A Time of Thanksgiving

Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.

Worsh1p the Father with gladness;

Come before Him with joyful songs.

Know that His is God.

It is He who made us, and we are His; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name.

For Father is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations.

PS 100

Hello everyone, I hope you are well!  Blessings to you during this time of year! It is snowing even more and it looks so beautiful.  There is a common saying that when walking on ice here, it is not a matter of IF you fall, but WHEN you fall.  I have not yet wiped out on the ice, but I’m sure it will come.

I got an email a couple weeks ago about my “One-Month-To-Go” goals.  Reading it was one of the first times that I felt very sad about leaving.  I boycotted responding to this email because it was so hard to believe that my time was almost over.  I felt like there was so much to do that I did not want to think about it.  I later filled it out and it was actually very helpful.  Most people during this time of only one month left in country kinda start to get lazy in the work and start thinking about home or the next thing in life they’ll be accomplishing.  I saw this email as a reminder to finish the race strong and still make goals for this time that can be accomplished.  Father is working and moving even in the last few weeks, so I want to be focused on Him even more.

SO, I’ll share a few of my goals with you. There are many things that I’d like to accomplish, but these are some good things to start with.  You can ask me about them anytime – throughout the week or when I get home.  Ask me if these goals were met or if I was effective in any way toward these goals.

Friends: I will meet with Dina once a week and continue sharing with her.  I will meet with Arie and encourage her in her faith, encourage her to tell her story with people and study the Word together. Finally, I will meet with Cami to get to know her better, talk with her about her faith and why she stopped going to fellowship. I’d like to introduce her to other believing friends.

Work Responsibilities:  In preparation for Russian class, I’ll focus more on homework and be more on top of things.  I’ll start studying for our practicum next week.  I will meet with my local friend Martha once a week to practice language.  When I meet with Arie I’ll practice language.  I translated my story into Russian and I want to tell 2 people.  For English clubs, I was to prepare more creative lessons.  I will keep attending Saturday night game night and have movie nights for EC students on Friday nights.  I will meet with a couple EC students outside of club.

Be a Blessing to Supervisors: I made the sugar cookies and scrapbooked a Thanksgiving ‘thank you’ card. I will keep helping with babysitting for basketball night and hanging out with the kids during the week. One of these pizza nights, us HO girls will be making pizza for everyone! I’ll be collaborating with the other girls to see what else we can do together :)

Things to Accomplish: (Besides buying souvenirs…) I really want to tell the C to C story in entirety to someone before I leave.  That was a goal that I made in the beginning of the semester that I have not accomplished yet.  I will visit the Village once more before leaving too.

Ask Father About the Impossible: I am asking Him about my future plans and what He would have me do.  I am asking Him about finding a job once I get back.  Mostly, I’m asking that I will finish strong and sprint to the finish line for this semester.

Ok, so essentially, those are some things you can be lifting up for me.  Also these next couple weeks Gabi and I will be working on a research paper.  Ask for good time management and diligence.

Thanksgiving week was a wonderful time here.  It is still odd to me that there was so much snow on the ground this last week.  It felt more like Christmas in that way.  My week was packed with exciting events.  For both of the English clubs we help at we had a feast with traditional American Thanksgiving holiday foods.  We told the story of the pilgrims coming to America in search of religious freedom, their hardships and their befriending Native Americans whom they celebrated with the next harvest.  There was even a skit of this that we let the students do, which turned out pretty cute.  From the simplicity of blessing the meal before eating and answering their questions, I can only see Father’s hand in our club times last week.  It was a great opportunity to just hang out with the students, share a meal and talk about what we are thankful for.

On the actual holiday, it was very relaxing.  It just so happened that on Thursdays we do not have language class, so the day pretty well was a holiday.  We celebrated in the dorm in our own way with baked chicken and mashed potatoes, sharing our family holiday traditions over the hot meal.  I made cookies for my friends with the cute fall cookie cutters, sprinkles and baggies that my mom had sent in a package.  Most local believers here know about and celebrate Thanksgiving as a time of praising Father for all the blessings He has done in their lives.

We continued celebrating this weekend with gathering together with other workers from the company.   People went all out with foods that had been sent in holiday packages (mainly cranberry sauce and rice Krispy treats!)  It was a lot like being with my family at home… I ate too much and there was football all day long.  We had a great time of fellowship and thanksgiving to Father with songs and prayer.  Finally, yesterday was our last feast as we celebrated with our fellowship, gathering together for worsh1p and sharing a meal together.  Our friends came with us and I think they really enjoyed it.

Last week I was really reflecting in my quiet time on what I was thankful for.  Paul reminded me to devote myself to prayer, be watchful and thankful, pray that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of the Son, and pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should (Col. 4:2)  There is so much to be thankful for!  I am grateful for the opportunity to keep studying in my language class.  I so appreciate our teacher and her patience with us.  I lift her up to Father every day and she continues to be gracious with us. I am thankful for my friends helping me practice language and helping me with homework sometimes.  They are a big help.

I am very thankful for the support that I have here among my teammates, supervisor and other families.  They have been a great help to me in numerous ways.  Praying for me, giving me a hug when I’m sad after Skyping my family, talking to all hours of the night and having sleep overs.  I have been really blessed to be so involved with my supervisor’s family.  I love hanging out with their kids, reading books and doing crafts.  One night after babysitting, they said, “Dad! You can’t believe how much fun we just had!” That made me so happy.  The opportunity I have to have a cool ‘Aunt Callie’ relationship with them and talk to them about Father and stories from the Word is so amazing.

