Okay Go!

"Preach the gospel at all times and when necessary use words" -St. Francis of Assisi

Because the Hindi and Muslim faiths are so rooted and firm in thier foundation with the people here in India...the way they come to know Jesus is by seeing the way Christians live. God is love. So if they see love in us, they see God. Its a big deal to accept Jesus here. You will probably be kicked out of your own family if you do. I think this is why the people who do decide to follow after God are so on fire...it was never a light decision in their lives. It really humbles me...seeing Christians here so pure in heart and honest and loyal...I want that.

Since everyone has holiday from school (including us!) we have been spending allllll day in the children's home with the kids. We've started working with them everyday. At 3pm we always teach a lesson...because these kids want to learn! For 2 days we made bracelets; they got so good at it that they used all the string I brought from home! Last Wednesday we had drawing lessons, Thursday we made banana icecream, and then Friday we HAD to have an icecream party after their work had freezed overnight. Yesterday we made brownies and today we taught about preventing foodborn illnesses...you know. Its been really fun getting to know them. Everymorning they come in our rooms about a thousand times so they are there when we wake up. The littlest girl, Mary, usually just ends up crawling in bed with me.
Because we are spending so much time with them we are finding out how little they really have. We came home the other night and Pramod, the oldest boy (13), came to unlock the door for us since everyone was sleeping...in his jeans and long sleeve shirt. Its like 90 degrees outside, first of all. As I was asking him where his pajamas were I realized that I've never seen any of the children wearing pajamas. He answered by saying how he only has one pair of pants now because he gave one pair to one of the other kids...My little foster sisters at home get a bath, and lotion, and a clean pair of pajamas EVERY night...These kids have probably never had those three things together...ever. Its funny what we take for granted. And I would never have noticed if I didn't live here in the home. I don't even think the children here notice, or care, because they really are such a joy to be around.

Sunday we went to a leper colony. I had been wanting to go since we got here. If you have never seen people living with that disease it will take your breath away the first time you see it. There are many forms of leperousy, I think we saw them all. Most people are just left with nubs instead of fingers and toes. One of the men we met, his wife was in the hospital getting something amputated. Everyone understands that if one of them has to go to the hospital, they will be coming back with one less limb. Sometimes the leperousy manifested itself in people's eyes so that they were very large and red and sunk in. Sometimes it attacks the outer skin, making people look like burn victims. And sometimes it just causes the skin to become extremely dry and shrivel up. The hardest part about being there was seeing that they were suffering with this disease living in a slum. Every house was dirty and hot. Some people didn't even have fans. I wanted to stay there all day and put lotion on people. Their skin was so dry! I wanted to bathe them and clean their houses...There were a lot of kids in the colony. Once someone is declared leperous, it doesn't matter what caste they are in, or how wealthy they are, their entire family is outcast. There are 36 leper colonies in New Delhi...so many people. Tori, Eunice (Pastor Danny's wife), and I spent all day visiting and praying in every house. Even if they weren't Christian, people willingly kneeled down as we laid hands on them asking Jesus for salvation and prayer..

Missing home but I have new strength to finish out the next 40 days thanks to your prayers and exhortations and encouragement!!!!
Love, love, love!!!
Kate