SriLanka Report-6/25/2007

Letter from Drue Freeman and his wife Helen Freeman, while on a mission to India

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The accommodations were comfortable though and the air conditioning was very welcome.  The day before we arrived it was 115 degrees in Delhi.

The flight from Delhi to Colombo was delayed for almost six hours.  We had called earlier in the day to confirm the flight and were not told of any changes, so we were not thrilled at the prospect of spending another 6 hrs in the Delhi airport, but such is the nature of missions travel.  We were simply told that the flight delay was the result of “problems in Sri Lanka,” and no other explanation was available.  The Sri Lankan airlines people were very apologetic and helped all they could to make our wait better, but it was still a long time.  Instead of arriving around 11 p.m. as originally planned we would not be arriving until 0530 a.m. and thus would be up all night. 

At the airport they told us that the return flight from Colombo to Delhi had also been tentatively rescheduled and that there would be a conflict on the return flight.  That flight arrived after the Delhi-Chicago flight left, so rescheduling must occur.  Just call the airlines or your travel agent (Expedia) and all would be worked out.  This began two weeks of testing concerning our return flights.  Having been through more than one nightmare on return flights, I had become determined not to let Helen have to experience that part of a mission trip.  The Lord always teaches me several things on these trips.  One of the things this time involved just how lacking in “patience” that I really was.

On the 9th of May we finally arrived in Sri Lanka and went to the Pegasus Reef Hotel, where we had stayed before after the repairs had been made from the tsunami damage.  One thing quickly noticed was more of a military presence than before.  Machine gun emplacements were everywhere and heavily armed military men.  We did eat dinner that night at a Pizza Hut.  It was a welcome break.

The next day began a conference on Hermeneutics and the Book of Revelation.  Many people want to know about the Book of Revelation so we have used that many times as a tool to interest new people to teach them first the principles of Hermeneutics (the science and art of Biblical interpretation) and then the book.  There were about 30-35 people who showed up.  Many more were enrolled but were not able to show up because they could not get the necessary military clearance to go to Colombo.  The emphasis of this conference was learning how to study various topics of Scripture, comparing Scripture with Scripture to arrive at truth.  It was hot in the meeting hall, but they endured this kind of heat all the time and were eager to glean what information they could.

George Carle from Trinity Bible Church developed some charts to use to teach the Book of Revelation.  They were symbols of the various events and entities which we attached to a clothesline with clothes pins to show the sequence of events taught in the book.  The charts were a big help and many people wanted them to help when they taught it.

The 12th of May we headed to Nuwara Eliya to do church on Sunday.  This is the highest point in Sri Lanka, where some of the finest tea in the world is grown.  Flooding made us take an alternate route.  The van had trouble and we found out that it had a cracked head.  For some reason the Lord did not want us to make the trip into the interior.  We stayed in the town of Balangoda at a Rest House, like something out of the movie, “Casablanca,” sleeping under mosquito nets.  If we had gone any further we would have been stuck on the mountain with no repair shop.  Repairs are expensive but the cost of another vehicle is prohibitive.  Masi’s van is approaching 200,000 miles.  Please be in prayer for guidance about what to do.

Helen and I got our CPAP machines plugged in and settled in for a night’s sleep under the ceiling fans and mosquito netting.  A monkey was playing on the roof.  It struck me funny that in the United States we go to look at monkeys in their cages.  Here they look at us in cages.  We were awakened at 5:00 a.m. by the Buddhists who were broadcasting their prayers via loud speakers through the entire valley.  This lasted for one hour.  It was both saddening and sickening to see so much devotion so wasted.  If devotion was enough to save a soul then they would make it.  It reminded me of Elijah and the prophets of Baal and I wanted to challenge them, but that battle was for another time.

On May 15th we traveled to Cochin, India.  Solo picked us up in a new Toyota van (with good air conditioning) that had been graciously provided.  When the trip was originally conceived our main objective was to dedicate a new Training Center that was scheduled to be completed.  Due to a shortage of some of the building materials the completion was delayed a couple of weeks, so we were not able to accomplish what we had originally set out to do.  They were putting the finishing concrete on the outside of the bricks when we left.  Our plans and the Lord’s do not always coincide.  He had other things in mind for us to do.

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