ARRESTED???

Okay, so this kind of trouble was not exactly what I was expecting to happen on a beautiful day beside a river, watching people express their faith in baptism, but trouble is exactly what I witnessed. Our original purpose for traveling to the village that I wrote about in the previous post was because there were eleven people who had become Christians and decided they wanted to be baptized in water. My pastor friend / personal guide asked if I wanted to go see village life and observe a Christian baptism in India. I said sure.

You never know what you will see on these rural roads. Water Buffalo pulling carts, however are very common.

It was a two hour drive out of the small city of Seharampur over paved roads, then to poorly paved roads, to dirt roads, to washed out dirt roads. We pulled off of the road where there was a narrow dirt path that went through some fields of wheat into the village tucked away in a forested area. We entered the church building to see a group of people sitting on the floor smiling as they waited for our arrival.

This is the dirt path leading through fields of wheat and rice to the village just beyond the trees farther ahead.

We spent a brief time there in the church where the pastor gave a talk about water baptism then I walked through the village meeting people and talking with them. Afterwards we drove about a mile to a spot next to a river. It is not the Ganges and I am told it does not flow into the Ganges either so there is no real association with anything Hindu. The people gathered there were just believing Christians who were expressing their faith in water baptism. It is a common ritual among Christians around the world.

I was a special guest in this village so I gave a brief word of greeting to the people gathered there. It is not every day that they see a white person in their humble village. Made it even more humbling for me.

There were 14 people being baptized and one by one they shared their name and the pastor said a prayer put them under the water and then the rest of the church that had gathered sang a song. As we were doing this a group gathered to watch this curious sight. People on motor bikes who were riding up and down the dirt path that meanders along the river stopped to see why people had gathered here.

As the baptisms continued some continued on their way and more gathered. When the baptisms were finished some young guys who had watched part of the service started asking questions. Obviously I could not understand what they were saying but I thought this might be a good chance for the people in the church to explain what baptism means to those who may not understand what it means.

One lady just before getting baptized.

What I did not understand was that they were looking for a fight. They started getting upset and were trying to intimidate the group because they had participated in a ritual of a foreign religion. Hindu’s don’t mind Jesus, in fact they think he is great. He is another god for them to add to their 330,000,000 other gods. After a few minutes they started pointing at me and making some gestures that I took to be not good gestures.

This is part of the group that had gathered to question and then intimidate the Christians who had been baptized.

Shortly after, the pastor asked me to get in the vehicle and wait with the engine running. Two other guys who had traveled with us also got in the car. I saw a couple of guys who were not part of the church on cell phones though, again, I could not understand what they were saying or what their gestures meant, but I thought it probably was not good. Soon my friend and guide, the pastor, and the rest of our group got into the vehicle and headed off at a rather rapid rate. We had traveled about a quarter mile when we were passed by a police car traveling in the opposite direction. I did not think much of it at the time but I found out more later. (This is the problem when you do not know the language.)

A man from the village comes up from the waters of baptism. My friend and guide is the guy on the left in the photo.

The men who had caused the disturbance had also called the police claiming that there were Hindus taking Christian baptism because Americans were giving them money to do this… supposedly I was the American who forced them or at least payed them off to take baptism. If we had left five minutes later the police would have showed up and they could have detained us, me in particular. All they need is an allegation they don't need proof.

When we arrived back at the pastor's home in the city, I finally had a chance to really ask what had happened because I was still fuzzy on a lot of it. The way it was explained to me is that there are many elements in India that want India to be purely Hindu. The nickname they give India is Hindustan, which means "land of Hindu". Some of these groups are actually quite violent. The group we encountered were not violent though it was probably because there were more of us than there were of them, so they were not willing to start something they could not finish. The perception of some in India is that people only become Christians because Christians from the west are giving them money. They also assume that all westerners are Christians. So when they see a westerner standing there watching Dalits receive Christian baptism, a western, foreign religious practice, they immediately think that I am giving them money to become Christian. Now, I had never met these people before I have no idea who they are. Because some have a visions of an India that adheres to a pure Hinduism they will pursue whatever means they can to deter outside influences, especially from the West.

Since the incident I have spoken with that pastor, he told me some of the men went to the village to find those who were baptized to intimidate them for of their Christian faith. As far as I know, they have not hurt anyone, but it is not unlikely that this could happen. To top off this whole thing I was in the newspaper the next day. That is right. There was an article in the news paper about an American who was paying Dalits to become Christians. It was all written in Hindi, so I could not read it. But the next day as people were reading the paper, the pastor started getting a lot of phone calls from people who know him asking about what happened. I could not believe that the paper would print that without talking to both sides. But when you have an agenda you will see what you want to see.

