Month: January 2019

Here is a bit of trivia: What is the coldest capital city in the world? Answer: Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Ulaanbaatar is spelled with a “U”, but it is pronounced as if it were an “O”— like “Olaanbaatar”. Also of interest, there are actually four “O’s” in the Mongolian language, each with a slightly different pronunciation.

So – since it is so cold here – when my wife, Frances, says, “Gerald, go to the freezer and get a roast,” I step out the back door onto the deck of our 8^th floor apartment and into the world’s largest freezer, where I grab a 10 pound chunk of meat, which is frozen solid. With temperatures frequently registering at 40 degrees below zero, the temperature is easily colder than your freezer at home.  Interestingly, at 40 below, the Fahrenheit and Centigrade temperatures are exactly the same.

There is at least one good thing about the cold weather in Mongolia. One of the V.E.T. Net programs we administer is called Gift-of-Love (see the video available on our website and Facebook sites). This program provides sheep and goats to poor families in remote regions.  When delivered during the late fall, animals that are slaughtered and processed will last throughout the entire winter due to the extreme cold temperatures.

Processing meat is not a problem, since almost every rural Mongolian knows how to do so. Neighbors help those too old or otherwise unable to process their own meat. The skins can be sold for cash to purchase flour, rice, and other essentials. Mutton is the favorite meat of Mongolians, but goats are provided to the poor in areas where there are few sheep.  One of the principle advantages of goat meat is that it can be preserved by drying, using animal dung. The dung smoke gives the meat a special flavor, which actually improves over time. Cashmere goat skins are especially valuable.

Over the years, fishing has been one of our favorite pastimes. Many times my wife, Frances, and I waded the clear, cold waters of Montana and Wyoming to cast a bit of hair and feathers to those wily trout. Hour after hour we tried to entice sleek rainbows and browns until the surface of the river exploded and our lines drew taut.

However, God touched Frances and me on the shoulder and said, “Come and follow Me and I will make you fishers of men.” So, we left the U.S. and moved to Mongolia in search of men and women to reel in for the Savior.

But even as we “fished for men,” God gave us the desires of our heart. The Mongolian streams teemed with Siberian salmon and we were in the midst of some of the greatest fishing in the world. Tiamin, which grow to the size of a man, lurked beneath the surface of shimmering rivers, just waiting to be caught.

“I got one,” Frances would scream as my pole also bent double. We stopped counting after 50 fish that day and caught and released fish after fish — although we did keep a few for the frying pan, to break the monotony of our countryside diet.

Sometimes following God does not lead to deprivation. We may just be blessed with super abundance along the way.