A summer here can make you forget

Poverty is everywhere right?

Yes.

So what makes Mongolia any different from the rest of the world?

Frigid cold.

A summer here can make you forget.

I remember now. The unforgiving cold brings out the ugliness of poverty.

Today I saw a beautiful young woman. She was holding her hands in front of her face. She had walked down the hill to the bus stop and her hands were as red as apples. They looked painful.

I am fortunate enough to own a pair of mittens, and yet even with them on, my hands were ice cold.

Young boys run behind coal trucks and wait until they can get away with it...pulling pieces of coal from the back and cramming them into their pants. In some ways it a game to them...they have lived a long life...and they are not even teenagers yet.

Old men, they wear the cold the harshest. Just a month ago these men were dealing with their lives, trying to keep going...and now they hobble down the street, hunched over and broken.

When I drove up the hill I saw a man and woman carrying bags of coal to their ger. I didn't even want to look them in the eye. Seeing someone so cold, its like looking at them naked. I mean, its the ultimate vulnerbility...seeing pain so raw.

I'm reminded its not even winter yet...its going to get colder.

There is no where to hide from the cold.

I'm thankful for the families we met, before the cold hit. I'm thankful for the coal being delivered tonight, to new flowers house. I'm thankful to all of you back home who give and give and give.

Because of this, we don't have to say no. We have the tools to help.

Please remember the other side of the world today, as you pray....

Its so easy to ignore what you can not see, so thank you all my friends from home who let me show you, and who don't look away.

Much Love,

Shari

Since our last post

I brought her tomatoes, cucumbers and potatoes. She wasn't home, but her daughter was. Her little girl was doing the laundry and she was so full of cheer I felt like I had just stepped into a disney movie. This was the first time I met the daughter. She lives a few hours from the city with an older sister because her mother could not afford to take care of her.

"Mom will be home later if you want to come back for a visit."

This was a new ger...a real home. The daughter now had a place to visit her mom...and she was happy.

Her mothers name is Oyuntetseg. This is the woman that we wrote to you about in our last post.

Since that night, God has made it possible for us to find her a home.

It is not in our hasha, but right next door to us now. We wanted to find a temporary solution to the problem, with hopes to find more permanent housing. When we went on our search to rent a ger for her it took us just about 10 feet out of our front gate.

Our neighbor is renting us a ger on his property. Everyone wins here. Its pretty amazing actually. The conversation we had with our neighbor when he first came in for a visit was unique. Basically it was a LOT of questions about what in the WORLD are we doing in this ger district???
Why did we come?
He said..."you must be religious"
Our interpreter said.."no..not religious...not at all..but they know God and want to do His work."

wow.

"Right...so they are religious..." he said...

Once again she replied..."um..no...not religious...there are none of those rules that your thinking of here...but they KNOW God."

He was shaking his head.

We went through the process of signing papers, saying we would pay if the place burned down...and he was the whole time seeming very confused...still... '"Why are they here...did their church make them come?"

So this was how that first meeting went.

Oyuntetseg now our neighbor, living in the ger. The night she moved in, we brought the stove in for her to heat the ger with and she had wood and coal ready. I can't explain how happy it made me feel to see smoke rising from the pipe sticking out the top...I knew they were warm tonight.

I remembered a week before when I told her that we were going to rent her a ger. She sat on the edge the bed, hung her head and said, "thank you...I'm so tired of being cold."

"I'm so tired of being cold...." those words will stay in my head a long time.

And so its gone since, a little visit here and there. A smile. A wave. A bag of tomatoes and who knows what will come of it.

Yet this is what strikes me the most....it doesn't take a lot to change someone life.
Hope does not look like a million dollar check.
Its more like a bag of cucumbers and tomatoes...which is really just someone saying...I know your here..you exist and I'm glad you do...you are not forgotten.

The world takes most of itself, and says "Your worthless, its pointless, uneducated and ignorant, too broken to be fixed."

