A Little Bit Louder

The hardest part about being here right now is finding purpose. By Wednesday morning, I had said my goodbyes, packed, and was mentally already in Hong Kong with my relatives. Then I found out I BKK was shut down and I would be here at least another day…. and then another… and now I’m scheduled to go out Monday (which doesn’t look great either).

At least now I know I’ll be here a few more days and can once again ramp up my existence here. For a few days, I left my bags packed and tried not to start/get involved with too much locally because I wasn’t sure how long I was going to still be here. Being in that state… stasis if you will is tough on the mind. I was spending all my time trying to figure out how to still get to Hong Kong, or at least out of Kathmandu to somewhere with more flight options.

Today I pretty much accepted the fact that I am where I am, and I should make the most of my extra days here. So today was awesome. Binod taught me and Ashok how to ride a motorcycle. I’d never been on a bike before Kathmandu, and now I was riding one. Mountain biking tons this summer improved my balance significantly, so my comfort level on 2 wheels is decent. There’s lots to think about on a motorcycle though and I’m far from ready to ride in traffic, but it was a super fun afternoon of hanging out with a couple of local guys… and a whole lot of laughing. I’m not a motorcycle ninja… yet… but Mark definitely looks like one with his neck warmer up and his toque down… and I think it’ll be the NEB name one of these weeks.

Youth tonight was pretty cool too… movie, pop, popcorn… but great because of the part after where a mass of people walk home, laughing and singing silly nepali songs I don’t understand, but have actions to them … it reminded me of being in school, walking home with my friends where people would drop off along the way depending on where they lived. We never did any actions to any of the songs we sang on the way home from school, but then again, I don’t think GnR songs were meant to have actions. The best times I’ve had here in Nepal thus far have been times when I’ve just been able to hang out with people, without a specific agenda. Walking home tonight was another one of those times.

I think there’s something valuable about people living within a walking distance of church… or of the community they’re actively involved in… I love the fact that people from the church can walk over to our place… and that extended families live together… maybe I need to move?

Last night while we gathered as a home church at the Bartels, we hard a bang… more of a thud really… thought it strange, but nothing more.

As we were leaving, we noticed that my car had been hit… not a slight nudge, but a solid hit… not just my car, but another car had been hit as well…

Not what I was looking forward to on a Tuesday night. I wasn’t angry, and am still not… I felt really at peace. I had a great group of people around me praying and I know things will work out. They always do.

More than anything, I’m annoyed… that I have to do paperwork…that I had to wait for police to come fill out a report….that I have to be without a car for a while…

The insurance thing went pretty smooth… it was trying to find a collision repair shop that wasn’t booking into the summer to get work done, that was tough. I called about 8 places and had some quotes of August 18th to look at the damage. I did find one place Concours Collision Centres That give priority to non driveable vehicles. They can get me in on May4th… next Friday. I guess that’s better than August. They seem like a good shop. They get a lot of high end cars in the shop so I think they’ll do a good job.

The last week or so, I’ve been thinking about mentors and how it changes lives… When they released the name and picture of the shooter in the Virginia Tech shooting last week, all that came to mind was that the guy didn’t have a mentor… somebody to bounce ideas off of…to talk through the tough stuff… didn’t even have to be a mentor… just someone a bit older with a bit more life experience… This isn’t to say that if you don’t have a mentor, you’ll fail miserably in life, but I’m willing to bet that it would’ve made a difference….

In thinking about last night and the hit and run, mentoring was once again a dominant thought… whether the driver was drunk, or some joyriding teen, or someone else, would mentoring help? I’d like to think so…

I know it’s cliché to say we should be thankful for everything cause God’s taking care of it, but in this case, I’ really am thankful… that nobody was hurt… that I’ve got amazing people around me that stand beside me through the tough stuff and the stupid stuff in life… that I was able to get my car into a shop that will look at it before the summer… that I added collision coverage to my car last year…

Well, we’ll see how getting around Calgary without a car turns out… I guess I’ll get lots of biking in…

Its been a long few days… an 18 hour drive from Calgary, 6 stops, 3 turns later, we got to Winnipeg… we arrived quite late Saturday night… rather it was Sunday morning… after a much too quick 5 hours of shut eye, we were up and joining the WCV for church.

