Cameroon

“We must stop looking at our situation through worldly eyes, asking IF something CAN be done . . . instead of looking at what needs to be done and then seeking God’s provision. . . instead of asking IF something can be done, we need to ask HOW to accomplish it.” (A note in my journal a little over a year ago)

My financial support is just over 10% (nearly 17% if you count the one-time cash donations so far), I have about 70% of my minimum number of prayer partners (but of course, I would love even more!).

Let’s be honest. I have absolutely no earthly idea how the support numbers can possibly come together for me to leave this summer. Quite simply there IS no EARTHLY way. On the other hand, we serve a God who is able to do ‘immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine” a God whose hands have made the waters part on more than one occasion, and a God who knows EXACTLY where everly last penny is going to come from.

If I were capable of making this happen, it would be about me.
But the reality is that is isn’t about me. It is about HIS provision even against seemingly insurmountable odds (ok, ESPECIALLY in the face of humanly insurmountable odds)

I know those four things probably seem an odd combination, but they define my last week.

Sub-Zero Temperatures
For the sake of those of you NOT in Kansas right now, I should probably point out that it has been uncharacteristically cold around here for the last few days – cold enough, in fact, that we had two ‘snow days’ this week even though we only got an inch or two of snow. Truthfully, it hasn’t been nearly as bad as everyone predicted. I think the coldest actual temperature I have seen is about -6 or -7 F with wind-chill in the mid negative teens. I know the wind-chill is probably much worse outside of town, but it is still more than slightly humorous that we got out of school for two days! Mind you I am NOT complaining, simply musing at the unlikelihood of the situation. It is also interesting to think about the concept of a ‘snow day’ when I think about my approaching move to the tropics! I wonder if they ever have ‘rain days’ or ‘heat days.’

Houseguests
Ever since I have moved into this house (about 7 ½ years ago), I have been blessed with opportunities to open up my home to various guests: a young man from my brother’s church who was traveling cross country, a former student from Wisconsin visiting her fiancé stationed at Fort Riley, a couple families from my church with gaps between housing situations, college students stopping in our town on choir tour, and the occasional out-of-town co-worker needing to spend the night in town. It has been GREAT! I was just commenting to someone in recent weeks that this state of transition in which I find myself has really put a lid on those opportunities, and I miss them. I haven’t felt the freedom to really offer my home in the same ways I used to because of it being on the market and not knowing exactly when I might need to move out. Well, because the weather was predicted to get really bad Wednesday night, a coworker of mine who lives out in the country about 30 miles from school spent the night at my place to ensure she would be able to get to school Thursday if they weather got as bad as they predicted. Ironically school was canceled, but it was an absolute blessing to spend the last day and a half with her!

10%
As many of you either know or can probably guess, support raising (‘partnership development’ as it is now called) has been a source of both frustration and anxiety on my part. I know this is normal, and have been often reassured that it is through this process that many a pre-field missionary has learned to truly accept the sovereign hand of God, learning true dependence. I am no different. I know God can and will provide what is necessary, but often wonder if I am contributing all that He expects of me. Is there a part of me that He is asking for that I have not fully submitted to this process (and therefore to Him)?

Last night I got an email update on the progress of my financial support. As I opened the email and waited for the attachment to load, I prayed specifically that it would have at least passed that 10% mark. Current pledges have brought me up to 10.9%!!!! Yes, it is still scary to think that there is nearly 90% to go, but once again God has reminded me that He is Faithful, that He is Sovereign, and that those two things mean that I do NOT need to worry about it. Please continue to pray that I listen intently to His leading regarding all that I am called to do in preparation.

A Tiny Baby
Perhaps most amazing is life itself. I spent most of this past weekend at the hospital with a very good friend of mine who was having a baby. Her husband is deployed, so I was her ‘support person’ through the delivery. Wow! I’m not sure there is anything that can fully prepare someone for that (for me, but even more so for the new mom!). Seriously, consider everything that happens in the nine months leading up to the delivery, the tremendous stress endured by both mommy and baby during delivery, and the rapidity with which both recover! At 12:36 am, as they placed that 6lb, 6oz wailing little boy on her chest, all fatigue and pain seemed to momentarily disappear. Even with the doctors and nurses rushing around, the world stood still. We truly are fearfully and wonderfully made!

God provides. Not only has He provided a storage trailer as mentioned in an earlier entry, but he has also provided in so many other ways in recent weeks. He provided for my parents to come visit over Labor Day weekend during which Dad and I tackled a series of projects around my house in anticipation of listing my house for sale, tasks I didn’t have the time or skill to handle on my own. He has provided commitments from my first few prayer and financial partners and 3 speaking engagements so far this fall. He has even provided me with a great group of kids in my classes again this year and a classroom big enough to handle all of them. (That alone is an exciting thing for me considering I am in a district that has gained approximately 500 students since this time last year!) The list could go on and on.

