HIV in the church - where it should be!

Of the many blessings that we saw at special service of blessing and the marriage reception for Anil as he married Sandhya was this: there were so many people in the group who had HIV.

God's family is very big - and the right place for people with HIV is in the church. What a blessing to see people living with HIV participating in the communion. To see people living with HIV blessing the bride and groom. To know that people living with HIV were helping out with the many arrangements that went into this marriage.

Of course, one factor for so many being there is that the bride is their beloved Sandhya, who is a nurse who is serving people who have HIV. But beyond that, I think it marks for me a turning point. A time when we are seeing the doors of the church start to open and welcome people.

We have a long way to go, of course, but looking back on this weekend, we can only thank God for what He has done.

In our country today, every church should have members who have HIV. Not because we want new people to get the disease. But because it is the business of the church, the very reason for its being, to be the body of Jesus Christ. This body must include those who have HIV.

There is no shortage of people with HIV in our country. If we do not have a single known person with HIV in our church it can only mean two things:

1. We are basically comatose. We are not out with the good news. We are not changing lives. We are not seeing Jesus touch others through us - and seeing people come into a life-giving relationship with Him - and become brothers and sisters of the sinners-saved-by-grace who we are.

2. We are bound by fear. People may be coming to the Lord, but we are too afraid to open up and tell about their needs. How much we need to be real with each other - to really experience what it means to be brothers and sisters in the body of Christ.

Both reasons are all too common.

But the good news is the both can be changed. We serve a God who specializes in turning grumbling bumbling folks into people who have changed the world. Same folks. Same God. Lots of hope!

The new US prez

We are all connected in some way.

As Barak Obama formally swears the oath of office of the US president - putting his hand on the Bible that Abraham Lincoln had used - we have a message of possibility broadcast far and wide.

In our part of the world, where so much of political power still depends largely on being born into the right family and/or scraping your nose on the floor till you get some power, to see a man being chosen by the people - a man who so many said would never be chosen because of his race - is inspiring.

When asked by the BBC about a 1964 prediction that the late Robert Kennedy made that America would have a black president in 40 years, Dr. Martin Luther King's reaction was that he thought it would be possible within 25. The fact that it took a bit longer than 'predicted' points to the challenges involved - but also the the possibilities present in a society where the Bible has had a significant role to play (even if in often truncated and splintered ways). You can see a clip of what Dr. King had to say by clicking: here

Would that we could see something similar here in our country. The emergence of people who speak with clarity and candour - who actually inspire instead of fill with dismay.

There are a lot of people cheering on this side of the pond as the president of a far off (but still very powerful) nation takes office.

No ordinary day

January 16th is no ordinary day!

Eight years ago our lives as a family were permanently changed - for the better! - by the birth of our first-born daughter Asha.

What a privilege it is to think back on those years. Each one so full of

2001 saw Asha born in Jan, and us shift to Mumbai in October and her cousin Joanna's birth in December
2002 saw us move over to Thane and become involved with Jeevan Sahara Kendra
2003 witnessed the birth of Asha's brother Enoch in Feb and Asha started pre-school and her cousin Anmol was born in October
2004 was when Asha start pre-school
2005 saw us shift over to our Happy Valley appartment and Enoch began pre-school
2006 was when their cousin Ashish was born
2007 saw Asha begin primary school
2008 was when Asha began her violin lessons
2009 is when Ashish's brother or sister is to be born...

In each year, and in each day we have been blessed with so much joy. Sheba and I chose the name "Asha" for our lovely child because we knew that we would be seeing many dark things - but that we have hope in Jesus.

What we knew would happen, did! We have seen many sad and dark things - but through it all we have a well-spring of hope in our Lord. Asha fits her name!

January 16th 2009 was a very special day for another reason too:

After many years of prayer we were thrilled to see our dear Anil Sainani and Sandhya Aind become Shri and Shrimati Sainani - joining their lives together in holy matrimony in our house church! What a joy to see the answers to so many prayers being lived out as these two beautiful people promised their lives to each others.

Asha was thrilled that the wedding was on her birthday. It was a perfect day.

We Eichers are sticklers for tradition, and so the yearly Bday party was a must. This year's edition for Asha was a small event on the 17th - since Anil and Sandhya's wedding was on the 16th and their reception was on the 18th.


Asha's birthday made its appearance early on the 17th morning (the same day as we had a big church training too).

In the evening we had the children from three of our dear families come over for a small party.

A splendid time was had by all including a treasure hunt and Asha feeding all and sundry with her cake!

These are days to remember. Days of grace and the affirmation that whatever happens around us - we have a sure hope - a loving hope in our wonderful Lord.

Asha:
The sensitive, vibrant girl that she is. The remarkable, mysterious person she is becoming. The amazing, lovely, and still far-from-fully-known child of God is will be.
All a gift to us. We cherish this remarkable part of our family.

Thank God for hope.

Bringing us back to God

Life continues to be a blender of sorts. Lots of experiences. As I tap on the keyboard a real-life blender is being used by Sheba to make some delicious coconut-peanut chutney for the hot wadas she has just made for a small party we are having to celebrate Asha's 8 years!