Amissionary (Vicky) shared the incredible message about the ministry of presence… that is, being available to be used by God and people…

That night, Joe (Matt’s brother shared on God’s heart for the poor) He passed out lists of verses, and one after another, we read them out. One after another, we heard the heart of God… that he loved them… and wants us to love them as well…

Monday was a harsher day… we woke up to find that one of the Van’s had been broken into… several of the girls lost their purses/ipods/cell phones/cash… Matt and I spent a few hours looking in dumpsters and yards for them, but found nothing. The girls have taken it well, and shared last night of how they realized how tied to possessions they were, and how they knew God would take care of them.

It seems over the past few months, God has been screaming the same message over and over to us… “I LOVE THE POOR! DON’T FORGET THEM! FEED THEM, HELP THEM, LOVE THEM!”... sometimes I wonder if we’re listening… if I am listening?

Well, I’m off again. Not exactly to anywhere as exotic as Thailand, Nepal, Philippines or Maui, but away nonetheless. In 5 hours I’m heading off with my youth kids to Winnipeg.

I hadn’t plan on going on the trip this year. I have been away a lot in the last four months, and it’s taken a long time to get my bearings again and adjust to the rhythm of life here in Calgary. It’s quite disorienting to be coming and going all the time.

Even as I travelled, I I felt like every time I have a great trip or adventure, I have to quickly put it aside and get ready for the next place/country/city/trip. There’s so much I’ve seen and still have not had a chance to reflect and soak in those experiences… But alas, the world keeps going, and all those thoughts will trickle back into my mind as they fit. I know I’m been blessed… spoiled really… to be able to see so much of the world in such a short time, and given the chance I’d do it all again.

Back to Winnipeg… Our theme verse for the trip is:


We’ll be gone from March 31 to April 7 … while there, we will get to work with a few different organizations. Some activities we’ll be participating in are:

• A reading and running club, where we’ll be reading to and with younger kids… and running… I personally hate running, but I’m sure someone will be running
• We’ll also be running a few after school activities – one sports based, and one carnival for younger kids.
• Serving a few meals with the church we’re staying at, Winnipeg Central Vineyard.

By coincidence (perhaps divinely conspired), Winnipeg Central Vineyard is the sponsoring church to Kathmandu Vineyard where I was in the fall. I’m looking forward to meeting some other people who have gone and perhaps in that way digest some of what I experienced there. Matt tells me that there’s a fundraiser for KTM vineyard while we’re there…

The Nepal bit is great and all, but that’s not why I’m going. As I said, I wasn’t planning on going, but in the past few weeks, I felt that I should be there. It wasn’t a feeling of obligation or duty, but more a pull… an anticipation that God was going to do some amazing things in Winnipeg… and if he was, then I didn’t want to miss out.

I’m also looking forward to the relationships that will be built on the trip. The moments to talk with kids, both from our youth group and from Winnipeg.

Well, if you’ve read this far and would like to pray for us, here’s some specifics:

• Opportunities to share the Gospel, and the courage to do so.
• Sensitivity to what God is doing, and the willingness to join in
• Rich times of intimacy with God
• Miracles!
• energy for the leaders going (Matt, Tannis, Julie, Adam, and myself)
• Safety… it’s a long boring drive… pray we stay awake on the roads.
• Unity

Well, we’re now leaving in 4 hours… i should go get some sleep… not sure how much I’ll get in the next week. I’ll try to post updates here as much as I can.

Back in a few ways…. it’s been a while since I’ve posted… 2 weeks or so… Partly cause I’ve been away from the Internet… well, electricity in general, and partly cause the Blog’s been down… sorry for those who have been trying to access it…

We got back from the villages of Gatlang (also spelled Gutlang on some maps) and Nessing (Nesing to some) on Dec 1… both in the Rusuwa district of Nepal. It all sits in Langtang National Park. It all lies under some of the most extreme, harsh, rugged, and beautiful terrain in the world. There’s so much to talk about… and I’ve journaled quite a bit… over the next few weeks as I’ve got more internet time now, I’ll try to type some of them out here.

But for a taste, there we had babies get dedicated, a Buddist high priest come to Christ, a Maoist commander get baptized, and a buch of other cool stuff…