The Gift of Light

In our apartment building we have a very nice woman who keeps our stairwell clean, takes out the trash, etc. In Mongolia it is very commonly understood that these women are treated fairly poorly. They often live at the bottom of the stairs in what is the equivalent of a small bedroom. I have no idea if they even have heat or not in the winter, which, if you've talked with us about the weather here, that's hardly an option.

The first day we arrived we were brought to our new apartment and shown how to work our fancy puzzle-lock on our front door. Jess and I went out for a while with our new teammates and when we came back to our apartment I quite excitedly got out my four-sided puzzle key. :) I'd remembered from the demonstration that the key had to turn clockwise so I gave it a go. One clunk of the deadbolt and then...nothing. So I went back three clunks the other way, which I knew was wrong, but it wasn't working so I gave it a shot. When that didn't work I went all the way to the right again. I must have gone back and forth three or four times, ALL THE WHILE our stair cleaning lady and her counterpart from the next well were standing right next to us watching the whole thing.  We all shared a couple quick laughs but bottom line, we weren't getting anywhere.

Then Jess kindly and unfeministically offered to give it a try so I just couldn't pull the man card, plus, I knew I wasn't getting anywhere and thought it would be good opportunity to forsake my pride. Within seconds she had it open and all of us roared with laughter and I made sure to look at our stair lady so she knew it was OK to join in, and she was glad to! :)

We saw her a few times over the next couple days and she and I shared many kind looks. One time she looked at me and it looked like she could hardly believe that we wanted to be kind to her. I kept remembering how people generally look down on these ladies and was seeing first hand how an uncommon gesture of love can have a powerful effect. Love is a language that transcends all barriers. Think of our sin and what barriers had to be crossed for us to know true love. In this is love, not that we loved him, but that he loved us and sent his Son in our place...

What followed was most amazing and quite affirming. Pert'near the next night we were coming up our [usually dark] stairwell and noticed a super-bright, white glow coming from up by our door. When we came up around the corner we saw a brand new florescent pigtail bulb hanging right outside our door. Now, we're not 100% sure that this was the direct effect of the aforementioned cause, but I remember the second I saw it I said, "She gave us a new bulb!"

If this is true, then she gave us the gift of light. How ironic, that's the very thing we intended to do.








Please keep her in mind and hope along with us that we have many opportunities to interact with her as we learn the language. As Jess and I were eating some homemade soup the other night we both had a strong desire to look out for her this winter with a warm heart, our warm home, and hopefully lots of warm soup.

Rejoicing with you that the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. In light and love, Matt