God does the opposite. He hunts for you. He picks up all your pieces and puts you back together and says, "I knew the whole time you were something beautiful...now just look at that!"



p.s.
Since our last post we have been given a donation to purchase land and gers for "emergency situation living. Its faith in action. We are very blessed to have such an amazing support back home. Thank you!

As much as you did not do..unto the least of these, you did not do unto me.

The setting was a small closet size shed. The wind was blowing right through the cracks and making my hair pick up. Dirt floor. No stove for a fire so my hands and legs were getting cold just standing in there. On the shelf there were two spoons,a knife, cups, a pan and the food package that we had given the mother just a few days before when she was at Flourishing Future asking for help.

The mother was speaking to us, words that are too awful to repeat. Her many words added up to one tragic story of rejection, sadness and poverty. As if her whole life were a slow moving train towards defeat and now it was picking up speed, going downhill fast...and she was in her own small way doing all she could to put the brakes on.

I could not read Troy's face. At one point I wondered if he was even listening to her.

In the end, I put my arm around her small shoulders. As if my touch unlatched a forbidden door, where she kept her pain, she began to cry out in great sobs.

The whole time I was thinking..."how?" "How will we ever be able to help?"

I get this feeling at times, like I want to run. I want to run away from the things I hear and see. Yet, Gods hand continually holds me steady. I hear him say..."don't run...stop and look, look at what I have asked your eyes to see."

When we got in the car to leave it was the usual silence that befalls us after such visits. I wanted to scold Troy for his lack of compassion. He had seemed agitated, in a hurry to leave.

Then he spoke up first.

"We can't leave them there tonight Shari. We have no other choice....we have to bring them home to our hasha."

I had been mistaken. Troy was more then there in the moment. He had been overcome with God's compassion. He was about to break his own rules about bringing people to OUR home.

Not so long ago, a less affected Troy, had said, "You can't just bring them into the house...our house would be overcome with poor people! There are far to many. We have to deal with the problem logically."

Well, logically had just become illogical to him.

I began to remind him of all the good reasons NOT to bring a stranger into you home. I'll leave it to your own intellect, I'm sure you can even come up with a few I missed.

I heard his voice crack as if he were holding back emotion and he said to me, "In as much as you did not do unto the least of these, you did not do unto me."

It silence me.

He was quoting from Mathew 25. It's the story I really don't like to think on too often. The one that kind of rips the rug out from all of my justifications. It's the story that messes up the pretty picture of my plans. It's the story that can make you look like a complete fool...if you live by it. If you believe its words to be true.

I do.

"Shari, if we say, God Bless you, be at peace...and leave her there in that shack with her son, my conscience will not let me sleep tonight...will yours?"

As I prepared the ger in our hasha for this new family God was challenging me even further.

"Put your good blankets on the bed."

Instead of the older blankets, I went out to gather up some of my favorite ones.

"Not the half empty soap...give her your new full bottle."

So I put out the new soap, the best hand towel...my favorite tea...

Until finally the ger looked so warm, toasty and inviting I kinda wished I was living in it.

I prayed.
"Thank you Lord. Thank you for reaching down and putting me here...where I can not hide or ignore the pain. I am a blessed woman to look and see and KNOW that YOU are capable of taking even the darkest life and making it glow again."

My phone rang, it was Troy. He had left an hour before to go get them.

"They can not come tonight...they are working."

Later I learned that they work at night, in the wood market, cleaning it up...gathering little pieces of left over wood so they can make an outside fire for their supper.

The ger sits ready...maybe another solution will present itself before they actually take residence in my yard...maybe it is the solution.

Regardless...we all must obey. We all must live Mathew 25 in our own everyday lives. For there is always someone hungry, lonely, sick or in prison...and God always asking us, "What will you do unto or not unto me?"

Music

Lunch at camp

Until we meet again...and we will!

Its 5 a.m. here in UB. Team USA just left my little hasha on a bus to the airport. As I listened to the sound of the bus driving them away I wondered if they knew what its all meant to us, having them here for the past three weeks.

