On Saturday, February 27, Arun and his brother-in-law, Dinkar, who has been involved in the Caring Hands Ministry with Arun since it began, drove us to one of the local villages where Arun has established a Share and Care Program. I will describe our visit to the village in more detail in another entry, as I told Arun that I would send it to him to review before I posted it due to the sensitive nature of the subject.
We ate lunch at Arun’s farm, which is located near the villages and consists of 10 acres of land. We drove to it on a dirt road, and when the dirt road ended we parked the car and walked the rest of the way across a stream and the fields. Arun rents the farm to a Christian family that farms the land for him. They had previously planted corn, and this time around they were planting peanuts. After we ate lunch, we sat and enjoyed the peacefulness of our surroundings. The farm is literally in the middle of nowhere, and it was a treat to simply relax, enjoy the beauty of our surroundings, and appreciate God’s creation.
We returned to Arun’s home at dinner time, and after eating we said goodbye to the girls. As he did with Pastor George’s boys, Howard told the girls that when he came to India he had 3 granddaughters and now he had 70 granddaughters. Howard and I later agreed that birthdays will be a challenge for him and Alida to keep track of from now one.
During our dinner time it is the girls’ prayer time, and we were able to hear them singing their prayers to God while we ate. I complemented the girls on their singing ability, and they then decided that they wanted me to sing them a song. I can’t carry a tune very well, but I sang them a praise song that one of MPC’s past interns, Jonathon Fettig, taught some of us a while back which dealt with the Messiah’s coming. The girls then wanted Howard to sing, and he and the girls sang “Jesus Loves Me”. The girls then sang some songs for us and we said good night.
Like Pastor George’s boys, the girls are well-mannered, study hard, and have lots of potential. It is such a joyous thing that they have a healthy environment and bright future with Arun and Shobha rather than a life of prostitution ahead of them. However, Arun said that even though the girls go through his program, some will still revert back to the Devadasi system of prostitution (one reason could be family pressure). This is heartbreaking, but they have free will, as God intended for humans to have. Please pray for these girls – that they can move on and have successful futures and be good witnesses to God through a life of faith.