Treasure Hunts and Vegetarians

I'm playing catchup a little bit with my blog, so instead of going in order I'm going write generally about outreaches.

Home visit in the countryside in Henti 

Outreach is a regular part of life at HELP International.  During the week we make an effort to visit homes and on Thursdays we take the Gospel to the streets.  Sometimes we pray or go to a mountain to worship, but most weeks we do treasure hunts.  Going on treasure hunts is an evangelism tool developed out of Bethel where you pray and ask God for clues to find specific people.  We do treasure hunts back home all the time.  It is meant to be an exercise in learning to hear specific things from God.  For me it has typically been more of an exercise in humility.  Success is not so important.  The important thing is learning to step outside your comfort zone and love people.

In Mongolia my experience was very different.  I found my treasure every time, except once.  The first time I was looking for a woman in a green and pink deel (traditional Mongolian clothing) who had knee pain.  After about 20 minutes I saw a women of that description in a parking lot.  We asked her if she had knee pain and she let us pray for her.  Her knee was healed but she told us she still didn't believe in Jesus.

Another time I felt like I needed to find a man with a bright green hat.  I saw him but I missed him.  Twice.  Because I was chicken.  The first time I missed him I prayed "God, if it's REALLY him have him turn and walk toward us."  He turned... And walked past us and up the next block.  So I prayed something like "ok... If that was definitely probably the person I possibly should approach, let him turn around."  I feel like God lets us work through our fear in this way because on the second or third time you don't care anymore.  You chase them down and you don't even care that it's MUCH more awkward than if you would have just talked to them the first time.  So, there we were:  me and four Mongolians running across a park, jumping a retaining wall, making a beeline for the bewildered gentleman in the bright green hat.  We talked to him for a while and he told us he had problems with his kidneys.  We prayed for him and he was very touched.

One of my favorite encounters was when I visited Henti.  We didn't do a treasure hunt; we simply went out to the streets.  We prayed with several people before we felt like we should worship.  It was wonderful.  It was awkward.  At first nothing happened except two men with a plastic bag full of meat stopped and watched us.  After about ten minutes they approached us.  Before they left one of them said "I always avoided Christians because I thought they were vegetarians!"

You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.

Home visits are always exciting, especially not knowing Mongolian.  One time we visited my friend Saira's sister or sister-in-law (I still don't know how they are related).  From what I understood she had died and we were going to go to the hospital and pray.  Saira seemed to be doing surprisingly well considering the circumstances.  So we crammed too many people in a van and off-roaded for about 45 minutes until we came to the woman's house.  We found her very much alive.  I never knew raising the dead could be so easy!  As I began to piece together what the actual situation was, I found out she had cancer and she wasn't a Christian.  Saira and the others shared the gospel with her as well as her husband and they both excepted Jesus!  At the time she wasn't ready to give up shamanism and Buddhism.  She told us she wanted to, but she was afraid.  She had a red cord around her neck that is said to hold her life.  Many Mongolians have this and they believe if they ever take it off they will die.  Unlike western new age, most people in the east don't practice these religions because they find enlightenment.  They are told they will get sick, die, or be vulnerable to demonic oppression if they do not do certain things.  Many are motivated by fear and family pressure.

Saira and a few others visited her again.  They brought her a Mongolian Bible.  I do not know if she was ready this time to give up shamanism.  But we know her heart belongs to Jesus and He is faithful to complete the work He started in her.

Also, I got to ride a camel.  It was kind of a big deal.