I pray that they will take Mongolia home with them, somehow that they will be able to carry it for a long long time.

I joked with them last night that they would go home and turn the water faucet on and off in wonder and amazement!

Most of them I just met this month...so why the tears?

I suppose because they are a part of home. A part of me that still exists, yet is so far away. Perhaps its because they affected me, they touched my own heart, reminding me that I am not alone here and that God has put Mongolia on the hearts of many.

They really roughed it out here! I am overwhelmed by their courage, and strength and most of all the huge amounts of overcoming they had to do with each new day in Mongolia. Choosing to stick it out in the ger district with the Tvrdiks was a beautiful gift to me, and my family.

Having coffee in the morning, sharing my heart randomly (mostly when I was driving) and the late night tea talks with Patsy.

Thank you.

The time in Mongolia was fruitful. I pray that what was learned here will continue to challenge and grow the teams faith. I pray that the seeds of compassion, love, and financial gifts that they gave to the people of Mongolia, will GROW! GROW! GROW!

The Tvrdiks are blessed by your sacrifice to spend this time with us.

Please spread the word and bring a CROWD back with you!

Until we meet again...and we will!

We have everything

120 children from Mongolia...in a little camp out in the middle of absolutely NOWHERE! That is were we spent the last week.

The children are from the state run orphanage. Every year, they are shipped out of UB and into their "summer home".

Teams from Hong Kong, and this year USA, work hard to make this a special time for these kids. This year we got to go.

Many things learned from this week, that my heart is still processing, working through and accepting.

Here is just one story.

It was hot. Really hot. The sun had been beating down on Troy all day. He was assigned the job of "sports guy" for the week. That meant one soccer game after another. I was working with teams of kids at playdough making. By the time 6:00 hit...we were beat!

Elly had been really clingy all day long. All she wanted was my attention and having to share it with 120 kids was almost more then she could bare. By 6:00...I was wishing I had left her with friends back in UB.

We all met up in the Field, Troy, Elly and I and we were headed back to camp for a nice cold drink of water.

Elly started to whine, and cry..she wanted us to watch HER ont he monkey bars. Our patience was worn thin. Troy told her to stop crying, and get down...we were leaving for a drink. Elly began to stomp and cry. Her arms crossed she was doing all she could to display with her body that she was not pleased with us.
We called her,
"Elly, stop that...come here right now."

She stomped away faster.

Now we were really annoyed...and right before we were about to give her a speech about how ungrateful she was...

a litte voice from behind us called...
"Elly"

One of the little boys from camp came running. He had been watching us, and was now a part of the little drama unfolding.

He ran to her..."Elly!" "Elly!" His voice was pleading.

Not any bigger then her...he went to her side with hands folded out in front of him, pleading..."Elly!"

Then he grabbed her hand gently and took her to Troy. His eyes were so sincere. He put her hand in Troys hand and made a hand motion...like..."stay there".

I was already tearing up watching it all. Then he came to me. He took my hand...over to Elly's free hand putting her little hand in mine.

Then he looked at us. Big eyes. Pleading eyes. There we stood. In the field. A little boy, with no loving parents, pleading with us to be a family for him. He said in Mongolian..."ok..walk." Motioning with his hands to walk to camp.

We began to walk to camp, hand in hand, in silence. I turned to see what he was doing and he was standing there. looking on us, with such a smile, such a look of satisfaction. Both hands folded infront of him, he looked like he was praying.

He was looking at his own dream.

We were there, together, mom, dad and daughter. Walking through the Field we were the picture he has played out in his own little mind, night after night, day after day.

We had it. What he always wanted.

This is pure love isn't it? His joy, as he watched us live out his own dream.

To see us unhappy with one another, was more then his little heart could take. It was tearing apart his own hope.

As we got to camp we still held hands. Even Elly got it. She understood his message.

What can you learn from a poor boy who has nothing, but the clothes on his back?



