Hudson Taylor: founder of CIM (China Inland Missions), today known as OMF international
Tonight I had an opportunity to check out an event hosted by OMF. They’re a Christian non-profit organization that does a lot of great work in South East Asia. Working with orphans, urban poor, trafficked women, and going to the heart of darkness to bring hope to millions.
tasty deserts…mmm.
This event was put on to introduce us to the new national director and share OMF’s calling. I came up to Fullerton with D.Pat and his wife a few hours early and I got to meet some of the OMF staff which was pretty neat. It was shocking to realize David’s coworkers were almost all significantly older than us. I guess I got used to my work, where coworkers are roughly the same age.
In one instance, an asian lady walked through the front door and suddenly one of the caucasian ladies goes, “insert name ni hao ma! wo…” something something in crisp mandarin. I was pretty shocked but then I realized most of these people in this room have served and lived overseas for years and almost all know multiple languages through and through. crazy dedication.
I sat next to this one guy, Cal, and I had a blast! I asked him how long he’d been with OMF and he replied, “since 1965”! Him and his wife had served in the Phillipines for 30 years and another 5 in a Muslim country. He was crazy fascinating. During discussion time the whole table (all of us were in our twenties except Cal) leaned in to hear him share story after story, totally fascinated by what he’d seen and done. It wasn’t like he was trying to impress us or anything, he was just sharing about life and God. There is just something totally attractive about living a life for a higher purpose.
In the middle of one story he caught himself and said, “i’ve been talking too long, I’m sure you all have more fascinating stories. tell me yours.” to live a life like that and still be interested in others…amazing.
Surprise! A chance encounter
The picture above is pretty awesome.
I was standing in the back taking a few pics when I noticed the girl in the pink with a black vest. No, I wasn’t checking her out, she seemed familiar. Unfortunately I can’t remember names to save my life, but faces I’ve got a knack for. Flashing through my memory bank I realized she looked a little like a girl David and I had met in Shanghai in 2009. Then I thought, well she was with a caucasian boyfriend at the time, lo and behold to her left was her now caucasian husband!
Amazingly enough Katrina and Andy came tonight because Katrina’s friend is an OMF staffer and wanted to introduce them to David because of their Shanghai interest. God has a funny way of preparing bridges. We reminisced about the small group meeting at the international church (link) and the new years celebration (link) where we had seen each other. Crazy how small this world can get sometimes.
We got to catch up a bit about how life’s been since then and as we were leaving I turned to Andy and said, “At this rate, we’ll see you guys again in 2 years”. probably not, but who knows…we’ll see.
