Brittany Lentz bundles rice seedlings in preparation for a day of planting rice in the mountain village where the YES team lived with host families for a month of March. Photo supplied by YES team.

HIMALAYAS – After an hour-long bus ride from the nearest town, the six-member Youth Evangelism Service (YES) team still had a 40-minute uphill trek on winding foot paths to their new home.

During the first village stay in a picturesque hamlet of around 100 homes, the team camped out in the village church. The second month, they moved to another village where they lived with three different host families.

Daily routines included team prayers followed by work alongside host families. Some days it was shouldering baskets full of buffalo manure to spread on the terraced fields, clearing out large rocks in preparation for spring planting, sorting through last year’s piles of potatoes, or hunting frogs for the evening meal.

One day team members Audrey Landis and Brittany Lentz joined a line of women and youth to plant a rice field. Landis described the process, “You take two or three blades in your hand then push your fingers under the water into the mud, keeping the plants evenly spaced in rows. It’s a lot trickier than it sounds. The women around us were planting ten blades to our three.

“As we splashed down the field, the woman beside me suddenly stomped her foot, sloshing globs of mud on me. I thought it was an accident, but after a few more splashes, I realized there was a game going on. More women joined the mud slinging until Brittany and I knew the color of our skin would no longer be white! But having a mud fight helped us connect with the women when verbal communication wasn’t that easy.”

Team leader Jeremy Byler said, “There were definitely times of joy with our host families, but there are also times when our cultures clashed big time. The simpler life was fun – swimming, doing laundry, and washing in the river, but then we found ourselves wanting the comforts of home or the personal space we were used to.”

Team member Marlena Balliett noted that life in the villages, as well as other situations where she had to carry her own luggage, became a huge challenge since she had injured her back before coming into YES.

Balliett said, “During our stay in the first village, I finally asked the church for prayer. People wondered why I wasn’t asking for prayer, but after praying for almost a year, I had begun to believe that God didn’t want to heal me. I was very wrong.

“One day I again read the story from Mark 9 about the demon possessed boy and the desperate father who begged Jesus, ‘Have mercy on us and help us if you can.’ To which Jesus responded ‘Anything is possible if a person believes.’ The father cried out, ‘I do believe, but help my unbelief!’

	After a day planting rice in their mountain village – and losing a mud fight – three YES team members, Jeremy Byler, back left, Brittany Lentz, kneeling left and Audrey Landis, center front, work with their host sister, Renu, with hat, and other villagers. Photo by Jonathan Showalter.

Jonathan Showalter remembered one of his most trying times – being temporarily blinded by specks of dirt thrown up by a speeding bus. “I couldn’t open either eye without pain,” he said. “As I stumbled home along the mountain path, with teammates guiding me, a young man from the village offered to carry me home. I must have weighed over two hundred pounds with my backpack on, but he lifted me on his back and carried me over the most dangerous spots in the trail.”

After checking the eye with a flashlight, team leader Jeremy Byler, spotted the offending speck under the eye lid. The team prayed and the speck flipped up to where Byler was able to brush it out with a Q-tip.

Showalter said, “How wonderful to open my eyes without pain and see again! I wondered how something so small could limit me so much. Could things which seem small and insignificant be preventing us from truly focusing on God’s kingdom?”

This month the team wrapped up six months in the Himalayas. Team member Sarah Ann Buckwalter said, “As I reflect on all that we’ve experienced – visiting villages, teaching English, speaking at a training center, prayer trekking, living and working with host families, I’ve noticed a pattern of God’s faithfulness. The things that scared me most turned out to be some of the finest moments, and times when God felt the closest.

“I remember being so nervous to meet my host family, but our time at the second village where we stayed was unquestionably the highlight of our Himalayas stay. It’s easy to put faith in God when all is well and comfortable, but when you’re tested, courage is needed to hold your ground in peace and faith.” 

Byler added, “Through all these experiences we always knew that God was calling us to something greater than acting out of our own desires. He was calling us to love, to lay aside our strivings, and to let him transform us from the inside out. He wants to saturate us to the point that we just can’t help but spill out his love on those around us.”

The Himalayas YES team members were: Jonathan Showalter from Free Union, Va., Brittany Lentz from Chambersburg, Pa., Audrey Landis from Manheim, Pa., Marlena Balliett from Wycombe, Pa., Sarah Ann Buckwalter from Gordonville, Pa., and Jeremy Byler from Lancaster, Pa. .

YES is a program for young adults ages 18-30 who desire to grow closer to God during two months of discipleship training and four-eight months of cross-cultural outreach. For more information visit emm.org/short-term or contact Sherrie Ober at 717 898-2251 or sherrieo@emm.org.

-Jewel Showalter

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