Where is home?

As the last few days tick away before we leave China and head back to America, I caught myself saying that "it will be nice to be home".  Unfortunately, the words got stuck in my throat and the phrase tasted funny in my mouth.  Is America still "home"?  Truth be told, these last three years we have been so immersed in Chinese culture, lifestyle, food, language, and friends, that in a very real sense to us, China is in many ways "home" also.  So do we have two homes, or none?

Fortunately God brought to mind the true answer to the question.  We do have a home, but it is neither America nor China.  Wherever we live, wherever we work, wherever we stay on this earth, we are but sojourners waiting to return to our real home.  That home is in heaven.  As believers, we truly can say with Paul:

Philippians 3:20 "For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;"

It is very easy to get too comfortable in the place we are staying and begin to think of that place as "home".  We settle in, we make friends, we find our favorite restaurants, we settle into our work routine, etc.  We can spend considerable time, effort and money making our little nest as comfy as possible.  We get all the right furniture, get the paint colors on the walls just so, get those wonderful drapes that match the carpet, find the perfect car, trim our grass and hedges just so...on and on ad nauseum. 

But what does all that really accomplish?  Having sold pretty much everything we own twice now (once when we came to China and now again before heading back for furlough), I think has given me a really unique perspective on things.  It is all just "stuff".  When you reduce your life down to what fits in a few suitcases, it really changes your system of values.  When you have to make "stay or go" decisions on everything you have spent your life accumulating, the reality that we are just on a journey and not meant to be too "comfortable" here really comes to life.

So think about it in your own life.  Do you own your things, or do your things own you?  Are the roots you have put down for yourself keeping you from being free to follow God's lead wherever that may be?  Are you too comfortable and in love with your life so much that if God's call came for you to "sell everything, give it to the poor, and come follow Him" (Luke 18:22) could and would you do it?  It is not a question I'm needing you to answer to me, but it is a question you should consider.  If you feel like God is not using you in a powerful way, ask yourself, have you made yourself available for use?

Finally remember this stern caution from God's word:

1 John 2:15 "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him."

By all means make yourselves comfortable, but make it the comfort you would have while staying in a hotel while on a trip.  Don't invest so much in your comfort and your "temporary home" that you miss out on the chance to store up treasures for yourself that will be waiting for you when you get to your true, "heavenly home."

By His Grace,

David G. Johnson

Home for Christmas - Adapting to Change

Wow, it is hard to believe we have been serving in Asia for three years now.  All the stress and adjustment of settling into a new culture is far behind us, little more than a distant memory.  Or is it?

Truth be told, we are about to have to do it all over again, but in reverse.  Our first term in the field is ending, and we will be back in the States for six months as we look to get all our ducks in a row for returning while spending some time with family and friends, speaking with churches about missions work, promoting my Christian Fantasy Adventure novels which just came out (links below), and not quite having time to get settled before turning back around and returning to Asia (Lord willing).

So what are some of the things I am looking forward to and what are some things I am dreading?

Looking forward to:
--Spending time with family and friends we haven't seen in three years
--Eating western food and enjoying eggnog, gingerbread cookies, and Starbucks!
--Praying for a chance to eat at Joe's Crab Shack
--Not being stared at like I have two heads everywhere I go. I'll look like everyone else.
--Signing my books for people who have bought them and supported me in my writing
--Worshiping with other like-minded believers...in English (yay!)

Dreading:
--Selling off all our stuff (again) before we leave Asia
--The long, grueling journey back home (which will include an overnight stay in Detroit airport)
--How badly my Chinese language is going to deteriorate during our time in the States
--Missing the people here and being away from the work God has called us to
--Not being able to get some of my favorite Chinese foods

All in all it will be a bittersweet time of trusting in and waiting upon the Lord.  There are still a number of things that will have to happen in order for us to turnaround and return to Asia in June 2014 as we hope, but we know it is all in God's hands and we trust Him with the results.

In a lesson I taught last night, there were two verses that I have read probably a hundred times, but that really stood out to me:

After Gabriel tells Mary that she will bear a child, conceived by the Holy Spirit, he assures her

Luke 1:37 "For nothing will be impossible with God."

If in our Christian walk we didn't get ANYTHING else but that one concept, it would radically change our lives forever.  We spend so much time worrying, anguishing, striving to use our own strength to engineer all the details of our lives, when all the while, the One who spoke the universe into existence with just His words, knows us, knows our needs, and knows His plans for us.

The other side of the coin is Mary's response.

Luke 1:38 "And Mary said, "Behold, the bondslave of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her."

God is able to help us.  He is willing to help us.  The question is, are we willing to let go, to cease striving, and step back to let Him help us?  God isn't going to forcibly wrest our troubles from us.  We have to be willing to go and lay them at the foot of the cross.  As long as we keep them locked tightly in our fist, we trap ourselves in our own faithlessness, refusing to trust God with the resolution. 

This is not to say that every resolution will be easy, or that it will always turn out roses.  But God means good for us, and even when things are tough, or we endure trials, we should not pray for God to remove them, but rather ask for the strength to weather them and the openness of heart to learn what God intends to teach us through them.  If we learn this, then we are well prepared to adapt to any change that comes in our life, be it a change of location, a change of jobs, a change of family situation, or whatever it may be.  The secret to adapting to change is truly grasping the concept that nothing is impossible with God, and having the right response to that concept.  It is the response of humble obedience and trust.

May the Lord bless you this Thanksgiving, and bring you a wonderful and joyous Christmas.

And if you are looking for some Christmas gifts for the avid readers in your family, my Christian Fantasy Adventure novels are now available for order in paperback and ebook format directly from my publisher, Tate Publishing.  Here are the links:

Fool's Errand:  Chadash Chronicles Book One

https://www.tatepublishing.com/bookstore/book.php?w=978-1-62902-869-9

Mystic's  Mayhem:  Chadash Chronicles Book Two

https://www.tatepublishing.com/bookstore/book.php?w=978-1-62902-870-5

I also invite you all to "like" my Facebook author page here:

https://www.facebook.com/DavidGlennJohnson 

By His Grace and with our love,

David, Amy and Ariel in Asia

Can Genuine Believers Lose Their Way?

