The Rollercoaster Life of Faith

This week, and today in particular, has been an emotional rollercoaster as we alternate between exhilaration and despair, exhilaration at God’s provision… and despair at all the additional work & expenses associated with moving and going back to Africa, things that just seem to multiply as the time for departure approaches! Welcome to our life of living by faith! This isn’t pie-in-the-sky living by faith. It’s where-the-rubber-meets-the-road living by faith.

Ask anyone who lives like this and they’ll tell you that it’s usually not smooth sailing with the calm, nonchalant assurance that God will provide. It’s more like walking along the edge of a cliff, with a yawning chasm ready to take advantage of your slightest misstep on one side, and God’s sustaining hand on the other. His hand will catch you if you slip and fall, but will not always prevent you from falling in the first place. After all, without the chasm and the fall, you will not appreciate His helping hand! And falling and being caught makes a far better story than merely being prevented from slipping in the first place, doesn’t it?

Today, first of all, we stood amazed at God’s hand of provision. Two people contacted us: one to increase her level of support significantly, and the other to join us in ministry for the first time. This leaves us now only $195/month short of our budget. Quite a change from only two days ago! Praise God for that!

Then we saw the chasm on the other side: the list of expenses still before us for visa applications, for equipment and supplies, for car repairs, for cleaning, for moving, for shipping, and more. Yikes! Our hearts and experience tell us that God will bring it all together, probably right at the very last minute. Our heads and emotions tell us that there is no possible way it will ever happen in time. Isn’t this an exciting way to live?!!!

Haha, actually it is! But I’m too tired right now to care. It’s late and I’m exhausted, so I’d better go to bed and get some sleep. Things will no doubt look much better in the morning :) Good night!

Things Are Looking Up!

$2,000! Holy cow! That’s what it was going to cost us to ship our box spring and mattress over to Burkina! So much for our great idea. When we read that in an e-mail from the shipping company, we knew we were going to have to find another way to get a good night’s sleep in Africa! So off we trekked to see what Canadian Tire and Wal-Mart had to offer.

Do you know what we discovered? The “Bed in a Box”. Did you even know such a thing existed??? Well, it didn’t when we first went to Burkina, but believe me, it does now! It’s a full-sized, mixed foam mattress that has been specially compressed into a box the size of a large tent, and weighs about 90 lbs (40 kg). Once unpacked and released, it is guaranteed to expand to normal size and provide a comfortable night’s rest for years to come. We tried out a floor model. We loved it. We bought it.

Apart from that, we spent much of the day on the Internet and the phone, checking out prices on carpet cleaning (to leave our townhouse as clean as when we got it), a new windshield for our car (it has some cracks from stones and we’d like to give it back to Kathy’s dad in good shape), a new battery for my laptop (after 5 years, the battery only lasts 20 minutes per charge now), and a myriad of other things. I’d really like to get a new laptop since this one is showing its age and likely won’t last much longer in the extreme temps and dust of Burkina, but we can’t afford it right now. C’est la vie.

I also spent some time bringing our financial records up to date, filling out a ministry expense report for July, and, almost on impulse, rechecking our ministry budget for return to Burkina to see if there was anything we could trim to help reduce the amount of funding we needed. Imagine my surprise and delight to discover that the premium for our overseas health insurance coverage was incorrect! It was nearly double what it should be. When I corrected that and factored in several new financial partners that God had brought on board over the past few weeks, our budget shortfall dropped to a mere 7%! Wow!

As you can see in the sidebar, we’re now only $340/month away from 100% and permission to buy plane tickets and head off to Burkina. Praise the Lord, things are looking up!

Happy Birthday, Mom!

One of the bittersweet things about going overseas again is doing things or seeing people and wondering if it may be the last time. I remember the first time we went to Burkina Faso in 1997. Kathy’s parents were in their late 70s already and it was tough for them to see us leave for the next four years, and for us too, not knowing if either of them would be alive when we got back. So I asked God to please allow us to return to see them at least one last time. He was gracious and we got to come home and see them several more times before Kathy’s mom passed away in early 2005.

We’ve made it a point when we’re home in Canada to go and spend time with our parents on their birthdays. This becomes especially important to us as the time for our departure draws closer.

Today, we drove up to Huntsville and spent most of the day with my mom. It’s her 77th birthday and we wanted to seize the occasion and help her celebrate it.