I am thankful for living in the dorm.  I love seeing people I know from living here around campus and chatting with them.  I love getting together, studying the Word with my friends and just being available to talk with them.  I am thankful for Addie and her roommate Ida.  I’m thankful for the Cardamom guys and local guys we have met and every chance we get to introduce them to our Brothers here.

I could keep writing about all the things I am thankful for and it would be the longest blog in blog history, but the one thing that I am most thankful for is the Son.  I am so thankful for His sacrifice and rising from the dead to give me life as well.  I am so thankful for the opportunity to live in Central Asia and share about Him.

Peace and blessings to you, my dear friends.  I am so thankful for you reading my blogs and lifting me up to Father continually.  It is such a blessing knowing that you all are interceding for me, even being thousands of miles away.

Love to you all!!

The Broken Are Becoming the Chosen

Dear friends, I hope this finds you well!  It has been a chilly week with lots of glittering snow, with which I am excited to finally have enough on the ground to make a snowman.  Some days it just looks like a blizzard, but really it is only because the windy speed is high.  The city has a fitting nickname: “The Windy City” of Central Asia.

Last weekend the whole northern team gathered for a retreat in the countryside.  It was a time of much needed rest and relaxation along with some great fellowship, and above all a time for gathering all together to worpish our King.  The country club was a winterland oasis and it looked almost like we all just flew on a plane and were retreating in Estes Park Colorado.  (I’ll add a picture of our cabin below!)  The icing on the cake was sleeping in a fluffy bed with no box springs poking me and taking a real shower.  Oh the simple joys in life…  Some brothers from Atlanta* came to facilitate and man, did they bring the Word!  We also talked with Papa for hours and hours one evening and it all was so encouraging for me.

With much joy I would like to tell you that my dear friend Mulan has become a Sister! She told me Sat. night while at a student event and I just screamed for joy.  (I think the only other time I have shrieked was in August when my sister-in-law told me she was pregnant :))  Mulan is so happy she almost cannot contain her joy.  She loves I$a and she is all smiles!  She said that she had many conversations with Father and the other day while she was all alone on her balcony, she accepted the Son into her heart.  Wow!  Father had been revealing Himself to her for a long time and we had been lifting her up daily throughout the semester.  It is a great blessing to see Papa work and move in her life.  It really is a privilege to be a part of His process of redeeming the broken.  Please be asking Papa to encourage and strengthen her new faith as she learns about all of His goodness.  Ask specifically that He would provide a spiritual big sister for her to continue growing.

Her story has been an encouragement to me and a reminder that just as much as a non-believing person needs the Good News, so do I.  I need the GN daily because it isn’t something I heard once and moved on, but it is a process and foundation on which everything is supported from.  In Paul’s letters I see his anxiousness to tell the GN to not only the non-believers, but the believers (Rom 1:15).  An author named Milton Vincent put it like this:

“The go<pel is so foolish (according to my natural wisdom), so scandalous (according to my conscience), and so incredible (according to my timid heart), that it is a daily battle to believe the full scope of it as I should.  There is simply no other way to compete with the forebodings of my conscience, the condemnings of my heart, and the lies of the world and the [Enemy] than to overwhelm such thigs with daily rehearsings of the go<pel.” – A Go<pel Primer

Another big area you can still be lifting up is our language class.  I sent out an email last week about the university’s announcement to discontinue the institute I study in.  As of today I have not heard any more news.  We have done all we can, but the program is officially closed after May.  My HO sisters and I will continue going to class until they actually decide we should not be there. I really appreciate all of your thoughts and prayers about this situation.  This really throws a big wrench in the work going on here, especially looking at future people joining the team, but Father will provide.  Everyone in the department is being relocated and our teachers have not gotten paid in 2 months, so please keep remembering them.

Language is slowly getting better for me.  It has been a frustrating process through this whole journey.  I feel like a two-year-old and some days it amazes me how much I do not remember in-between class times, but it is improving.  This past week with all of the excitement of the department closing, I realized how much I was taking our time with our teacher for granted.  I began to appreciate the time spent in class and many hours outside of class more and more.  I really do love learning Russian, I do.

We have been having some great English clubs and extra events.  We have hosted movie nights and a Halloween party.  I am continuing to meet new people through clubs as well as get to know girls I have already met.  It has been a great way to build relationships and have salty conversations.  We are starting to plan a Thanksgiving English club celebration for the two different clubs we help with.  I am getting pretty excited about making lots of pumpkin pie!

I met a girl several weeks ago who I have really enjoyed getting to know.  I met her at a movie night organized by some friends and we instantly clicked.  We started talking about where we were from and to my amazement; she knew exactly where my hometown was!  I found out that she had been an exchange student her senior year of high school in Lebanon, Mo.  She ended up attending a university in Indiana after graduating.  She loves American culture but also loves the traditions of her native land.  Recently she had also gone through some reverse culture shock, so I’ll say it was a divine appointment that we met!  I have had some great conversations with her, but I’d like you to lift her up for me. Her name is Nara.  Ask that her heart would be softened to accepting the Son.

There is a new project that we are considering being involved in during our last few weeks in country.  I am not quite sure what it would look like, so we ask that you all be lifting it up.  Thank you all for reading and being such great warriors for me and my friends!!  I really appreciate your continual love and support!

Blessings to you!