The simple and possibly unexpected answer is: Yes.  Now understand here what I am and am not saying.  I am not saying that believers can lose their "salvation", I am saying that believers can lose their way, wind up wandering in darkness, straying from the Lord for a season.  There is a subtle distinction between those who go "out from us, because they were not of us" as John says in 1 John 2:19 and those who are truly saved but have lost their way.  I will talk about that distinction a bit later on in this blog.

First off we need to know about this process of losing our way so that we can recognize and guard against it.  We are given a great picture of this process in Scripture.  Our main text we will look at is going to be Matthew 26, with a few references here or there outside that chapter.  Our model for what "not" to do will be the apostle Peter.

Peter was the real deal.  He was not a false convert but was the very apostle upon whose confession of faith Jesus said He would build His church.  Not Peter himself, but his confession of who Jesus was.  Jesus would not choose the confession of a false believer as a foundation for the church, so we can rest assured that Jesus did not doubt the genuineness of Peter's faith.  That is critical to remember.  This is reiterated by Jesus in Luke 22:32 where Jesus basically tells Peter he will fall away for a season, but that Jesus has prayed for him and instructs him that when he returns he must strengthen his brothers.

Peter's faith, like many of us, started strong.  We see at the Last Supper, when Jesus is saying that there is a traitor in their midst, Peter boldly confesses that even if everyone else leaves he will stand strong (Matthew 26:33), to which Jesus answers that before the rooster crows the following morning Peter will have denied Him three times (Matthew 26:34).

Despite Jesus' prophesied betrayal, we see when the going gets tough, Peter is bold and fiery about defending his Lord.  He even draws a sword and is willing to oppose those coming to seize Jesus (Matthew 26:51; while not identified in Matthew, we see in John 18:10 that this is indeed Peter).

However, once Jesus is taken, the true test begins and we see the genesis of the trouble in Matthew 26:58.  Notice now, when the true test of faith has begun, how Peter begins following Jesus.  "...Peter was following Him at a distance..."  Have you ever noticed that before?  Peter, instead of walking closely beside Jesus in troubled times, began to draw away from him.  His eyes were still watching what Jesus did, but Peter's presence was withdrawn.  On top of that, we see he sits down with the very officers of those who arrested Jesus, the enemies of the Lord.  John 18:18 clarifies even further showing that the officers had made a fire and Peter was right there fellowshipping and warming himself by the fire of the enemies of Christ.  Scripture warns us in Psalm 1:1 that "Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers", yet that is exactly where we find Peter.  He was not spiritually pursuing unrighteousness, but by choosing the company he did rather than either staying with the Lord or seeking out other disciples to rally together in this time of crisis, he made his way into the company of the very scoffers who had arrested Jesus.

How often could we look closely and find ourselves there around the campfire as well?  Things get tough, real-life distractions wander in, and soon we find ourselves trailing along at a distance behind Jesus.  Soon we lose sight of Him altogether and feeling alone out in the cold, we spot a comfy fire surrounded by people and we sidle up to take comfort.  We have taken our eyes off Him and locked them on the comforts of the world and soon we can't find Jesus anywhere and are so consumed with the comforts and fellowship of the world around us that we stop even looking for Him.

I mentioned at the beginning that there is a telltale difference, however, between true believers, like Peter, who have lost their way for a season and those who were never truly of the faith.  That difference can be seen when our actions are pointed out to us.  Unbelievers who have wandered away continue to scoff at the faith, lamenting their own period of "delusion" where they went through the motions of belief. 

Believers, on the other hand, have a very different reaction which we see played out in Peter's story.  At the end of the chapter (Matthew 26:69-75) we see Peter's denial played out just as Jesus had foretold.  When Peter realizes this, what is his reaction?  Verse 75 tells us Peter "wept bitterly".  There was recognition of the wrongdoing and there was repentance.  That recognition and repentance are the earmarks of a believer who has gone astray when they realize their error.  They immediately seek to find Him again.  John tells us in his gospel that even though Peter was older and presumably less fit than the younger John, he nonetheless ran with the younger man to the tomb looking for their master (John 20:4).  Peter couldn't wait for the chance to seek and reconnect with Jesus again.

Examine yourselves.  Where are you spiritually right now?  Are you walking beside Him and following closely wherever He leads?  Do you still have your eyes on Him but have begun falling back a bit, "following from a distance"?  Have you lost sight of Him completely and have made yourself comfortable around the fire of His enemies?  Or have you realized your error, wept bitterly, and are now running as fast as you can to draw close to Him again?  Wherever you find yourself, know that He is still there, that He has not drawn away from you.  Run back to Him and focus your efforts and energy on staying at His side.  All of us wander from time to time, but what is most important is what we do when we realize we have done so?

Following God's Lead

Sorry folks, it has been another extended period in between blogs, but life has really picked up and diversified for me in the last few months.  I have finished my first two Christian Fantasy novels and worked through the grueling first round of edits with the publisher.  We also saw our daughter off on her first very-own short term mission trip to Bangladesh with a group of other high-schoolers and some sponsors from the mission board with whom we serve.  It was a bit nerve wracking to wait ten days with our daughter in a strange country neither Amy nor I had ever been to, so we passed the time with an "authentic" Chinese tourism trip through Yunnan province, which was an adventure unto itself.

I have also created my own author page on facebook (you can like/follow it here: https://www.facebook.com/DavidGlennJohnson ), my own Amazon author page in anticipation of the end of year release of my novels (you can like/follow it here:

https://www.amazon.com/author/davidgjohnson ) and been working on getting myself and Amy through all of the preparations needed for our turnaround to career status and hopeful return to the States in January 2014, appointment in May 2014, and return to China in June 2014.  To that end I have been tutoring Amy through Systematic Theology 201 and 202 courses via Liberty Online (she has passed both with a 4.0, I'm so proud of her) and been lining things up for our family health checks in Hong Kong at the end of the month.  Barring any unforeseen surprises during the health checks, we should be pretty much set for our transition and return by the beginning of September with only minor "check marks" on a few things left to handle after that.