The 'real birthday' was yesterday - but that was also Anil and Sandhya's wedding! Tomorrow is their blessing service and reception. And in the middle of all of this we held our first HIV Care training of the year.

It was very encouraging to see the 40 odd people who came for the "Love your Neighbour... with AIDS" training today. Encouraging because so many were young! Encouraging because you could really see on their faces that they were digging deep into the subject - and being challenged by the needs of people with HIV - and also by God's heart to work through His people the church!

It was also encouraging because we had at least 7 people with HIV present in the training itself.

As we mapped out the different areas where HIV affects people with HIV, one of our HIV positive participants made this comment: "HIV does not always lead to all of these things (i.e. depression, suicidal thoughts, rejection etc.) - many times it can be used to bring us back to reality - to be praying to God."

Crushed

Crushed.

That's what they ordered. The carts are to be crushed and left there.

Last night men from the Thane Municipal Corporation came and did just that to the hand-carts of the hawkers who line the street outside our housing complex.

Some of these men have been hawking vegetables and fruit for years at these locations. Rain and shine. They are there with their wares.

Not today.

"Someone in one of the housing societies said that they should not just take the carts away, but destroy them and leave them there" said the hawkers "in the past we would get our carts back after they were confiscated. Now this."

That someone must be pretty powerful to have the TMC staff do what they say.

The poor live in a web of legal illegality.

I asked one of the vendours about the 'daily tax' that the TMC collects.

"They take Rs. 15 from us every day" he said, showing me the stub of the receipt for the payment he made yesterday.

And yet the same municipal government which collects taxes from the vendours also authorises the destruction of their carts.

Ditto houses in the slum pockets.

Ditto small businesses.

Its a cruel world.

The irony is that India's big retail bubble is just about to burst.

The massive fraud at Satyam computer services - where a company kept sending its stock higher every year by posting fictitious profit figures (more than 10 times their actual profits) - and thus 'creating value' that never was - shows the absolute corruption of our system.

The trickle down will be felt later this week when a big retail super-market - which opened to much fanfare 2 years ago - will be shutting down.


The writing has been on the wall for our neighbourhood "Foodland" store for some months now. Each time we go in, there is less inventory, and less people. The contrast with their local competitor "D-mart" is stark. Foodland has become a gleaming and largely empty shell - while its competitor seems bursting at the seem with robust buyers waving their debit cards.

The irony is this - Foodland had enough clout and savvy to work through the various regulations governing its running. They didn't have the TMC come and destroy their operations. Their demise has to do strictly with the cold issue of cash - not enough coming in to justify them running the join.

The street vendours will be back. But in what form? And what does this do to the inner person? To the child of God who is sitting, staring numbly at the pile of twisted metal and splintered wood that was his hand-cart, his livelihood?

Crushed.

View from a train window

First there were two.

Boys that is. One with a sickly, peeling face. His index finger cocked back full-stretch as he aimed the marble. The other boy watching vaguely.

The station platform they were on was framed by the window of the slow-local to Karjat. From the inside I saw the first boy ping his marble at the target and then slouch-scamper to retrieve it. He held something in his pocket and put it to his mouth. Then picked up the marble and had another shot.

The second boy, whose clothes were not so tattered and who did not have the burnt out look of the first looked on.

Another shot - this time the marble riccocheted off the bench the second was sitting on and fell of the platform onto the tracks. The first boy stood for some time and again put his hand to his mouth, cupping something inside it.

The watching boy did the same.

What was in their hands? It looked like a cloth, a hankerchief of some sort. As the first boy retrieved his marble from what must be excrement stained tracks (this was out of the frame of the window I looked out of) I found myself rooted by these two vagrants. Off to the left a lady folded a cloth and lay down in the dust. Her pitiful body surrounded by a thin cloth. The boys continued sitting, watching, and repeatedly bringing their cloth-clutching hands to their mouths.

Now more boys joined them. First one. Clearly younger. Then another. Then two more. Six in all. Some pushing and shoving. Coming in and out of the frame. All of them holding the cloths and putting them to their mouths.

I called up Nitin on the mobile to ask him what was going on. Is it glue? Are they sniffing some paint distiller or something. As we talked the answer played itself infront of my eyes. The window framed one boy taking a small bottle out of his pocket.

The others gathered around. "Maybe somekind of white-out remover" said Nitin. As he was talking on the cell, the boy with the minute bottle seemed to pour out something on each other boy's cloths. They quickly put them back to their mouths. Some drifted away.

With a long-overdue lurch, the slow-local to Karjat started moving. The boys left the window-frame. Staying behind with their hand-to-mouth-motion-cloths on the platform of Kalyan station. Their images printed in my minds eye.

Blast from the past

2009 is a week old - and already we have had a number of hard knocks.

As we step forward in 2009, its good to remember some of God's goodness to us.

Our good friend Philip Tusing sent us these treasures from his visit to us in early 2004. Asha turns 8 this month and Enoch 6. What a long and wonderful trip its been - and what hope for this year too!