It was a dark and stormy night....__Actually, it's a dark and stormy day in Haverhill, MA as I pack for India. This storm was born in the turbulent Pacific last week to El Nina, who with her consort El Nino attacks North America repeatedly. Now, over New England, a triple convergence assails us with winds approaching hurricane force, together with pelting rain.__
But I sit comfortably near the woodstove, hoping that Ellie will be OK as I board Continental Sunday afternoon to head for India. I have called our oil burner guy - Cliff Peters, an old tenant of ours when we owned 105 Bellevue Avenue (where Rachel and Dale spent a stressful year early in their marriage) to resurrect our aged oil burner before the frosts get severe. That old Federal Huber furnace was sold me by cousin Harry Carlson when we built this house in 1970. So we have no basis for complaints!__
Friend Jim Herrick has become my personal chauffer to Logan and back on my recent trips to India and Kenya - bless his heart. So at 2 p.m. he will load my bags and deliver me at the terminal. This year I am flying to Newark, whence I can get a non-stop to Delhi. This seemed like a good idea last August when the plot to blow up planes to the USA was thwarted. "Maybe 11 hours in one plane, flying over Greenland, Finland and Russia isn't a bad idea!" So I'll put on my elastic socks to keep blood from settling in my aging legs, and also get up and walk the cabin aisles frequently. I'm even bringing along my new stretch-cord exercise kit, determined as I am to avoid getting out of shape during the cold months. (It now takes me too long to get back in shape in the spring, as the chain saw and wood-splitting chores inflict me with increasing muscle pain. I'm not wild about pain any more.)__So I ask your prayers for my journey.__
I get into Delhi Monday evening (although it's ten hours ahead of EST, so it will be Monday morning here) and be taken by Saju Varghese to the Delhi guest room. By 6 a.m. he will see that I am on the train to Dehra Dun. It's a 5 hour trip through the lush plains dotted with rice paddies and then into the hillier terrain near Dehra Dun. There faculty brothers from New Theological College will pick me up. By car we travel the several miles to the campus, dodging the ubiquitous cows that wander EVERYWHERE in India. Ensconced in the lovely guest house, I'll take sleeping aid. zonk out for 10 hours. Rengit (the cook) will wake me in time for breakfast before morning chapel. He is not a Christian (yet) but has become a friend to all who visit the campus. And that would include you, should you wish to come to visit India.__
Just a word about cows before I sign off.__
Hindu lore says that when a mother stops nursing her boy or girl around age 3, the milk of the cow sustains her children. The basis of all puja (sacrifices) is ghee - what we call butter, more or less. One sees milk in tiny bowls under trees where Hindus make their offerings. So the cow is divine, the source of all sustenance for life. When a motorist killed a cow a few years back a mob lynched and killed the driver. Officials pressed no charges. One of the gurus said that the life of a cow was worth more than the life of many humans.__
This is the context in North India, formerly Hindustan. Pray that I may add a spiritual value to the training of men and women whom God is calling to proclaim goods news in this wonderful nation teeming with people who have never heard the Gospel.
About Me
- Jim Gustafson
- In case you are the kind of person who likes to have the background of a writer to help judge whether his or her opinion is an informed or educated opinion, let me present my "credentials." I graduated from Roxbury Latin School (Boston), Wheaton College, Fuller Seminary, and crowned my formal education with a PhD in philosophy from Boston University. I have been teaching philosophy at Northern Essex Community College for over 30 years and I teach as a volunteer in Kenya and India. I have published The Quest for Truth, an Introduction to Philosophy, now in its 6th edition. Lover of the outdoors, I have hiked and camped all over New England with friends and family. Like to fish, too - mostly catch and release style. My chain saw can be heard in our family forest in Vermont where I make up firewood to warm us when the snow is howling. My wife, Eleanor Gustafson, is a published novelist. Our greatest production however is our three children, all very successful adults with super spouses, who who have given us perhaps the greatest earthly joy of all - eight delightful grandchildren. Talk about blessings In 2012 I wrote "Wheat & Weeds: a History of West Cong'l Church."
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