 

While with the actual work here in our city of Zhangye, many of the recent doors that had opened seem to be closing.  We still have some steady discipleship going on, but we have prayed that God would show us when we come back whether we should return to Zhangye or go back to the much larger city of Lanzhou.  Several of the teams who were in Lanzhou have left the field, for various reasons, leaving the city of around 4.5 million people underrepresented.  It seems that God is telling us that the work He meant for us to do here is done, and that a return to Lanzhou seems to be the path.

 

So why did I just dump our life story of the past few months onto this blog?  Where is the inspirational message?  Where is the biblical teaching?  The lesson I wanted to share is this:  Be ready to follow wherever God leads.

 

As Americans we tend to like to see the whole picture, weigh all the angles and possibilities, and then decide on the course of our future.  God doesn't expect His followers to work that way.  First of all, even when we think we have all the facts, we can't see all ends.  Only He can.  Second, he tells us that He will be "a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path" (Psalm 119:105).  That description is of a lantern or lamp which will illuminate the next few steps in front of you, but won't help at all in seeing the end of the road.  We have to trust what He shows us, take the steps we CAN see, and depend on Him for the rest.  In summary, we have to grow comfortable with following God's lead.

 

On our own adventure, for example, I knew God was leading me to Seminary and to work in ministry, but I couldn't see how that was possible with a wife who was still a practicing Buddhist.  I trusted Him and took the steps without knowing how in the world this was going to work.  Ten months later, God called Amy to Him, and Ariel had already expressed faith, so our whole family was now on the path together.  Following God's lead we wound up in the right place, whereas following my own might have led us somewhere completely different.

 

When He called me to missions, Amy's heart did not share that call.  I proceeded to follow God's lead without any idea if He was calling me to leave my family behind and go to China alone or what.  It seemed impossible.  Then, on a short term trip when Amy accompanied me to Hainan, China, God opened her eyes to the need and desire for missions and called her heart as well.  Again, by following God instead of my own leading, we wound up exactly where He wanted us to be.

 

Now I have this burning desire in my heart to write.  I do it in my spare time as our mission work here still takes top priority, but much of the groundwork was already in place long before I even became a believer.  God has also gifted me with words, so the first two novels I submitted to a publisher were picked up right away.  Those books are now due out at the end of 2013.  Where this will go from here, or what part God has for writing in the future is unclear, but I know He has opened the door for me to write for now, and has made a way for it to be my hobby while not detracting from our primary work as missionaries.  He has even engineered the timing of the books coming out to coincide with our time back in the States so I can help promote the books while we are home via book signings and speaking engagements.  Once again, I didn't see clearly where this could ever be possible, but God has shown me the path and by following God's lead He has brought a dream of mine for over 30 years into a reality.

 

None of these things would have been possible if I had trusted what I "knew" and followed my own sensibilities.  Our life is what it is today only because we were willing to step forward without knowing what was at the end of the road and just follow God's lead wherever it went.  Being in control is one of the hardest things for most people to let go of, but I can assure you God has shown me time and time and time again that if I am willing to just keep pedaling and let Him worry about steering, the blessings and opportunities and experiences are just waiting there for us on the path He has chosen.  Let God drive, and just content yourselves with following God's lead, and you will not only find your journey less stressful, but you will find yourself less sure of what is going to happen but more confident that it all will work out than you have ever been in your life.

 

Blessings and peace until next time,

 

David G. Johnson with Amy and Ariel in Asia!

A Missionary's "Vacation"

South China Tour Journal

Many people have no idea what the life of a missionary is like.  Their imaginations run wild at times as some of our friends ask questions which give an idea to how wide of the mark their perception is.  In some ways our life is better than most people imagine in that we are not stuck in some tiny hole-in-the-wall hovel existing on bread and unclean water.  We have a small, simple but comfortable and clean home and all the “necessities” of life.  We do learn to do without some things, and there are many areas which do require adjustments, however.  One of those areas is regarding vacations.  I can only speak for us in this, not missionaries in general, but it is hard for us to envision just taking time away from the work just for ourselves.  Most of our “vacation” time is generally a day or two here and there on the front or back end of meetings or shorter-term trips where we are someplace interesting in the course of our work.  In two and a half years on the field we have not taken a “proper” vacation, so while we were stuck in Kunming waiting for our daughter to return from a 10 day, short-term mission trip with other highschoolers to Bangladesh, we decided to take a proper vacation, a second honeymoon (or so we thought) and do one of the genuine, Chinese “bargain” vacation tours of south China.  Here are my journaled thoughts from the excursion to give you all a bit of insight into our “vacation”.

Day 1:  Not sure if this counts as a day or not, since it actually begins at about 7pm from the tour office and puts us in our first overnight stay after midnight, so the only thing we were to see today was the inside of a bus.  The day started off with a test of patience and witness as we found out the travel office had an advertised price of 238 yuan per person (roughly $35 USD) for the entire tour.  We thought that was too good to be true for a 9 day 8 night tour of south China, but thought “why not?”.  Well the deal was for “native Chinese only”.  The “American” price was 1,100 yuan (just over $150 USD) and the halfway American price for Amy (since she was ethnically Chinese but had an American passport) was 500 yuan (about $75 USD) if she could get a friend to lend her a ShenFenZhen (Chinese ID card).  So we got one of the local believers to lend us an ID and we were off for 1,600 yuan (about $225 USD) for a 9 day 8 night trip but knowing there would be other things we would have to pay for along the way.  Another way the Chinese tour companies offer such ridiculously low prices is that, like time-shares in America, you will be expected to endure several “shopping excursions” during the trip.  While not forced to buy anything, you are strongly encouraged to and you know there are anywhere from 4-6 planned stops along the way where you are basically locked in a shop for 45 minutes or so.

