the globe. Daniel

Thanks For The Tea

Here we are in the incredible town of Darjeeling. It is a unique place where Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and Christian all live together in peace. On one corner you can see Buddhist monks playing cricket and then with just a glance in the opposite direction you can see a variety of Hindu temples and Muslim Mosques.

Its a place renown for its tea. But many people and especially backpackers that come

through here are on a spiritual pilgrimage to find enlightenment and truth. Therefore it has been a perfect place for YWAM and also for we three to be wandering the streets. Upon arrival into this small city in the Himalayan mountains we found such an incredible group of people here. The team that was in from Oz was just so life giving to the three of us. We had the opportunity to worship with them, share stories of our different adventures and just be revived. They also let us tag along as they hung out with a school for deaf and dumb kids. That was an incredible time as well. I got to just hang out and talk in sign language with some of the kids there. It was slow going but over time the alphabet came back into perspective and I remembered what I had learnt as a kid working at camps. Now we are getting into some practical work here painting and building bunk beds for our friends that are living here in Darjeeling. We have also been able to really live out our faith though in day to day life. Just the other night walking home from supper we met three backpackers that were stranded without a place to stay for the night. So after talking with them for a while and sharing about our trip and what we were doing here, we got the opportunity to show them what we were talking about. Our friend here said that we could sleep on his floor and therefore these three could have our hotel room for the night. With this news we grabbed their bags and walked them across the city to our hotel talking the entire time about the amazing God that we are in relationship with. They ended up being able to get a room of their own at the hotel, which worked out great. I don't think that our talk with them changed their belief in God but maybe it changed their view of Christianity. And just today we were visiting with the new group that showed up here and they were saying that last night they had this great conversation with three backpackers from Europe. As the story went on it was pieced together that it was the same three, and they totally remembered us and were amazed that only a day later they were meeting more Christians that were challenging them to think more about Christianity. So our time here has been quite eventful already with meeting some amazing new friends from all over the world and also being able to really get involved in the community. Lehmann

The pics for India

When they honk at you, you GET OUTTA THE WAY!!! (check out that gun)

Tashma Hall. (That's as close as we got... )

Temples everywhere...

Ladies watch out!

Kendall... good luck...

Gateway to India.

We were on this train for 26 hours. It was a lot of sleeping, and eating.

Here we were just doing our best to find a ride. Sitting on their roof seemed like a good idea.