We have everything.

Life is too hard for too many.

We have each other.

We are not alone.

A Firm Place to Stand

The flooding was really awful here. It hit quickly and the water left so many of the poor with even less then they had before.

I was walking the streets today, looking at how the roads had changed from the rushing water, and wondering how people survive for so long with so little.

Then a brick flew over the fence and landed in front of me. Another brick ...and another. I realized they weren't trying to kill me..but that they were cleaning up the yard, one brick at a time.

To the right of me was a young boy, about 10 years old. He was wringing water out of a blanket. I thought of the boy I saw the day before, during the flood. He was standing in the back of the truck that was stuck in the rushing water. He was shaking and wringing his own hands.

The perfect picture of who we are when everything is too big for us, and we are completely out of control.

I felt the boys helplessness, his fear, dispare.
When we pulled the truck out, I wonder if the feeling went away?
And then, when its all over, we just clean up, one brick at a time.

For a moment I got angry inside. I thought, "The world doesn't care, no one will even hear about this...no one cares about this place."
Of course, how wrong this thought is. God cares. He cares so deeply. No one here, not one person is forgotten by Him.

When God looks down, and sees us wringing our hands, wringing our water out, digging ourselves out of the mud...He does not just walk by. He comes to our rescue every time.

He lifted me out of the slimy pit,
out of the mud and mire;
he set my feet on a rock
and gave me a firm place to stand.

Psalm 40:2

THAT ONE!

I went for a walk in the woods the other day, and while I was walking I was praying. I was thanking Jesus for everything He has done in our lives.

As I walked, I saw a little rusted out tin can in the grass of this beautiful woods. I felt the Lord say, "Go pick that up."

Well, I really wondered, "was that you speaking Lord?" but I walked by it. After passing the can the Lord again spoke, "why didn't you obey me and pick up that can?"

"This is silly" I thought, but then that check in my heart made me wonder..."Lord, if that is you asking me to pick it up...I don't want to ignore." So I turned around and went back to pick up the rusted out can.

I was carrying with me a plastic bag for my Bible, journal and a water bottle, so i stuck the can in there. As I continued on I wondered, "IF that was you asking me to pick up the can...why? Why did you want me to do that?"

I began to imagine all the reasons why God would ask me to pick up a rusted can. Maybe someone would have gotten hurt, or maybe He just wants me to be a good example to the Mongolians, to care for creation....hmmm

Then I began to see other pieces of garbage along the way. I picked them up one by one, putting it into my plastic bag.I began feeling pretty good about myself, I was cleaning up the earth!

Eventually I was nearing the end of my journey and my plastic bag was almost bursting through with garbage. I was a little tired and kinda getting grumpy by now. It seemed that everywhere I turned there was garbage to clean up. Just when I thought I was finished, I saw a whole pile of junk in the grass before me. "Oh brother!" I thought. "I'll need another bag for all this." I bent over to pick up a milk box and something poked my leg. It was the original rusted out can. The bag had become so full it ripped, and the can was sticking out.

"NICE" I thought, "I'm out here just trying to do what God wants me to do."

That's when I heard Him speak again.

The Lord spoke to my heart, "I didn't tell you to pick up all the trash in the forest..just that one."

I started to laugh.

"Ok, I get it Lord."

He began to show me, this was very important to my ministry here in Mongolia. He showed me that the reason he asked me to pick up the tin can was to help me understand this concept of ministry.

All around me are hurting, hungry, desperate people. I can not pick them all up. If I try...my bag will burst, and someone will end up hurt (mainly my own family).

However, our Great Lord Jesus WILL show us who to help, (I want you to pick up THAT ONE)...and then GO and do it...and do only that!

I could stay up 24 hours trying to get it all done, and feel I haven't even made a dent. Yet when I follow HIS leading, I feel so much has been accomplished.