                Well we are no novices to bargain travel in China, being missionaries with very little income for such things, so we patiently endure the shopping trips knowing we don’t buy anything unless we really need/want it anyway, so the end result is a pretty amazing deal for a tour of four major places in south China: XiShuanBanNa, Dali, LiJiang and Shangri-La.  In discussions with the tour company I called upon the Holy Spirit for patience and gentleness in talking to them and said that basically I knew I was paying more than three times what Chinese pay and that was fine but the one thing I would ask them to arrange would be hotel rooms with a western toilet instead of the traditional Chinese “squatty potty”.  They hemmed and hawed but in the end said they would arrange that, but it might mean we had to stay at a different hotel than the rest of the tour group.  We said that was fine.  On the road our first overnight is in a town called PuEr, famous for PuEr Tea (which I love).  As we approached PuEr we got a call from the travel agency which said the town we were staying in was so small that there were no hotels with western toilets.  Not overly concerned as we were only going to get there at 2am or so and be back on the road by 7am it wasn’t a big deal.  The room was clean and apart from some interesting electrical work, was comfortable for a few hours.  I made a mental note to eat lightly the next day until we were sure we could get a room with a western toilet the next day.

Day 2:  Early up and a whirlwind tour of several places in XiShuangBanNa.  This place is an area in south China very near Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, etc so the southeast Asian culture seems blended through.  There are 12 different minorities which call XiShuangBanNa home with the largest two being the Dai people and the Hani people.  Two cultures growing up in close proximity but could not be more different.  Our tour guides were Hani, but they told us a bit about the two different cultures which I plan to “borrow” and incorporate into my fantasy novels at some point.

                The Dai are fascinating.  They are a matriarchal culture which is interesting considering how the majority Han Chinese so devalue girls and value boys.  In the Dai culture it is the women who own property and hold power and are the only offspring who can inherit wealth and property.  If you see a very poor Dai house, run down and in disrepair, you know they have only sons, but the wealthy houses are those with many daughters.  The Chinese minority peoples are exempt from the “one child policy” which has limited the population growth among the majority Han Chinese.  In Dai culture you marry into a bride’s family.  A prospective son-in-law must come to the house of his would-be bride and sleeps in the living room while working for three years as basically an indentured servant while earning his bride.  Reminded me a lot of the story of Jacob and Rachel (well Leah THEN Rachel thanks to Laban’s sneakiness).  During this time the son-in-law must sleep with his feet away from the door showing that he intends to stay.  Guests staying in the home sleep with their feet toward the door showing that they intend to leave.  Once the servitude time is up, assuming the service has pleased the girl’s parents, the groom will bring a dowry into the family and the marriage happens.  Again quite different from Han culture where the dowry is paid by the bride’s family to the groom’s family.

                The Dai are also very honest people.  Tradition has it that if you lose a wallet or something in a totally Dai area, you can find whatever you lost in the local temple where it will be brought intact and held for a year until the owner comes to claim it.  Unfortunately with all the moving around and the government incentivizing Han Chinese to move into minority controlled areas to avoid another Tibet situation, it is hard to find an area now that is truly all Dai people.  To the Dai, tall and thin is beautiful, so the Dai females are usually tall, slender and with delicate features.  This is a fascinating culture.

The second major minority in XiShuangBanNa is the Hani people.  They could not be more opposite from the Dai.  The Hani are patriarchal with the men holding property and wealth.  The Hani are also a more war-like culture in their history and their values for beauty are dark skin and fat.  A skinny, light-skinned Dai would have no luck finding a Hani husband.  When a sufficiently plump and dark-skinned beauty manifested in a village and word got out, other villages might actually raid the village to “capture” the potential bride and bring her back to marry into their village.  Kind of like Helen of Troy, Hani beauties could cause considerable conflict between villages.

The Hani are also an extremely musical people.  Our guides told us that among the Hani, “girls can dance as soon as they can walk and boys can sing as soon as they can talk”.  Our guides did have amazing voices and in a cultural show we saw this night there were some amazing music instruments, dancing and singing by the Hani.

Another odd thing about the Hani is their dislike of even numbers.  This manifests most disturbingly in their view of twins.  A single birth, boy or girl, is celebrated.  The birth of twins is another matter.  First of all the family giving birth to twins would be considered “cursed” and might even be ejected from a village.  Secondly the family itself would cherish the first child to be born as a blessing from heaven, but the twin with the unfortunate luck to be born second might either be severely ostracized or even abandoned to die in the wild, being viewed as a curse or a devil.  Despite the picture this might paint of the Hani people, both our tour guides were Hani and they were amazingly polite and helpful and went out of their way to make sure we were well cared for, even arranging electric cars (at our extra expense of course) to take me up and down the mountain at the huge Buddhist temple we visited so I could get to see everything without negatively impacting my already bad knees.  It just goes to show how far off course a people can go apart from the truth of God’s word in the Bible.  It put a real burden in my heart to pray for workers among the Hani people.

Well apart from all this cultural information poured out upon us, and the several shopping expeditions this day, we went to the elephant park and got to see some amazingly beautiful jungle scenes on the raised walk which took you through the jungle treetops with a bird’s eye view of this beautiful, tropical jungle area.  We got to see an elephant show and then were off to the natural bird and butterfly park.  The weather held out fairly well early and there was another minority people represented in the park with the Aini people.   They also are musical, like the Hani, but with a particular love of drums.  The Aini live in the higher elevations of the jungle and are known as elephant trainers.  Long hair is a valued beauty trait among the Aini, so the girls all have very long, beautiful hair and even the men wear their hair at least to the shoulders.

