I am learning to thank God even in our times of sickness because sometimes we all just need to slow down and snuggle more.
I had a wonderful morning out with this little lady as we waited for her ear infection diagnosis. She’s such a delight even in her moments of sickness. We just walked the store aisles, waiting in the clinic. Her little joy in climbing in and out of the clinic chairs. Her jabbering about the MnM display guy being her size. Such sweet little moments. And I just drank it all in. Every “up please” came with open arms.
I think God knew how much we both needed to just spend a slow morning together. Me and little baby girl. Just taking our time. Nowhere to be but with each other.
And after her little love tank was filled to the brim, she took her medicine and only got through half of “Jesus loves me” before this happened:
I love you, precious little girl. I’m so blessed to be your mommy. Even after the sleepless nights, baby, I’m just so incredibly blessed by God to have you.
We had an assignment here at orientation to cook an African meal from scratch. So we decided to stick together as our Sub-Saharan Africa group and make our meal pot-luck style.
We contributed some fresh squeezed lemonade.
Yes, we cleaned out all our paper cuts and hang nails.
And ended up straining the lemon juice through disposable tea bags.
Hey, you use what you have, people! 😉
It was definitely more fun to try new things together as a group. You know, things like peanut soup.
It smelled so good!
I love that when given the option, we choose to do things together.
That’s what this new Africa family is all about.
And while we’re spread out all over the continent, in our hearts we will always be near.
Building has been so rewarding and so wonderfully challenging.
It has looked like seven children; one little girl that went straight to Jesus’ arms, two little boys for eleven months of investing, and four little girls that we still get to hold.
It has looked like one dog, six cats, and one turtle.
It has looked like a tiny one-bedroom apartment, a four bedroom mansion,to us, with a fenced in backyard, a hotel, a guest bedroom, the floor of a friend’s basement, and now a temporary apartment for only 4 more weeks before we move overseas.
It has looked like unfair arguments followed by yielding apologies.
It has looked like dancing through Scripture and worship together.
It has looked like letting go of our “mine” in exchange for the most beautiful “us”.
It was looked like this building of “who we really are”, reveling in the family unity stitched by our Father.
It has looked like endless parenting tears of challenge and utter joy as we hold each other’s hands throughout this lifelong investment in curls and beautiful brown eyes.
And while the storms sure seemed to build wind and rain surges to hit the very house we’re still building, through God’s grace I always find you with a hammer and a ladder. I’ll take the nails, my love. You will always be worth building and rebuilding our “us”, even on the most exhausting of days.
Love is our choice. And the most utterly rewarding choice of all.
So just like we have sung together over the passing years…
What I’m trying to say in some clumsy way is that it’s you and only you, not just for now, not just today. But it’s you and only you for always.
So if you hold the nails, I’ll take the hammer. I’ll hold it still, if you climb the latter. And if you will, then I will build.
So to my love who is currently asleep crammed in a twin bed beside his sleep-struggling baby girl, I love you. It has been an utter privilege to walk beside such heart and such love for these past nine years. I really don’t deserve you. I thank my Father ever so many times for the gift of you in my life. Thank you, Matthew, for relying on Jesus to love me ever so deeply and continue to lead us in such gentleness.
Looking back on the last nine years, I have nothing but excited anticipation about the beautiful story God is unfolding in our lives. Matthew, I don’t know what the future holds, but I am certain of this: with your hand in mine it is so much easier to find the beauty among this world’s offered ashes. Even though this world is not our home, I find my home in the reflection of Christ in your eyes. As we fix our eyes on Christ and with your hand in mine, we find our feet stepping out in His Word. When the storms arise and the temptations hit too close to home I am thankful that your hand will continue to pull me to Jesus. And I likewise.
I scream. You scream. We all scream for… Frozen yogurt.
We found a local frozen yogurt store while out and about the other day. It’s been nice to get off of the facility every once in a while for something more than toiletries.
Today was clinic day 1 resulting in shots for the 130+ people at orientation. With shots day comes some grace in getting the afternoon off.
All the preschool children families got cycled through first before naps. (Seriously good call, medical team!) The girls have known about the shots for over a week and were pretty laid back about them with only a bit of anxiety mixed into conversations. Let’s be honest, no one likes shots. But we all agreed that dying of rabies was a far worse plight.
Our girls were champs! Three out of the four of them didn’t even shed a tear! And the one who did shed a tear was perfectly fine almost instantly. I’m really proud of their courage and trust!
The rec team pooled together and gave the kids Popsicles and ballon animals. The nursing staff got everyone fun character bandaids and even played a Disney movie in the waiting room. It was a surprisingly fun experience for us all!
So this weekend we’re taking it a little easy and enjoying the beauty of pain medicine as God teaches our body to fight off small doses of various vaccines. Isn’t that just incredible? Like that God would so design us to be able to overcome such sicknesses? I don’t want to take it for granted even if it is a well-known and common fact.
In the past missionaries would pack their belongings in coffins instead of suitcases when moving overseas. Their coffins! Today I am reminded of how thankful I am for God’s gift of knowledge to be able to invent vaccines!
We have sent out first prayer list update via our email. And it has struck our minds that maybe someone may have fallen through the cracks in joining our prayer team. We covet your prayers so humbly and thankfully, dear ones. I just can’t stress it enough.
So if we have somehow managed to fail in adding you to the email system that Matt has been updating, please, please email us at [email protected] with a little note so we can be sure to spell your name right, etc.
Again, we thank you so for your fervent prayers for us and the Chopi people in Mozambique.
To God be all the glory as He reveals His plans for the Chopi in the years to come.
I’ll keep updating this blog on our adventures and we’ll catch you on the next prayer update!
