Go Beyond | Kolkata

Sunday

Today was our planned outreach day in Kalighat, a red light area. Monsoon season is in full swing here. It has rained almost everyday. There is a tributary of the Ganges River that runs right along the area that we were to be. We had been told that it was likely to crest today and that we would have to make a quick exit if it did. This was the river was when we arrived.

The ladies of JIAC had invited friends and neighbors and family to the program. They were expectant for God to speak to them and prayed that the river would cooperate.

This morning Hope, the daughter of the ministry director, was praying for the program and that God would bring deliverance to this dark area. He gave her the image of floors being swept and mopped. He impressed on her that we were but the mops and brooms and that He would do the cleaning.

A couple of our team left church early this morning to go with the director to set up the rooms for our program. The place we were to meet consisted of three tiny rooms with open windows and doorways between them. It was supposed to be cleaned and ready for us. When Bobby, Malory and the director arrived they found the room was dirty and not ready at all. To their surprise, they found large ceramic idols laying all over one of the rooms. The ladies joined in and started cleaning, moving out all the debris, sweeping, dusting and cleaning the floors. Of course, the heavy idols were carried out one at a time. As if Hope’s word from God were not strong enough this was one more reminder that we are just the God’s tools and that He was ready to clean house.

Then they began to pray.

As the rest of our team worked our way there we walked through the darkness that is this red light area. We passed the large temple where people were standing in line laden with flowers, food and other offerings for the goddess Kali. Many were waiting for the regular daily morning sacrifices of goats.

When we arrived at our destination we joined the others and all spread out, inside and outside, to pray and ask for God’s light to fill this dark area.

Nestled among little one room homes were lots of small rooms made up mini temples to various gods. People were milling about everywhere, children played and incense was burning.

We had a large speaker set up to amplify the sounds of the program that would go on the the tiny three room house. Christine had shared earlier in the week that she felt very strongly that what would be shared wouldn’t necessarily be for those in crowded rooms but for those on the outside listening in and those that didn’t even know they were listening.

The ladies shared their stories and songs. We sang and shared a testimony of the freedom that God offers. Christine shared the gospel and said through tears that her fear was that any of those listening would ignore the freedom that is found in Christ.

Just as Christine was finishing we were alerted that the river was cresting. Just in time we finished….so like God to hold back the waters just long enough. Here’s the moving water that was beginning to overflow as we finished:

A great day came to a close with a special event. Jordan Raycroft is a Canadian recording artist and Juno nominee. He’s kind if a big deal and now he’s our friend….we all feel a little bit cooler because of that. He is serving an internship at JIAC. He has been such an awesome blessing to our team and was very instrumental in our recording session with the JIAC women. You can hear his amazing music at http://www.raycroftmusic.com