We did get to see some amazing butterflies and birds, but missed out on the peacock show as a pretty hard downpour came in the late afternoon and they could not do the normal outdoor show.  We did get to see some trained parrots, but the crux of this “show” was basically getting parrots to fly and roost on the hands of the people in the audience, having the trained photographers shoot the shot, then selling the pictures to the guests.  We waited for a while thinking this might just be a pre-show sales pitch thing, but soon left once we figured out that was pretty much all that was going to happen.  Still and all not a disappointing excursion given the elephant show and the beautiful jungle walk.  Lunch was edible but nothing to write home about.  Given I still was not certain we would have a western toilet in the room, it was more than enough.  In the end, however, we did end up with a fairly nice room with a not-completely-rock-hard bed, an A/C unit and a western toilet, so all was good.

Day 3:  Last day in XiShuangBanNa and we visited a Dai village.  It obviously was a village deliberately built for tourist but genuinely populated by Dai most of who worked selling souvenirs or fresh fruit.  The fruit was truly amazing as the mangos, shijia, pineapples, coconuts, etc were truly very fresh and attractively priced.  We were “hosted” by a Dai girl who took us to her “home” and gave about a 40 minute introduction to the Dai people and culture, followed of course by a sales pitch to buy genuine Dai silver items.  Still and all it was an interesting presentation and the fruit and food was amazingly good.

After that we went on another “shopping” excursion to a crystal shop, after which we visited the largest Buddhist temple in south Asia.  It was truly impressive but such a monument to the lostness of the people here.  They had a statue of Shijiamoni (the Shahkiamuni Buddah, the original first Buddha) that had to be at least 100-150 feet tall.  The hugely ornate temples strung up and down the whole mountainside, including the huge main temple area, must literally have cost millions to build, and yet the people in this area traditionally have been very poor.  While the kind spirit of most Asian Buddhists is truly amazing, how messed up are the priorities that would have people living in poverty while these opulent temples are erected to false gods?  The feeling of blended amazement and pity nearly overwhelmed me.  I did get some good ideas and research for use in writing my novels, but couldn’t get past the number of travelers kneeling and bowing before these false idols.  We did stop and pray for the people here and for workers to be sent to bring the truth of the light of Christ to them through an incarnational witness.

On the bright side, a couple of college girls who are traveling with us were talking to us and discussing everything and we got to bring up the gospel.  We tested the waters to see any light of receptiveness and I have hope that at least one may be open to learning more.  We will be traveling with them for the next 6 days or so, and will look for a chance to deliberately share the full gospel with them.  We have about 12 hours on the bus tomorrow, so that might prove to be a good time to share and explain the full gospel, but we did speak a bit about truth and falseness in worship and how the Buddha was only a man, a prince in fact, and never in anything he himself wrote ever claimed to be a god or asked anyone to worship him.  In fact he would be quite irritated at people turning him into an idol as he himself had always admitted he was a seeker of truth and did not have the answers himself.

In the afternoon we went on a boat ride which turned out also to have a transvestite show.  Like in Thailand, there are boys who are basically raised as females from childhood and given huge doses of hormones to change them into what these people consider a “third gender”.  It saddened me to the point that I could not even look at the performers, so tragically transformed by the twisted and sinful mind of men into something so opposite from how God created them.  I prayed for the performers.  I know in Thailand there are Christian workers who specifically go there to work with getting the he-she’s out of that life and back into a proper understanding of who God made them, but I am not sure there is enough awareness that this same twisted sub-culture exists in XiShuangBanNa, so I prayed and I ask anyone reading this journal to also pray for God to send workers to these terribly confused boys to tell them about God and how they were fearfully and wonderfully made by His hand and that there is no need to take on an identity so different from how the Creator made them.  My reluctance to even look at the performers prompted a question when we were back in the bus by one of the college girls as to why I was so disturbed by the show which gave me an opportunity to further share about the Creator and how man had so twisted what God had made.  I explained I didn’t look down on the performers or hate them but that I couldn’t bear to watch as it broke my heart to see people so lost and twisted from what God had made and that if I had looked at them I likely would have broken down into tears with pity for their situation.  This seemed to move her, which is why I have hope that she may be open to hearing the full truth of the gospel.

This day ended fairly early as we have to be back on the road by 6am, but we did head to the main street near the hotel around 8pm to take advantage of the nightly food stalls erected all up and down the way.  With street food you never know truly good from bad, but we just went to a place that seemed to be teeming with business, both locals and tourists, and figured this was as safe a bet as any.  It turned out that Amy and I ate until we nearly were ready to pop.  Nothing says Chinese culture like skewers of mystery meat grilled over an open flame on the side of a street.  Amy had an amazing bamboo dish they stir-fried, and we had grilled tilapia, spicy beef, chicken skewers, lamb, tofu, sausage, and a few other things I didn’t bother to ask about before I ate them.  Everything was amazingly wonderful, and I hope I still have that same opinion by the morning.  Street food is almost always good on the way in, it is what happens later and on the way out that generally decides if it was a good choice or not.  I remain hopeful, but the good news is that for the next 8-9 hours we still have a western toilet close at hand, and plenty of packed stomach medicine in the event things turn south, so all in all it should be amazing.  We are up very early in the morning so going to end the journal here for the night and we will see what tomorrow brings.

Day 4:  Not sure this day could have gone any worse if Satan had been in charge of things.  Maybe he was.  18+ hours on a bus, no western toilets in sight, had to make do with the squatty potty at the tea shop, much to the dismay of my knees, arms, and self-confidence.  On top of that, they switched us to another bus away from the nice, friendly college kids we had been witnessing to and onto a bus half filled with people over 70 and the other half people with really bad attitudes, which of course did little to improve my own demeanor.   Then, despite assurances from our travel company that hotels the rest of the way had been arranged with western toilets, we arrive in the big city of Dali well after midnight to find once again my arch-enemy the squatty waiting for us in our room.  Of course the travel agent wasn’t answering her cell phone at 12:30am either, now I’m upset over the facility situation not wanting to experience another draining and humiliating experience like this afternoon, and Amy is upset because I am upset and pretty much the whole day has been one exhausting experience.  Not exactly the second honeymoon I was hoping for.  On top of that they pumped us so full of tea in the late afternoon that I couldn’t fall asleep on the bus, and despite it being about 1am now we have to be up again at 6am and on the road by seven.  Tensions are high, spirits are low, and I am feeling a bit like Job set upon from every angle.  I want to have a better attitude, but I am not sure Amy understands the gravity of my situation with the facilities.  Being overweight with bad knees, and not having grown up in a “squatty” culture, I physically cannot perform the functions needed to use these facilities.  At this point I am doubting my suitability to serve as a missionary in Asia, and in a fit of displeasure Amy said as much.  Perhaps if such a thing causes so much stress, I may need to rethink things.  It is sad that two and a half years into our service this is the first time this has been this major of an issue.  It is what it is.  I am going to call it a night, pray that tensions reduce by the morning, and try to salvage what I can out of the rest of the trip.

