In everything be thankful!

On Monday the mid-day meal wasn‘t ready until 4 p.m.

- thankful that there was eventually a good meal;

- that we had had a good breakfast that morning, so we weren’t too handicapped by the lack of food in doing our teaching;

- that there were no complaints and the students kept working with discipline even though some of them had been traveling since very early that morning without food;

- that this revealed a transportation problem the cook had in getting to and from the market, and that a solution was found.

Sunday night the electricity went off in the campground where we are lodging.

- thankful that we were able to get settled and check email before it went off;

- that we had brought flashlights and candles with us;

- that the cool temperature means we can sleep without air conditioning.

- that we still have running water and got a good meal;

- that it had come back on by the next morning and stayed on for the rest of the week.

Wednesday morning Yaya, our driver, couldn’t get his car started to drive us the half-hour to the teaching center.

- thankful that he sent someone to let us know what was going on;

- that he quickly found someone else to drive us to the center;

- that the problem was relatively minor and could be repaired that day.

From Thursday night to Saturday morning we had no running water at the campground.

- thankful that the manager could purchase jerry cans of well water in order to give us buckets of water for washing up;

- that we can easily procure safe bottled drinking water (the water coming through the faucet is not safe);

- that we still have electricity;

- that I grew up without running water so the situation is not that shocking for me.

Friday morning Yaya came to tell us that one of his tires was torn by going over the huge potholes in the road.

- thankful that it didn’t happen while we were somewhere out on the road (we learned there is no spare tire);

- that he could get it repaired right away, right here in the village;

- that it happened at the end of the week when most of the teaching is finished;

- that the repaired tire held up to eventually get us to the center;

- that there is good understanding with the director of the center so he knew what to assign the students to do until we arrived nearly an hour late.

Also Friday morning, after we did get on the road, the tailpipe fell off Yaya’s car.

- thankful that it was not something more crucial that broke;

- thankful that the local mechanics work quickly and have the know-how to keep vehicles running and on the road; it was fixed by the time he picked us up at the end of the day.

The road over which we have a 15-mile ride morning and afternoon is extremely rough and nearly impassible in some places.

- thankful that we have a local driver who knows the road very well so we don’t have to navigate it ourselves;

- that Yaya is a good driver and quite careful overall, balancing our need to get to our classes on time and to get there safely.

40 years ago today

September 5, 1972.

That date will forever remain engraved in my memory.  One reason is that I've had to refer to it a lot since then.  You see, that is the day that we first arrived in France to begin our overseas missionary career.  So, on all residency papers filled out over the 37 years that we lived in that country, the line that asked for "date of entry" was filled out with 5 sept 1972.

In and of itself, the day was very special.  I remember my nervous excitement as the airplane descended through the clouds toward the old Marseille airport and I caught my first glimpse of France.  FRANCE!!!!  After several years of decision-making, finding a sending agency, raising support, working temp jobs so we could travel around the country to contact supporters, multiple trips to the New York City French Consulate for a long-stay visa, it was happening!  We were moving to France.

We were met at the airport by Eugene Boyer, and his wife Charlotte introduced us to the French style of eating with a lovely multi-course dinner.  (Note to self:  DON'T fill up on the first yummy thing served, there is a lot more to come).  We stayed with them for several days and the first French city that we walked around was Aix-en-Provence where they lived.

The day is also significant because of what happened in Europe that day.  The Olympic Games were being held in Munich, Germany, and it was on that day that Palestinian terrorists attacked the Israeli athletes in the Olympic village, eventually killing 11 of them.  The news was breaking on French television and our horrified host was translating what was happening as he learned about it.  That was great motivation for learning the language -- we needed to be able to get information ourselves.  It was also a sobering reminder of the complicated world in which we live and minister.

Forty years later we are still ministering, although no longer living in France.  After an intense ministry of church-planting in cooperation with the Evangelical Reformed Church of France (Eglise Protestante Réformée Evangélique) in 3 different areas of the country, time during which we came to deeply love and appreciate the French people, French culture and history, France's place in the world, and especially the wonderful French Christians, our ministry is base is now located back in the USA.  However, instead of "pulling back" to a retreat-like home base, our interests and involvement have actually expanded to embrace West Africa, along with Southeast and South-Central Asia.  God expresses himself in cultures all around the world, and he is giving us the on-going privilege of working alongside several of them.

