Another lady missionary involved was Betty Bailey. When people share God’s burden and call on Him, He hears and speaks, giving precious promises. One of the verses God gave Betty concerning Nepal was this verse about an abundance of grain in the land and it would wave on the tops of the mountains! You must remember that Nepal is the country in which the highest mountains in the world are to be found! This was an apt promise from the Lord to those burdened for Nepal. Authentic Christians always long for fruit don’t they? Not just by bearing the fruit of the Holy Spirit in themselves but in others coming to Christ. I had a traveling companion in the ministry during part of this trip, a doctor friend John Simkins. We were scheduled to fly to a place named Gorahi. It was a small town, at that time unreachable by road and is on the southern plains of Nepal. Once a week a small plane flew to the landing strip about seventeen miles away. Obviously we were to spend a week there and duly arrived and trekked to the little town. Betty Bailey was living there. Again, although probably only fifteen or twenty years older than me, she seemed ancient! We had daily meetings to which a number of young men came. I remember that in one of those gatherings John said that his reading and subject was from the book of Jeremiah. He was met by a blank stare from the interpreter, for in those days there was no Old Testament translation into Nepali! I cannot remember how many people came to those times, it was not a large group but some of them knew the Lord. During our days together Betty shared that the Lord had given her the verse about the grain on the mountaintops and I was gripped by the burden and the imagery too, participating with her in her God given vision. Already in those meetings we could see some of the grain!
On the Saturday a trip had been arranged. A long walk up into the hills. John and I went along with the young men. First through the paddy fields where the rice was being harvested and we all sang Christian songs in Nepali as we marched. I remember one of them to this day. Then we climbed up into the hills through into the tree line, it was memorable. We had taken some simple food and sat to eat and drink together, praying and praising the Lord and looking down on the plain. I looked around and about me were these young believers with their hands waving lifted high as we praised God our Savior and so that verse became vividly alive for here were some firstfruits of God’s grain waving on the mountains! Young men who had been brought to God by an older lady missionary whom God had sent amongst them and I, a young man (I was thirty at the time) sharing with her in her labors. Here were older and younger intimately bound together in the family of God serving in harmony. Younger giving honor to those older and the single and the married sharing the common life of service to God. I feel that these ones like Roy and Alma and Betty were showing me the way. Our links continued through the years even up to this point in time and some of those young men are now well grown and have become leaders in the churches of Nepal.