Day 5:  Today was a bit better, although Dali was overall a pretty disappointing stop with one exception.  They brought us first thing in the morning to the “old city” in Dali, basically a beautifully done street where a river, or stream actually, runs down the middle of this street that traverses down the side of a not too terribly steep hillside.  The sides of the street are full of ancient dynastic style buildings and permeated with artwork of the Tang dynasty in general and the Bai culture in particular.  Dali is a city where the main minority population are called the Bai people.  The Bai have a rich and colorful cultural heritage, but our tour guide was less informative than the guide for XiShuangBanNa (or perhaps it was the fast that she spoke about a thousand miles an hour so I was lucky if I caught 5-10% of what she said in Chinese) so I didn’t get as in-depth an understanding of the Bai as I did the Hani and Dai people of XiShuangBanNa.  I will have to do some more research on my own when I get the time.  In any event they only gave us an  hour to explore the old city, which was woefully inadequate, so if we ever effect a personal return to Dali, we will give the old city a more proper once-over.  What we did see of it was neat and we got quite a few amazing pictures of the scenic stream running through the town, so overall this was the highlight of Dali.

After the old city, we were ushered to a boat ride which basically was a 30-40 minute trip up the river and back.  It was not particularly scenic as little, run-down towns or possibly different districts of Dali pock-marked the scenic shore.  It was a cloudy day peppered with intermittent showers, so that perhaps took away from the experience a bit as well.  This overall was an experience I would probably have skipped as there wasn’t even a tour guide or anything like on most boat trips I have been on with someone explaining what was along the shore, the history of the river, etc.  It was just a boat ride wrapped in tourists jogging each other about fighting to take snapshots on the bow of the boat.

We visited a “Bai” area which unlike the Dai village in XiShuangBanNa was more like a touristy souvenir market than an actual attempt at replicating a village, unless of course the Bai traditionally live in souvenir shops.  There was a little performance showing off the traditional bride’s clothes for the different sub-groups of Bai, and that was colorful and interesting to see how vastly different the styles are between the different sub-groups.  They then shared with us the Bai “three flavor tea” custom with the first being very bitter, the second overly sweet, and the third being cinnamon-flavored and spicy, but I think my third cup tasted more like dish soap with a hint of cinnamon.  We got a brief, whirlwind explanation of the Bai architecture and picked up an interesting tidbit or two, but this was much more rushed and less enjoyable than the previous minority people excursions in XiShuangBanNa.

The final stop in Dali was a mountain hike.  With my knees and my exhaustion, plus the guidance of a few experienced travelers who had been here before, we skipped the mountain hike and just took a few pictures at the bottom and enjoyed the breeze and the shade while waiting the hour for the others to return.  Based on the pictures others took, we really didn’t miss anything.  Honestly if you are looking for a relaxing, fun-filled vacation a Chinese bargain tour is the wrong choice.  If, however, you want an arduous schedule cram packed with running here and there seeing glimpses of things and liberally laced with forced shopping “excursions” at overpriced souvenir shops and sprinkled with the occasional marathon bus ride, this is perfect.  The upside, though, is Amy and I are using this time to see a few places that might catch our interest for a future return, at our own pace and schedule, where we could spend some relaxing time.  I liked XiShuangBanNa, but Amy didn’t so much.  Neither of us liked Dali.  Still ahead tomorrow and the next day we will see if there is something about LiJiang worth returning for, and after that is the part of the trip I am actually looking most forward to: Shangri-La.

We almost had another debacle with the western toilets tonight.  Despite continued assurances from our travel agent that it was “all arranged” we got to LiJiang and of course our tour guide knew nothing about it and said the place we were staying had no western toilets.  After a few more frantic calls and some honey-worded wheedling of our tour guide, he said he would take care of it.  We got on the bus to head for the hotel and the tour guide basically announced to the whole bus that there was an American who couldn’t use the bathroom like a Chinese so we were changing to a different hotel that had a few rooms with western toilets.  The upside, he said, was that it was closer to the center of the city so those wanting to eat late at night or visit bars would have closer access.  Despite the initial embarrassment at this being announced to the whole bus, everyone seemed ok with the change as dinner had been woefully inadequate and quite a few left hungry, so having access to street food at the new place seemed to quell any animosity toward me at the changing of the venue.  Truth be told, however, it wasn’t like the accommodations could have been downgraded or anything.  These places you stay on the bargain tours don’t really have “star” ratings, because the people who rate things by stars don’t stay in these hovels.  I think I might have seen a place or two on an episode of COPS that might have been a close approximation.  Nonetheless as we told the tour guide, I am not trying to be a pain in the butt and actually aside from the one request of western facilities due to my knees, we are pretty easy.  I eat what the Chinese eat, sleep where they sleep, and otherwise have not asked for any special treatment whatsoever, so all in all we will see how the day goes with this tour guide.  I did not like the lady for the Dali section, but the two guides for XiShuangBanNa were super-friendly and accommodating and were absolutely wonderful.  Tomorrow we are supposed to go horseback riding on a trail in LiJiang, which I am looking forward to.  I rode a little as a kid with a friend who kept horses, a few times while living on my own, and a few times at my brother’s place who raises horses.  I really love horses and am hoping for a wonderful adventure in nature.  I just hope, for the poor horse’s sake, they have one with better knees than I have and a strong back to take my weight!

