Update...

Update:  Yesterday Garth and I went to Kota Raja to visit Jacob who is still in the police hospital from the surgery on his arm.  He broke two bones and had to have two pins put in.  We are hoping that he will be able to come home some time this afternoon. His Mom is visiting and will be staying with us until Friday.

We are still dealing with kids having stomach and head aches.  Three kids stayed home from school today.  One of our girls had an asthma attack last night.  Thankfully I had Wyatt's inhaler here.  She needed something quick, and the inhaler helped her breathe again.

We have a set of parents on their way here to see their two kids.  I am always so thankful when the kids can spend some time with their family.  I know so many of them are homesick and they really soak up these moments when they can be together with family. 

I was reading the other day in Psalms 25.  In verse 7 it says, "…according to Your love remember me, for You are good, O Lord."  What a great way for Him to remember me.  According to His great love.  What if He remembered me according to my sins, or my good deeds, or how much money I have?  That would be so discouraging.  BUT, that is definately not what He sees when He looks at me.  He sees His great love for me.  Yahoo!  That is so very reassuring!  I am so thankful for that.

So, I think about verses like that when I am feeling discouraged by all the junk that is going on, all the sickness, all the cultural frustrations.  "To You, O Lord, I lift up my soul; in You I trust, O my God!"

Thanks for your prayers.

Love you

We are getting hit!

Well, here is what has been happening in the dorm the past week.  Starting on Tuesday...sickness.  In a big way.  Today we finally were able to see a doctor-12 of the 18 people in the dorm had an appointment.  These were the diagnoses:  strep throat, bronchitis type chest stuff, GI infections or rotovirus type stuff, fevers, headaches, stomach aches...blah, blah, blah.  Some are on antibiotics, some are just supposed to wait it out and see.  Crazy!  Then, on top of all this sickness.  One of our dorm boys, Jacob, was playing basketball on Saturday, went up for a rebound, landed wrong and broke his arm.  Garth took him to one hospital 40 minutes away for x-rays (all the while praying that the power stayed on so the x-ray machine would work.  We lose power all the time.)  Then to another hospital farther away for a doctor to read the x-ray.  And finally to yet another hospital where he was admitted for surgery the following day, today (Sunday).  We were able to get ahold of his parents, who were able to get a next-day flight and get to the hospital before the surgery!!!!!  That is amazing.  It is not common here for things to be done so quickly!  

Let me enlighten you on some interesting facts about how surgery works here.  After an examination, the nurse will hand you a piece of paper with a list of the medicines that will be needed for the surgery or care, and you have to go out to a pharmacy and buy those items before they will begin.  Jacob's parents even had to buy the pins they were going to put in his arm to hold the bones together.  I remember going through all this when Garth went in for his appendicitis.  Such fun!

So the surgery went well today, but he has to stay in the hospital until Tuesday at least, to check for infection.

So, needless to say our plans to go and spend a relaxing day at the beach this weekend did not happen.

As you read this and think of us, please pray for quick healing for Jacob, and for all of the sick dorm kids.

Thanks.

Love ya,

Rachel

The Duet

So, we have this bird here that is super cool.  I listen to it almost every evening.  The other night I was paying special attention to its song.  From what I've learned the male bird starts off the night by singing a short little song.  He repeats it over and over again waiting for a female to join in.  He sings by himself at first, and then eventually the female echoes his song.  It goes like this-Male sings, 5 seconds later the female repeats it exactly.  Sometimes he changes the tune a bit, and she always copies it. After awhile the female echoes get closer, 3 seconds, 2 seconds...until they are singing the same song together.  It sounds so beautiful.

That is exactly how we should be with Christ.  He is there all the time, waiting for us, singing-hoping we will join in.  Sometimes we notice, sometimes we don't.  Our lives are to be a reflection of Him-our song should match His.  As we get to know Him, and as we fall in love with Him, we begin to sing together.  That is when our songs are spectacular-when we are truly living for Him and not our own selfish means.  We are reflecting His glory.