That is my story and I am sticking to it...

SATELLITE

On Monday I went to the training center in the City of Seharampur. It is very much a grass roots kind of organization there. They basically offer one year of Bible and Christian education and the students earn a certificate. These students are between the ages of 17 and there was at least one who was in his early 40's.

Students from the Sehrampur Satellite school. Girls, as always, sit in the front and guys in the back.

Most of these students come from villages where there is extremely low income. They just want to know more about God and get something started in their home village. While they attend this school, most of the students live in the first floor of what really is a very big house. The basement of the house has space for their "dorm rooms" as well as a kitchen and common space. The second floor is the home for the pastor and his family.

The rooftop area is open and can be used for a variety of things from drying clothes to just hanging out and drinking tea.

The third floor is just the roof but it has space for hanging out clothes to dry. It is just an open space. The training is done in the church building itself. The students sit in the pews and the teacher, me for three days, stands at the front with a white board. They receive some basic teaching and training so that they can do ministry in their home villages among their own tribe.

There I am during one of the training sessions. My interpreter is standing next to me. He is actually a graduate of the school where I spent most of my time in Derhadun.

Some are here from the city and are just looking for a little extra knowledge to help them understand the Bible more. I feel so inadequate to be in front of these people. I am just a student teaching other students. I don’t even know for sure if what I am saying has any kind of help for these students or if things are getting lost in translation. I taught for almost four hours on Monday. I was expecting to teach for an hour or two each day, but now it seems that I will be going for four hours each day, or until I die, whichever comes first.

This is the view from the roof of the home where I stayed. You can see that just beyond the street in the lower part of the picture, is where there is a portion of dense jungle.

I really did enjoy the teaching but when sweat is dripping down your face and getting into your eye, and then they say ‘oh we need to stop for tea time’ your first reaction is ‘ sweet I could really use a break. Sitting down would be the best thing for me right now.’ Then they bring out the tea and you realize that they made the tea with boiling milk then put the teabag in a metal cup which conducts the heat directly to your fingertips, and you think to yourself, ‘who in their right mind drinks boiling hot tea in a time when the average temperature is in the 90’s with about 90% humidity. Then your brain starts working again and you think, oh yeah, I am in India, this is normal for them...

This is the library in the Satellite facility.

The Satellite school is doing a very difficult but a very valuable work in this part of India. The Church absorbs the cost of the students to go through this program and some after completing the one year program will go on the four year school in Derhadun. The pastor I mentioned in my previous post started here in 1993 and there were Christians present in only three or four villages. Today there are Christians in about 200 villages. This is largely due to the work he has been doing in and around Seharampur…

OGDEN

My travel-mate Matt Ogden is from a traditional Christian background that is a little more reserved than the typical Indian Christian. He mentioned to me that some of his family and friends are reading along in “Meandering Thoughts of a Vagabond Ragamuffin”. So for all of Matt’s friends and family who are reading I wanted you all to know that Matt was actually “getting down” in a way that only Matt can during one of our Charismatic Spiritual Emphasis services. Here is video proof during one of the times of worship:

Yes... that was Matt getting into a Charismatic service!!!

CLASS

On Friday, at 10:30am, after morning tea (a leftover tradition from the when the British ruled) one of the professors asked me if I would be willing to take his class which meets at 11:40am. and two classes next week. I thought about it for like a second and said sure. Needless to say there was little time to spare. But for those of you reading this who have ever been in a class that I have taught you know that sometimes I do pretty well when I wing it. The class is called “Basic Christian Spirituality”. Knowing that people in India have a very different view of spirituality than Americans do, to assume they are thinking the same thing I am when talking about spirituality could make for a very confusing class.

I began by asking them about their religious background. Many had come from other religious backgrounds and I asked them to share with me and the class some aspects of spirituality from their own background. I had a Buddhist, a few Sikhs, and many Hindus share. About a third had a Christian background. I made a list of some of the “spiritual” aspects of each of these religions and then demonstrated how Christianity has many things in common. Things like:

• There is a Holy Book or holy Scriptures.
• There is an ultimate reality
• There is some form of divine figure or figures (though for Sikhs they are gurus who are treated like gods)
• There are good works you are supposed to do

What we discovered as a class however, was there is one big difference between Christianity and these other religions. That one difference (there are many things but one big one) is the person of Jesus.