I looked pretty weird, emerging through the woods with a big bag full of trash. I had to hold it kinda pieced together until I found a can big enough to dump it in. I realized that God is a great teacher...and I think He enjoys watching us learn.

Psalm 141:5

Let a righteous man strike me. Its a kindness. Let him rebuke me; it is oil on my head. My head will not refuse.

"This is how it always should be"

So today is a day to remember.

Writing it down will help.

Today was graduation day at the little kindergarten I've been blessed to come to Mongolia to help with.

36 children have been studying here for the past three months. In that little time they all learned their alphabet, learned to read, learned addition and subtraction...and managed to have some fun also!

This was the life raft I referred to back home...the one shot...offered to these little ones.

I watched them this year, each day showing up for class, grabbing the raft and working hard to stay afloat. They put their whole hearts into this.

The teachers, they loved these kids enough to push them and to help them believe they could learn this, they COULD do it.

Today was the celebration of this grand effort and even grander success. Each of the children sat at a well decorated table with bowls of fruit and goodies set in front of them. They were treated like little kings and queens. Each was given a back pack, blue for boys and pink for girls (a huge luxury). Inside the back pack were special surprises for the children. They each received a clean white dress shirt and black skirt or shorts. They had notebooks and pens and coloring paper. This was all a reminder to them that this was just the beginning. Next year, they will enter public school with the knowledge from this year, they will succeed. They will go to school with brand new clothes, a new back pack, and school supplies.

They left our little school yard one by one. I thanked God for this chance to invest in their tomorrow. To watch them stand tall in confidence. To know that next year, they will not be the laughing stock of the class because their parents could not afford pre-school. They will flourish...they will shine.

It was a day of singing and laughing...a day to eat and be merry. A day for a thankful heart.

One speech was given by a Mongolian man from the community. He stood in front of the class and said, "Today as I see the children sitting in front of bowls full of fruit, dressed up with smiles, I think..this is how it always should be."

Isn't he right?

Thank you to everyone back home supporting...it goes a long long way...

Blessings,
Troy and Shari

From the Secret History of the Mongols ~ a history of Mongolia

If My litte body is tired,let it be tired
Let my great government not unravel

A strong body can win one victory
A strong spirit can win many

Do not despair that the way is long,
If you go on, you can reach it.
Do not despair that the load is heavy,
If you can lift it, you can carry it.

Just peaking in

This is our neighbor. I give him a lot of credit. So much noise coming from our hasha...and yet this is the first time he was giving it a peak.

Right before this, he was on the bottom, checking out our yard from the little holes in the fence.

Now, here he was brave enough to almost climb completely over.

Here's what he saw.

Troy playing football with the kids in the yard. Another little neighbor riding Elly's pink bike as she had been doing for the past two hours. Me sitting on the front porch taking it all in.

I wondered what he was thinking...what his heart was telling him about our family.

I wondered how often he had been peaking in...before we noticed him. What did he see then?

We asked him to come on over but his mom caught sight of him up there on that fence and gave him a scolding to come down.

I cant wait to get to know them better. Summer is coming here and hopefully this means more kids popping in over our gate...looking through the holes...I hope they find what they are looking for.

Inspite of the perfectly imperfect Tvrdiks...its not our light we shine..its His.

Mommy...how did Mongolia get broken?

Elly, our 7 year old, was holding my hand as we walked from the bus stop to our little home. She was unusually quiet, (if you know Elly this will make you smile). She finally broke the silence and asked me,

"Mommy how did Mongolia get broken?"

The question just kind of hung in the air. Here I was thinking she was in her own little world...

Looking around us, that's exactly what it looks like. As if someone played with it...dropped it...and forgot about it. The dust was blowing around and the wind was picking up the thousands of pieces of trash, scattering it here and there. Men lying in the street drunk and passed out, people literaly walking over them. The streets were torn up, pieces of re bar sticking out everywhere. The buildings, all of them broken up with windows out...as if the whole city was duck taped together.