It is entirely too common not only in our society, but also in our daily lives, to dismiss God’s providing hand as coincidence or something of our own doing. A speaker (Dr Tim Brown) at chapel in college once suggested that we “dust off the furniture of your ordinary lives for the fingerprints of angels.” What a great image! If we examined our lives for the hand of God with as much effort as one searching for finger prints, imagine what we would find!

God is good! Once again, His provision comes in unpredictable yet amazing ways.

I have been considering purchasing a small trailer in which to store whatever belongings I still have here in the states when I take off for Cameroon. Though they seem terribly expensive, it would still be WAY cheaper than paying for storage for a couple of years. My parents got word of someone wanting to sell a trailer (14 foot I think) for a really reasonable price, so they called him to check it out. Though he lives an hour or two away from them, he was going to be in their area tonight, so volunteered to bring it along to save them a trip. As it turns out, the young man is a pastor, had purchased it for a similar reason (though he ended up not needing it), and gave them an even BETTER deal than they had anticipated. My dad is going to have to do some work on it to ensure it is water-tight and critter-proof, but it sounds like that shouldn’t even be too difficult.

As I plant myself behind the keyboard in hopes of putting the many thoughts bouncing around in my head to paper, I am completely distracted by a fly buzzing around my room. It has been circling without landing for several minutes now as both my cat and I sit mesmerized. How can something so tiny may so much noise and so completely capture my attention?! Now that the buzzing has stopped, I wonder what God is trying to teach me through this fly. That may sound silly, but such an annoying and useless creature MUST have SOME purpose. Right? Well, my brief trip into the land of google didn’t produce anything terribly exciting about flies, but the thought remains and is joined by an acute awareness of the many mosquito bites that cover the lower 18 inches of my legs. Perhaps today the fly is simply a reminder that no matter how small or how much of a nuisance, it is ALL a part of God’s grand design. Maybe a good reminder as we head back to school tomorrow. . . May the Lord help me to always be aware of the overflowing love He has for every single child who walks through my classroom door from the quietest to the loudest, from the most compliant to the most obnoxious. Let me see them as God sees them.

7/13
I arrived in Winnipeg this afternoon for Triennial. It was a long drive, but it was absolutely beautiful! That probably seems crazy to a lot of people, but as I drove north through Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota, I was reminded repeatedly that I am a child of the prairies! How beautiful they are! My parents and I have discussed many times the difference in perspective of those raised in different geographic settings, specifically those surrounded by trees vs. those surrounded by space. Only a few short weeks ago I was in New York State. Houghton, New York is remote and rural by anyone’s standards but in a completely different way. There your neighbor could be 100 feet away or miles away and you would never know because of the surrounding trees. On the prairies, your neighbors are likely further away, but you KNOW they are there, you can see them. To me, looking across the prairies is a tremendous reminder of the vastness of God. THERE ‘as far as the east is from the west’ mean something! Many people look at my prairies and say they see emptiness, nothingness, the absence of anything. In the vastness of the prairies, I see the tiniest glimpse of the fullness of Christ, a minuscule glance of the depth and height and width of his Love, and a momentary hug of One far greater than I can begin to comprehend. He is more. He is bigger. He is greater. He cannot be contained, even in the vastness of my prairies! Even there, I am surrounded by Him . . . as far as the eye can see and beyond!

On a very different note, as I crossed the footbridge over the roaring rapids above the falls, my attention was captured by what appeared to be a small reservoir of calm amidst the tumultuous rapids.  Water was rushing past with tremendous power and speed, and yet sheltered behind some debris was this boulder covered in green. 

How could something green and living possibly gain a foothold in those rushing waters?  The pile of debris caught behind the boulder provided protection and created an environment in which that specific type of plant could not only survive, but thrive.  Doesn’t He do the same for us?  He is our shelter.  It is human nature to so easily see the debris of broken relationships, loss, and personal struggle trapped in the midst of the rushing waters of life around us.  We have a God who sees our individual struggles, each piece of debris, and each dip and crest of the waves, submerged obstacle and looming precipice.  More amazing than that, He has purposefully put each one exactly where and when it must be in order to work together for OUR good so we can glorify Him.  We don’t have to create the shelter.  In fact, we can’t.  He has provided the way.  He has put us where we need to be.  He has established the foothold and enabled us to stand.

Today a bunch of us at PFO (PreField Orientation) loaded on a couple of busses and spent the day at Niagra Falls.  Wow!  How can you stand at the edge of such power and magnificence without comparing it to the far greater, far more magnificent, and infinitely more mighty  God?!  One of my favorite verses is from Ephesians 3 where we are assured that God is capable of “immeasurabley more than all we ask or imagine,” but in this context I can’t help but be reminded that He also IS immeasurable more than we can fully comprehend.