Lessons in Kannada and Iranian friends...

Brent and I are members of a local gym that’s right next to our apartment.  We’ve become friends with one of the trainers, and Brent found out last week that he’s a believer!  It was during Diwali, and Brent asked what Simon's plans were to celebrate.  He said that he didn't celebrate Diwali because he was a Christian!  I was so excited to hear that news when Brent came home and told me.  Sometimes when I’m here in India and see a “white person”, it feels like I’m seeing a family member even if they’re a complete stranger, because it’s so rare.  There's just a connection that I can't explain.  I felt the same way finding out that Simon was a believer.  I just felt like we’d found a long lost family member or something.  When we leave Bangalore, we're say goodbye to Simon.  But it won't be a permanent goodbye, because we know that we'll meet this friend again.  So exciting!

Well anyway, Simon invited Brent and me to visit his church sometime.  We’re perfectly settled into our home church here, but we did want to try out a larger service at one point before we left just to see what it was like.  So we went this morning and really enjoyed it.  The service was 95% in Kannada (the local dialect in Karnataka, which is the state that Bangalore is in), which made it very difficult (ok, impossible) to understand.  But God goes beyond language barriers and still taught me during that service. 

Lesson #1: God speaks all languages.  The service today sounded like pure babble to me, but we were all worshipping the same God, and it made perfect sense to Him and brought Him joy and glory.  One day all nations, tribes, and tongues will worship Him together.  What a great preview!

Lesson #2: Every once in a while during the service someone would throw in an English sentence or two and then just keep right on going in Kannada.  I’ll admit that while they were speaking Kannada, my mind tuned out a bit.  But it took less than a millisecond for me to recognize and tune right back in the instant I heard an English word.  I knew it immediately.  God taught me today that I should be just as in tune with His voice.  We can tend to tune out occasionally with all the “babble” around us.  But as His sheep, we must immediately recognize His voice when we hear it and tune right back in, eager to hear what He has to say.  Great challenge to me!

We talked to Simon after the service, and he said that he’d like to come to our church next week.  We’re really excited to have him!

Hudson Memorial Church

The children singing "I believe in Jesus" (one of the few English parts!)

After church, Brent and I went to visit Amin.  Amin is a Muslim shop owner near our place that Brent met on his first day in Bangalore.  The encounter was seemingly “random” (although we know it wasn’t), and we’ve since become really good friends with Amin.  We visit him in his shop about once a week to talk and drink tea.  We talk about God, Jesus, the Bible, the Koran, and how it all fits together.  

Today another family who Amin had met in his store stopped in to say hello while we were there.  This family has recently moved to Bangalore from Iran (the wife and kids just came yesterday!), and they’ll be here for 5 years.  The husband is a dentist but came to learn English better before they go back to Iran.  They were so sweet, and we really enjoyed talking with them.  

During the conversation (somewhat limited by langauge barriers), our new Iranian friend kept telling Brent that he wasn’t a tourist.  We weren’t sure why he wanted us to understand that, but we just kept telling him that we weren't tourists either.  Well later we realized that he was actually assuring us that he wasn’t a terrorist!  I guess he thought we might be afraid to talk to him since he was from Iran and he knows how some Americans feel about them.  It’s actually sad when you think about it that he felt like he had to tell us that, but the tourist/terroist mixup was pretty darn funny.  And even funnier that he must have wondered why we kept saying that we weren’t terrorists either!  They told us about their country and how pretty it was.  The family was so welcoming and actually invited us to their home for a meal.  We might go with Amin some time and eat with them.

 

Amin (in the yellow shirt), and our Iranian friends

We asked Amin to come in front of the counter to be in the picture, and he said "oh, no no...I'm just the shop owner".  That's why were are all laughing in this picture.

Bangalore has been such a neat experience for us, and I truly have been learning so much.  I’ve experienced other cultures, other religions, and other ways of life.  It’s made me thankful for my own but also made me recognize things that I'd like to do differently when I return home.  

Brent and I were talking this week and agreed that we’re missing home much more.  The first few weeks were spent exploring and discovering so many new things.  We certainly missed family, but we were really engaged here and didn’t think about it too much.  If I had the chance to go home tomorrow, I still wouldn’t be quite ready.  But we’re missing home a lot and will definitely be ready to go when the time comes.  I have about 7 weeks left in Bangalore, and Brent has 11.  It’s gone by so fast, so we can’t waste a single minute. It’ll be over before we know it!