I said, "Elly this is a wonderful question. Have you heard of war?" she nodded yes.
I told her that a kind of war had come to this country. A bigger country took it away from the Mongolians. They came here and ruined it and left. Since then, no one has been able to fix it back the way it was.

Then she said,

"Mommy, that is so sad, did they ever say they were sorry?"

another moment went by because I wanted to cry

I said, "no they haven't."

"Mommy, maybe we can help...maybe we can buy a lot of garbage cans and clean it up and make it better."

I told her that all of the garbage cans in the world wouldn't make it all better.

"Elly, the people are very sad, the worst thing that is broken here is the hearts of the people. They were very sad when they lost their country and then they became very mad when everything was broken. Then they started to get sadder, madder and many of them began to drink alcohol, that is why you see so many of them drunk in the street because they have very broken hearts. Even if we picked up all the garbage here, and fixed all the houses, this would not take away their broken hearts. What we could do to help them is to help their hearts heal...and Elly, only Jesus can do this for them."

Elly started to skip...she said very loudly, "OH I GET IT NOW! That's why God wanted us to come to tell them that Jesus can heal their broken hearts!"

I just smiled. It took her four months, but she got it. She looked outside of her own world for just a few minutes, she noticed the world around her, and asked two very important questions.

Its good for me to keep my focus, thank you Elly.

Today In UB

So much to learn

Exhausted by the morning rush and already looking forward to going to bed tonight...that was me at 9:00 this morning.

We were in the taxi headed for an appointment we had to have Elly fitted for a flower girl dress.

We've only been here three months and yet blessed beyond our biggest hopes with dear friends already. The woman who is sharing our house with us is getting married in 3 weeks and she asked Elly to be in her wedding.

The directions were obscure as they always seem to be in Mongolia and it felt like we were lost for the thousandth time since coming here. When we finally parked to get out we were in front of the wrong apartment building and we had to walk a few blocks to where we needed to be. It was a little brisk outside, I chose the wrong coat...could feel myself getting annoyed. Besides that I had to use the bathroom and so did Elly...I was thankful that I was going to an apartment with a real toilet.

The seamstress saw us coming and stood outside to wave us down. As we rounded the corner I was amused to hear someone playing the Doors song "Riders on the Storm" and it danced outside from wherever it was coming from drowning out the noise of the city around me.

We followed her around the apartment building, down the broken up concrete stairs, through a dark concrete hall way and finaly to her front door.

Her home was actually the utility room of the apartment complex. Inside this little room, about the same size as my dear bathroom in the states, was a little family of 5. They had two beds, a little cook stove, fridge, a couple of dressers, tiny little couch and a sewing machine that looked like it was from the early 1900's, push pedal and all.

Everyone in the house was pleasantly going through their morning routines. Everyone was light hearted and smiling. The father was on his way to work and packing his lunch box. The teenage son was putting his books for school into a plastic bag. There was a little boy playing on the floor with the water bucket. Everyone was clean, and ready for the day.

On the wall hung carefully pinned up sheets of words in English. It amazed me to see the words they had chosen to learn Love, Patience, Happiness, Joy, Encouragement, Trust, Kindness, Eager, Beauty.

They quickly pulled out the chair for me to sit in, and handed me warm tea. The lump in my throat made it hard to swallow.

They watched me drink my tea as if it made them happy to make me happy.

I was thankful for the morning rush, thankful for the crazy ride across the city, thankful to be here. Even Elly was humbly looking around. I knew that she felt it too...the smallness, the reminder of who we are, who God is and who these amazing Mongolian people are.

This was their home. These were poor people who have chosen to love eachother through it.

From that antique machine, this woman was sewing day and night beautiful dresses, making something from nothing...out of nothing. The Mongolian way.

The seamstress asked in Mongolian where we were from...Russia or America. My Mongolian friend who was with me said, "Amerigos...they are missionaries"

Missionaries.

For me, the correct word is, Learners. We are learners here. Yes, we have much to give...but oh to not forget...we have so much to learn.