Day 6:  Well if we did nothing today past the first stop, the day in LiJiang would have been worth it.  The guide took us to a huge horse ranch where literally hundreds of families of the Na Xi minority people own horses and do horse riding tours for tourists.  As our guide said, “horse riding” is really a misnomer.  What we did was more “horse sitting”.  Seeing my size, there were quite a few that wouldn’t let me on their horses, but we finally found a guide with a sturdy horse and we were off.  Truth be told I was worried about the poor horse myself as these were very small horses, not much bigger than ponies, and I am quite a bit bigger than most Chinese.  The guide had given our horses (there were three of us in this guide’s group) names:  Obama, Harry Potter and Wei Xiao Bao (a famous Chinese eunuch from history).  The one lady from our group was in front on Obama, and without being too cynical, I think the horse was at least twice as smart as his namesake.  Harry Potter was a gray, eight-year-old stallion and he bore up well under my weight and took good care of me.  Amy was in the rear on Wei Xiao Bao, a two year old and the least experienced of the three horses, but he took good care of Amy on the ride as well.  The guide walked along with us and gave us a lot of interesting information about the area, the horses and the Na Xi people.  He was a great guide so I am very glad so many others turned me away.  It was a divine appointment.  I shared a little of the gospel with him, but the Na Xi are very devout Buddhists and a short conversation on a horse walking tour is not enough to really make an impact on a deeply entrenched Buddhist as they believe “all roads lead to heaven”.  Nonetheless we planted what seeds we could and prayed for him and the hundreds of other Na Xi families working these horse farms.  They are a fairly good sized minority group, so I am sure the Lord already has workers among them, but as the Bible says we prayed for more as there is a large population of these wonderful people without a witness.

In the afternoon we went to a Zang people (Tibetan Buddhist minority) restaurant as our tour guide was also Zang.  He took us later to a Zang people area and we got to tour a little time there, but while there were a few Zang cultural places, most were just shops so it was like a huge outdoor mall populated by mostly Zang but also several other minority peoples here.  According to our guide, out of the 58 or so “official” minorities in China, 22 of them can be found in and around the city of LiJiang.

We ended the evening with a Minority Peoples Culture and Music show.  It was amazing to see the different customs, cultures, and colorful clothing of the different groups.  It is mind boggling that a single country could have no many vastly distinctive cultures growing up and coexisting.  It was a beautiful show but also brought to mind clearly how much work there is left to do in China among the huge number of minorities.  While the “official” 58 mostly have been engaged to some degree, the true numbers of culturally distinctive minorities in China actually numbers in the hundreds, and the majority of them have not been engaged and do not have Scriptures in their own language.  Many of these people groups have amazing cultural heritage but the lostness without an incarnational witness among them is staggering.  Much of the work we do is training native Chinese “M’s” to reach these people as a lot of minority areas foreigners can’t even get into, but the Chinese can travel freely about.  The city of LiJiang is large enough though that foreigners could likely base here and still reach out to quite a number of the minority groups.  Whatever His plan is for reaching these people, I hope others will join me in praying for workers to rise up and go to this vast array of amazing and wonderful people groups to bring the light of the Lord to them.

We have an early rise tomorrow as we head to our last destination: Shangri-La.  I fully expect another round of battle with my nemesis, the ubiquitous squatty potty, but we have decided to give it to the Lord and trust in His provision.  Either way tomorrow will be many hours on a bus before we get there but we are looking forward to the last leg of our journey.

Day 7:  Wow just wow, and not in a good way.  What a day of ups and downs.  Our guide was a Zang minority (Tibetan Buddhist) and apparently rudeness and lack of concern for others seems to be a trademark of this particular tribe of Zang.  The whole day was like being fleeced over and over again.  From the nastiest roadside hole in the ground restrooms costing 1 yuan to use each time, to overpriced fruits, and everything else, the folks in this area only seem to care about one thing: money.  Our guide was the rudest person I ever remember meeting and we didn’t know until we finally got into the hotel (if this hovel can be called that) whether or not the contracted facilities would be honored.  Well, they technically are.  There is a western toilet in the filthy, moldy, broken down room.  Of course there is no actual water attached to it, so that should be interesting.  We used to rehab broken down, foreclosure houses for several years as a business while I was in Seminary, and honestly this place is worse than about 90% of the pre-rehabbed houses we bought and worked on (and that is saying something).  Amy and I agreed early in the day, however, when we realized this leg of the trip wasn’t going to be pleasant in any way, to just focus on the fact that we are together and let that be our enjoyment for these couple of days.  So with that in mind, I will leave what I have said about the hotel to be what it is.

We stopped at a few interesting scenic spots on the way, including “Tiger Leaping Gorge”.  Things were nice but honestly I think our trip last year to Nine Tribes Gorge was WAY more beautiful and enjoyable.  After a few more forced shopping trips, where we bought nothing since the guide would get a kickback on anything we bought and we did not want to reward in any way his bad attitude, we went to a forced and grossly overpriced Zang dinner and cultural show.  Unlike other places this was not optional and cost twice as much as any other show we have seen on the trip, and it was less than half as enjoyable.  Apparently, in addition to rudeness and obsession with money, drunken revelry is a major part of Zang culture as that pretty much was what the evening was about.  Not drinking alcohol ourselves, the evening was probably much less enjoyable sober than most of the other customers experienced through alcohol-dulled senses.

Tomorrow we begin the journey home.  There is one more activity in Shangri-La in the morning then it is back to LiJiang, an overnight stay there, and then back to Kunming the next day.  While there was enough positive things about XiShuangBanNa and LiJiang to say I am glad we came, I think our negative experiences with Dali and Shangri-La has pretty much settled the question of Chinese bargain tours for us with the result: never again.