Today is another September 5, and there is an inevitable surge of nostalgia and gratitude as we again remember where it all started.

Those who have no choice

A refugee is someone who has had to flee his homeland in order to survive. This usually means living in a UN-sponsored camp somewhere with no possibility of working or otherwise providing for himself and his family. In many places people have been living in these camps for years, sometimes even decades. Their only hope is to eventually be moved to a country that accepts a certain number of refugees. Often,they have no choice in where that country is. If their case is accepted, they go. This means that people from tropical jungles can end up in cold Northern countries, or that subsistence farmers can be sent to urban areas. These destinations are frequently in places where the newcomers don’t know the host language, food, or customs. Put yourself in their place. What would you need in order to start living again? Who could you lean on? How would you feel?

Of the 14 million people in the world now living as refugees, 9 million of them have been living in camps for ten years or more. The United States has the policy of accepting around 60,000 refugees per year for resettlement.

These facts were presented in a training session on how to befriend refugees that we attended last weekend at a local church. It was eye-opening. This is an area of intervention that seems ready-made for Christians. It is also an area where Christians around the world are already doing much, both in the original camps as well as in the resettlement process. We as individuals have a role that we can play in continuing this ministry of help in our communities.

Since our denomination is partnering with a church in Nepal, we were interested to learn that Nepalese make up one of the largest refugee groups being resettled here in the county where we live. This is one of God’s surprises since we were unaware of this before moving to the area. These Nepalese are one of the populations that has been living in camps for decades. Some of them are already Christians, having heard the Gospel while in the camps. Bill has worshipped several times with the church organized by one of the groups that lives nearest our town.

As an immigrant-background people, the Lord’s command also applies to us:

“When an alien lives with you in your land, do not mistreat him. The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.” Leviticus 19:33-34

Who are the “aliens” (refugees or immigrants) living near you that you can love and treat as native-born?

Christmas all around the world

We were sent this video from one of our partner churches in Asia, showing a children's artistic presentation of the Christmas story. Even though the language isn't one I know, the story they are telling is very well known and clear. They do a good job. Merry Christmas to all!

My "salad bowl" neighborhood

I am pleased that we now live in a part of the US that is multi-… : multi-racial, multi-national, multi-colored, multi-cultural, etc. Our house is on a small circle of 15 homes. Our neighbors are of Polish, African-American, and Mexican origin as well as traditional white. In the neighborhood across the street are a couple of Pakistani families. There are probably many other nationality origins that I haven’t yet met.

It has been fun to meet up with these “salad bowl” Americans as we have moved around over the past two years: the dealer we bought our car from was Iranian, the workers in our aunt’s nursing home were Haitian, the mattress salesman was Pakistani, the donut shop was run by a Chinese family, the restaurant hostess in the hotel was Thai, our movers were Bosnian, and so it goes. Unfortunately, these people, although Americans and very numerous, are invisible in the “public face” of America. Few of their representatives are television news reporters or seen in tv ads or shows, and almost none of them are among the politicians who publicly “speak for Americans”. How inappropriate.

In the weekly packet of ads that arrive in the mailbox is one for a Hispanic supermarket a couple of miles away. This week they had some special prices on things I usually buy, so I stopped by there yesterday. It was one of those delicious cross-cultural experiences that reminded me of so many similar excursions in other countries --- a few intrigued glances (what is she doing here?), some special attention “to make sure I could find what I was looking for”, my disorientation at shelves filled with so many unfamiliar products, and some wonderful surprises. Who would have thought I’d find the best freshly-baked French bread outside of France in a Hispanic supermarket in the Western suburbs of Chicago!?! There is now a new store on my shopping circuit.

My shopping trip is a kind of parable for cross-cultural contact. I had to take the initiative. It involved a certain degree of initial discomfort that I must be prepared to accept. But, it ends up being great fun and most rewarding, in both the short and long terms.

Full circle

There has been a huge pause in postings because we are in the middle of moving into the first home in the US that is actually ours. The mover deposited our boxes in the house a week and a half ago. Since we have so very little furniture, actually getting the boxes emptied and the contents stored away is going to take a while as we gradually accumulate the appropriate stocking places.

