It started in Kathmandu the first week of December.

Christmas is coming! The weather changed quickly! It became cold! 

We pulled out our flannel sheets and heavy blankets.  We started wearing layers of clothes to fight off the chilled air inside the house.

We were greeted with early morning fog or frost with even the full moon still shining! In our garden and the other houses around us, the poinsettia plants, reaching to the sky, burst into their bright red colors!

With Advent having starting, we set up our nativity set and Advent wreath.

Hotels started holding Food Fairs, with their chefs making exquisite foreign Christmas foods. The lobbies were decorated with red balls, brightly colored lights, and festive streamers.

Holiday Bazaars a-plenty, providing people (foreigners mainly) chances to purchase Christmas gifts. The Kathmandu Chorale sang its Holiday Program.

Meanwhile, in Talui, Manipur, India, the members of Talui Baptist Church were getting ready for its  100^th Anniversary, their Centenary Celebration, December 16-19^th.  The centennial choir and invited choirs from surrounding villages were practicing their songs.  Young adults learned their traditional dances for the cultural show. 

On Thursday, December 15^th, we left Kathmandu and flew to Imphal, Manipur in Northeast India. Then we drove 4 hours to the remote village of Talui to join the other 3,000 participants to celebrate this village’s 100 years of Turning from Darkness to Light: the villagers, the Tangkhul Nagas, had turned from being head hunters to following Jesus!

What a magnificent celebration it was! Bucky opened the celebration with the unveiling of the monolith in commemoration of this event. Special choirs and musicians performed songs in praise to our Lord. Speakers, including Bucky, spoke on “Called to Witness”, “Called to Lead”, and “Called to Serve.”

My turn to speak was on Sunday. Grace, my interpreter for my sermon on “Called to Bear Fruit,” is the granddaughter of the first pastor of this church. Her grandmother – who eventually died at the age of 114 – had been praying for someone to follow in her husband’s footsteps. And now Grace, along with her sister and brother, are in full-time ministry.

It truly was a glorious way for me to spend the fourth Sunday Advent: as the choir sang the Hallelujah Chorus in the Tangkhul language, I joined them in English. Tears rolled down my checks in appreciation for our being invited to join this village church’s 100 years celebration of their turning from darkness to light.

Having returned to Kathmandu, we now are finishing the preparations for our celebration of Christmas.

The words of the Christmas Carol, “Joy to the world, the Lord has come!” keeps going around in my head as I think about the wonderful reality that the Lord came to this village so many years ago, and as I remember the joy I saw on the faces of the people of Talui Baptist Church who have received their King.

May the words of a Christmas Carol you hear bring you new joy this season.

Celebrating the wonders of His love,

Carole