• There are no gods in the other religions who claim to love their people to the point of dying for them.
• There are no gods who became human so that they could die for their people.
• There are no gods who died and rose from the dead to forgive sins.
• Sins are not forgiven by gods in these religions instead they are worked off by suffering or through good works.

The other religions represented by those in the class state that the way to experience ultimate reality in their expressed form is through human effort; by outweighing you bad deeds with your good deeds. But according to Christianity, human effort is not enough. The only way to get to God is through God, not through our own work. Ephesians 2:8-9 tells us that we are saved by grace, and not by works, otherwise people would boast about how much they had done in comparison to others. I told the class, now that we understand the similarities between these religions we can begin to look at what makes Christianity different. And really the person of Jesus is the big difference.

One thing you may notice from the pictures is that it is all guys in one and mostly girls in another. Indian society is still very gender conscious. So most women have the same access to education but they separate men and women in their classes. Men sit on one side women on the other. This is the case in most places in India. They guy to the extreme right of the first photo is the professor of the class. He graduated from GCTS (where I am now) four years ago.

JUSTICE Part 2 of 2

Most of us would say that we want justice for the wrongs that we have endured. Justice is one of those American values that we aspire to maintain. When the towers fell on September 11th and we soon discovered who was responsible, we felt emboldened and righteous as we sought the one responsible and those who were helping him. We were fighting for the great American value of Justice.

If you read through Bible you will find many stories of people who fought for justice after experiencing injustice. One the most unique stories is the story of God fighting for justice. In all the reading I have done in Hinduism and Buddhism in the last year and a half as well as some of the Greek and Roman mythology I have not come across anything like it.

I was recently reading how, in ancient near eastern culture, when a criminal was caught, the punishment that was agreed upon by village elders was equal and opposite to the crime. One example I came across was that if a man were to punch a pregnant woman in the stomach and she were to lose her child as a result, the punishment would not be for that man to be killed, but for one of his children to be killed.

In those times, much of the economy was based on your name, your reputation. To defame the character and reputation of a man would be to destroy his standing in the community, no one would interact with him. It was as serious as committing murder today.

A name or reputation was extremely valuable in that culture; If you did not have your name you did not have anything. Why do you think the third of the ten commandments is not to take God's name in vain. He does not want his name associated with anything that is not from Him. Our sin is like defaming or slandering God's name and thereby Him. Not living to the standards of holiness that God has established is like saying, "to me, God is dead" or "to me, God does not exist". An equal and opposite punishment for that? Paul really meant it when he said, "The wages of sin is death." (Rom 6:23)

We have no hope of ever living up to that standard; our lives will be a hopeless mess of falling short. When justice is served on us it means death. We have committed injustice (some of us have committed lots of injustice;-) against God; God in turn seeks and renders justice. But this is where the story takes a turn for the unbelievable.

At the moment when injustice becomes justified by death we notice that we are not the ones who have died. Instead, the one who was wronged is the who has died and served the full sentence with his own life. You and I, though we perpetrated injustice, do not pay for our injustice with our death. God pays for our injustice against him by accepting our punishment on himself and once the criteria for justice has been met he gives us credit for justice being served. This means, innocence by association. (When we draw close to God he draws close to us.)

Most Americans feel that justice has been served for 9/11 now that Osama bin Laden is dead. And even according to his own beliefs justice has been served. I've got to admit, I'm really grateful that God's justice works differently than American justice...

Just a Meandering Thought...

INDIA: Religulation (religious population)

The Total population of India right now stands at about 1,200,000,000 (1.2billion people). That makes it the second most populous nation on the planet. Based on current birth and death rates, estimates put the population at 1.6 billion people by 2050 surpassing estimates for the population of China. India also has within its borders some of the most densely populated urban centers in the world.

These 1.2billion people are made up of about 2,533 distinctly identified ethno-linguistic people groups. Within these groups, Hindi (and its various dialects) is the most spoken language at a little over 40% Bengali is second with just 8%.

The twenty largest ethno-linguistic people groups in India make up almost half of the entire population. The largest group in India are the Shaikh people. At about 72,649,000 people they live mostly in the north (though there are population centers throughout India and in neighboring countries as well) and are predominantly a Muslim people. Of the next nineteen, eighteen claim Hinduism as the predominate religion. In each of these groups there is no viable Christian church to reach the people with the story of Jesus Christ. All 2,533 ethno-linguistic groups adhere to various religions in the following break down.

• Hinduism: 81.6%
• Islam 12.7%
• Christianity 2.3%
• Other / Small 2.2%
• Buddhism 0.7%
• Ethnic Religions 0.4%

Stats were taken from
www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.html
www.joshuaproject.net