My language tutor said that it is written in their rel.gious text that passing your sins onto the animal and then sacrificing it will take you to heaven quick as lightening. However, one goat covers only one man's sin and a goat costs around 7000Rs ($113). Our neighbors are poor, so, if anything, this is another reflection of how impossible it is for us to cleanse ourselves, let alone our entire family, of the sins of a lifetime... Or even just one year. Also, what if you were to sin immediately after this sacrifice and become unfit for God's presence again? It is so hard to explain that there is only one Sacrifice that takes away the sin of the world.
We visited some new friends yesterday. We met these girls and their family for the first time at a bazaar when our friends Todd and Daniel came to visit. We initially thought the girls were being flirty with Todd, but they only wanted him to take a picture of them with Emma.
They invited us to celebrate Bakra Eid with them. Matt and the men had a discussion about Genesis 22, the sacrifice of Isaac, because their festival is loosely based on this Scripture... except their text changes the story to be about the sacrifice of Ishmael. I got to know the ladies in the meanwhile and managed Emma's stranger anxiety outbreaks. There are two families in this home. The first has three daughters and this man's brother and that man's wife have no children. Several neighbors of theirs also visited with us.
They served us chai and then after some visiting time gave us lots of chicken biriyani, chicken curry with chappathis, and sheerkhorma for dessert. In other words, they pulled out all the stops.
Hospitality is of great value here and theirs was the biggest example. They couldn't afford to do a goat sacrifice, but they offered themselves to each other, their neighbors, and us--the new friends. We hope and pray they will have open hearts and minds to what we shared with them and to more sharing of Truth in the future.
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