Last night when I was listening for this bird, I noticed that it was singing all alone. The female never came.  I missed her voice.  The song didn't sound as pretty.  Now that I have heard what it sounds like as a duet, I don't want to hear just the solo. We should be like that with Christ.  Once we experience what it is like to be hand in hand, voice to voice, completely in love with the one who created us, why would we go back to anything else?  Why would we want to go back to trying to do things on our own?

I want my life to be a lasting duet sung with my Precious Heavenly Father.

Love

Rachel

My Day

Many of you spent the day sending kids off to school, or at work, or meetings, or maybe braving the bitter cold…

Here is how I spent my day:

I was able to chaperone Grade 6 on their beach trip.  In November each kid in the class wrote their own novel for NaNoWriMo.  The beach trip was in celebration of everyone meeting their goal.  It was awesome!  The weather was beautiful-the boat ride out was spectacular, (except for when Anne's shoe fell through a hole in the boat and we had to turn around and get it). Haha.  On the way there the van's spare tire fell off and then a piece of metal was hanging off the back and had to be tied up to keep from dragging.  Always an adventure!  I felt so blessed to be a part of today.  Most of the kids went snorkeling and we saw such a rainbow of colors under the water with all the fish and coral.  Breathtaking!  

One of the teachers was talking to the kids about a spot on her hand where she had some sand.  The kids were guessing there may have been 100,000 grains of sand in that little spot.  In the Bible in Psalms 139 it says that God's thoughts about us are more numerous than the grains of sand.  That is a LOT of thoughts about little 'ole me, and you!  Pretty cool, huh?

Here are a few pictures:

I gave up the strike!

Well, I am back from my writers strike or I guess you could call it a rebellion against our internet.  After many, many, MANY attempts throughout the last few months to send out emails and losing them to our internet, or trying to open Gmail, but the internet is so slow I couldn’t even get it open…I gave up writing for awhile out of frustration.  Yet I have found out that I need to write, whether I  ever actually send them or post them to my blog, I need to write.  It helps me get through.  It helps me process.  Besides, I think about you guys and stuff I want to tell you all the time.  So when I can’t write it is like a one way conversation.

So, here I am.  The end of our Christmas break.  The dorm kids come back tomorrow.  I am not sure if I am ready, but I sure feel blessed.  I was in such desperate need for a break, and for some quality family time.  That is what this break has been all about.  It has been wonderful.  It was so tough coming late and jumping right in.  I honestly felt like we were playing catch up the whole semester.  Now, we have a fresh start!  Yeah!

We had a few trips to beaches, 2 boat rides, movies nights, (We even got to see Frozen twice, imagine that!) lots of games, some GREAT talks, numerous rainstorms pounding our roof so hard we couldn’t hear each other, good discussions as we read together through Luke, soccer games, Knockout, baking, and inventing new concoctions,  a couple trips to Jayapura, fun with friends, a few motorcycle rides with Wyatt driving…(He does great!), Track Mania, lots of book reading and gobs of laughing.  Doesn’t it sound like fun?  It was fantastic!

This Christmas was so different from Christmas last year-we truly missed our family, the snow, the smell of a fresh pine tree in the house, our big church family, all of our friends…and yet, looking back now on the Christmas we had here, we feel so blessed.  It was so simple.  We had a donated fake tree with only a few ornaments, incredible heat, no family, and only a few gifts for the kids to open, but none of us feel like we missed out.  The kids have commented over and over how this was such a fun Christmas.  It is an answer to prayer.  God met us right where we were.  We felt God’s presence here with us in such a profound way.  We were by ourselves but we never felt alone.  We only had a little but we never felt deprived.  We are so far away from those we love, yet we felt such love all around us here.  It is such a testimony to how God can do so much more than we could ever ask or even imagine.

Thank you for your prayers.  I feel much more equipped to start anew.  Keep praying.  We have so many young kids and I know it will be hard for them to say good-bye to their families tomorrow.  Also, we will be getting a new 7^th grade girl named Hannah.  We want that transition to go smoothly as well as the transition for our family to go from 3 weeks of having Mom and Dad to themselves to having to share us again with 12 other kids.

Love you all-

Rachel