Just a couple of days before moving, Bill and I celebrated our 43rd wedding anniversary. We met at Wheaton College in the fall of 1964. Now, we have bought a home 5 miles from where we first met -- one of the last places we ever expected to live! In the meantime, we have literally traveled all the way around the world. So we really have come "full circle".

It has been quite a ride! And the past year has been the most surprising and stimulating part of it. There is a certain exhilarating feeling in living out of a suitcase, unattached to a lot of "things", and always ready to hop on another airplane. But, it is again time to settle down and get integrated into a community and a church family. Now we learn whether or not we are as adept at "settling" as we were at moving around. The Bible shows us frequently that migrants are more likely to depend on God and answer His call than sedentary folks are. We just don't want our settling-in to take the edge off of that alertness to service.

But, we again have a place that we can call "home".

Anglo-Other cooperation

We attended an ethnic church in South Philadelphia yesterday. This is an interesting situation where a historic stone church with stained glass windows is still surviving amid the continual melting-pot stirring of an ever-changing mixed-race neighborhood. A remnant of an Anglo congregation still meets here, but they have had the graciousness (or courage) to open their building to multiple ethnic congregations representing the surrounding community. Presently, a Hispanic congregation, a Cambodian congregation, and a Laotian/Nepali congregation all share their facility.

Our contact is with the Laotian/Nepali congregation. The Laotian man serving as pastor has taken courses at our denominational seminary here in the Philadelphia area. When Bill first visited them in January, the group was mainly Laotian, with a few Nepalese. Since then, word has spread in the Nepali community, and they are now overwhelmingly the majority group. This mixture resulted in a very interesting trilingual service, with everything being translated into English, Laotian, and Nepali and songs in all three languages. The children sang a special song for Father’s Day – in Nepali and English. We were told that the children all learned English in refugee camps before arriving. A young person from the host church organized a children’s church (in English) for the kids. Those attending the service were really pleased to see the short video we presented of Bill’s time in Nepal in March.

As I was sitting toward the back of the group during the Sunday School and church services watching this ballet, I was asking myself: what kind of relationship can our American churches have with these rapidly multiplying ethnic churches in our towns and neighborhoods? How can we all work together to demonstrate the Oneness of the Body of Christ?

The answers need to be more than spiritual theory or lovey-dovey feelings. These are some ideas for concrete cooperation that came into my head:

1- Offer them a place to meet. It is unrealistic to think that first-generation immigrants and refugees can always just automatically integrate our services. We do things SO differently than what they are used to! And they do need to be able to express their faith and their concerns in their heart language. Besides, when you are half-a-world away from your culture, it is important to be able to meet with those who know and understand who you are and not have to always be on your guard about doing things the way the host culture expects. There is really no way they could ever acquire property for a separate church meeting place. So, being given access to a recognizable church building is important for them.

2- Establish a genuine pastor-to-pastor/leader relationship. I think this is important whether or not the ethnic group has a formally-trained pastor. Whoever is leading it is going to have to handle pastoral needs and concerns, and contact with the pastor of the host church as well as with other pastors in the area provides an essential network for support and accountability. For instance, the pastor of the host church came in at the end of the service yesterday to participate in special prayer offered for the military son of the Laotian pastor who is leaving this week for Iraq. I think working on this point is the key to carrying out numbers 3 and 4, below.

3- Ask them what they need. Perhaps it is English classes for adults, or tutoring for school children, or clothing and household goods for newly-arrived families, or information on local healthcare and social services. Immigrants often don’t know “how things work here”, so they need someone to whom they can talk safely and ask questions which they might be afraid “sound dumb”. We can help in many ways to let them feel more comfortable among us.

4- Find out if their pastors/leaders, children’s workers, and other volunteers would like training. There are so many resources available here that they do not have in their home countries. Most of this training could easily be provided by local pastors and people in our churches. It doesn’t have to be terribly formal. It can be just one-on-one.

5- Accept their invitations and their gifts. They have much to offer, and they are very pleased when we accept it with gratitude. In this way, you can participate in some really fun festivities and eat some really good food! It is also a very down-to-earth way of showing respect, acknowledgement, and acceptance for other brothers and sisters in Christ.