Day 8:  Well this was a day of firsts and a day of ups and downs, literally.  It began with my first time ever being thrown off a horse!  Three things contributed to this wonderful experience.  1) ignoring the fact that the owner of the horse I was on having major difficulties controlling the horse even as he walked us out into the pasture.  All the signs were there that this probably wasn’t the best horse to “go solo” on and yet ignoring caution and common sense I chose to try and ride myself anyway.  2) The Tibetan “saddles” are little more than a few blankets attached to the horse by an elastic band.  Not exactly the sturdiest of platforms.  Even with this loose seat, I was doing fine as my spirited mount plunged uncontrolled and full-tilt across the pasture until the wily beast figured out that taking a sharp turn would cause the saddle to slip to the side thus effectively unhorsing his overweight, American burden.  Once he discovered that trick, winding up on the ground was pretty much a foregone conclusion.  3) The Tibetan horses don’t have bits in their mouths.  They are “controlled” only by bridles attached to a mounting on their head.  Of course this only works in “controlling” animals well trained and willing to be “controlled”.  My particular horse paid no attention to my emphatic pulling on the reins to slow his bullet-fast gallop across the pasture.  It was kind of like a pee-wee league football player trying to stop an NFL linebacker by tugging on his jersey.  One thing is for sure, I will forever sympathize with the western movies where a guy gets knocked from the saddle only to have his foot get caught in a stirrup and be drug off down the trail.  My oversized American sneaker hung nicely in the tiny, Tibetan stirrup and my spirited mount dragged me about 50 yards or so through the pasture before stopping and turning to stare at me.  I swear he was laughing as I looked up at him from the ground, still unable to free my foot from the stirrup.

Fortunately I have enough natural “padding” and the Tibetan horses are short enough to where I ended up with a bruised hip rather than a broken one.  I think the most painful part is going to be when we tell my daughter about this and she sees the pictures of the miniscule Tibetan horses.  I can hear it now “My dad got thrown off a My Little Pony!!!”  They may be small, but they are powerful and this particular horse had an attitude easily as bad as our Zang tour guide!  Oh well, I guess I can cross getting thrown off a tiny horse off my bucket list!

We visited a few other fairly uneventful places including the world’s largest Tibetan prayer wheel.  Given my pain-riddled condition, I let Amy go and take some pictures while I convalesced in the bus.  The one upside of the day was getting to share fully and deeply the gospel with one of the young college boys on the trip with us.  These kids were great, but unfortunately his friend seemed to tune out when the conversation turned to God, but the other, Xiao Feng, was attentive and asked many questions.  Chinese rarely have an instant “conversion moment” but I could tell the seeds we planted were turning the wheels in his mind.  I believe this young man will come to faith.  We got email addresses for all the kids on the trip (2 boys, 2 girls all in college) and will keep in touch with them going forward.  Please pray for Xiao Feng that the seeds we planted with him will grow into faith in our Lord.

Finally the day ended with another first.  Amy and I wound up riding in a police van due to an infraction of the law.  Sounds exciting, doesn’t it?  Well that was the “spin” version,  the real version is much less exciting.  The law infraction wasn’t ours, but the tour company we paid to arrange this vacation had put us in a hotel that could not legally have foreign guests.  Around 9pm the hotel manager comes pounding on the door saying the police had done a records inspection and found foreigners were here and that we had to go with him down to the police station immediately.  Okay, fun times.  We go to the police station and after explaining that the tour company booked us there and we had no choice and no other options for where to stay to about seven different policemen (since every time we explained it they seemed to pass us off to someone else) and spending about two hours while the police figured out what to do, they agreed to issue a waiver to allow us to stay at the hotel for the one night.  The police were nice and offered to drive us back to the hotel instead of making us pay for another cab back (the hotel manager made US pay for the cap to the police station).  So we had our first ride in a police van back to the hotel.  The cops were really nice and even posed for a picture with us at the hotel.  The end result was the end of a very interesting but painful day.

Day 9:  Not really much to our last day.  We pretty much drove straight from LiJiang back to Kunming with a few last “mandatory shopping stops” along the way.  We didn’t buy anything, but still it stretched the normally 6-7 hour trip to Kunming into 10-11 hours.  We made it back in time for a decent dinner and some much needed rest.  After 10 days without internet, I spent the rest of the evening catching up on emails and Facebook before finally calling it a night.

Summary/Reflections:  Share the gospel wherever you go and whenever you can as you don’t know how long you have.  We were planning on sharing with one of the young college girls, Cao Huan, who I felt was receptive to the things we had talked about.  We thought we had the whole trip together as we were on the same bus from XiShuangBanNa, but when we got to Kunming we got separated away from all the college kids.  We did bump into them at various stops along the way, but nowhere with enough time to share.  Fortunately we were reunited with the two boys for the Shangri-La leg of the trip and got to fully share with Xiao Feng, but we will have to work on sharing with the girls via online methods as we never got another chance.  Don’t miss the times you have and make the most of the chances you have to share.

Don’t sign up for “too good to be true” priced Chinese tour packages.  From now on, when we want to see someplace, we will fly there, arrange our own hotel, and hire a local guide to take us to the “must see” places.  P.T. Barnum said “there is a sucker born every minute”, and we were living proof of that on this trip.

Don’t think that just because you have ridden and are fairly competent on American horses that this means you will be able to say aback of a spirited, ill-tempered Tibetan horse intent on relieving itself of its American rider.  Not all “experience” translates fully in another culture and country, and while a very skilled horseman might have managed to stay on, a merely “competent” horseman is probably not going to fare as well.  Thank the Lord for a well-padded behind and that my little “drag” didn’t injure my knee.

The world is filled with fascinating peoples, cultures and amazingly scenic examples of God’s creativity.  Don’t spend your life focused so much on your “comfort zone” that you don’t take chances and get out and experience the wonder of our world.  While the vacation package left a lot to be desired, overall I am fantastically glad we went and got to experience wondrous places and fascinating people groups that otherwise would be no more than print in a prayer guide somewhere to me.  God stretched, grew and used us on this trip. I pray you will all make yourselves available for Him to do the same to, in and through you as well.