She told us not to bring any presents, so we disobediently got some anyway and enjoyed watching her open them. Then we took her out for lunch at a unique restaurant called “Three Guys and a Stove”. By the time we were done, it was pouring rain outside and we had to run for the car. And once we got back to her place, it was raining so hard that we had to wait in the car for 20 minutes until it settled down enough to make a run for the back door.

None of this is a big deal in the overall scheme of things, but these are the things memories are made of, the kinds of things we will look back on with fondness and nostalgia when we get tired, lonely, and discouraged in the years ahead in Burkina. Happy birthday, Mom!

A Long Day (But a Good One!)

Thursday was a killer. I went to bed well after midnight, had to get up at 6 a.m.(an early morning person I am not!), and didn’t get to bed again until after midnight. But this was worth it because we were scheduled to spend some time that day with our friends at Canadian Baptist Ministries (CBM) in Mississauga.

Kathy & I serve with Wycliffe Bible Translators, but we are also Strategic Associates with CBM through our Baptist church membership and the fact that our ministry reflects CBM’s strategic focus areas (outreach, discipleship, leadership development, and sustainable community development). Since coming home to Canada three years ago, the folks there have kept in touch with us and invited us to participate with them in a number of ways, from a family retreat to a partnership development presentation.

Yesterday, they invited us to give an updated presentation of our ministry during their morning chapel time, and prayed for us. We also got to touch base and discuss a number of relevant issues with a couple of folks over breakfast and lunch. We appreciated the insights and broader perspective of ministry that these people could share with us.

Later on in the afternoon, we dropped in to see a friend at the PAOC (Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada) headquarters. While we were there, we got to meet the new General Superintendent (although we’re embarrassed to say that we didn’t realize who he was at the time!). However we had a pleasant chat together. He was particularly interested in the fact that we serve in Burkina Faso since his son had spent some time there too.

By this time, the late night, the early morning, and the good food began to take its toll. We found a parking lot, scooted back our seats, and had a short siesta. Getting back into the habit of taking a daily siesta is an important part of our preparation for returning to Burkina, don’t you think? :)

The reason we got home again so late was due to a very pleasant evening we spent with our friends and Wycliffe co-workers, Paul & Libby Hooper. They are the people God initially used to direct us into ministry with Wycliffe back in the late 80s, and who encouraged and helped us so much along the way. They have also been our direct supervisors over the past three years and we couldn’t have asked for better people to serve under.

Kathy’s still been researching airfares and the best workable deal she could find at this point is a flight for $2100 each. The good news is that we have funds available for the airfare once we reach 100% of our required funding and get permission to return to Burkina. And in the funding department, we’re glad to report that the remaining need has dropped from $1200/month a couple of weeks ago to only $920/month now. Thank God for these new partners! Please keep praying for just a few more...

Seek Ye First...

Just recently I read an interesting quote: “Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem more afraid of life than death.” (James F. Byrnes)

This sounds like a variation on Jesus’ words in Matthew 6:25-33, which conclude with, “So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”

It's hard to think in terms of opportunity as our planned departure date draws steadily nearer and the funds necessary to leave and serve God in Burkina are still not completely in sight! But experience has taught us that God can be counted on, that he will provide what we need if we focus on what he’s called us to do. It’s never a question of IF he will provide, but WHEN and HOW. That’s the adventure part! We got an example of it today.

We were at the gym, exercising the parts of our bodies that don’t normally get a workout on the computer, when it happened. A lady on her way out of the gym came up to Kathy and said, “You’re the reason I came here today.” Kathy must have looked a little stunned because the woman went on to say that she had read our latest EMU in the church bulletin and the Lord was giving her no rest. He wanted her to get involved in our ministry. How could she do that?

Wow! Now that’s God at work! Stay tuned to see what he’s going to do next.

How To Spend A Long Weekend

Serious sorting and packing has begun. Josh and his girlfriend, Melissa, came up this weekend to help. They tackled the big job of packing our books in plastic bag-lined milk crates (to help protect them from moisture and possible water damage). Kathy organized that task and a few others. Administration/organization is one of her strong points, an invaluable ability whenever we're going on a trip or moving. I can do some, but not near on the scale that she can. I'm better at detail work, and grunt work, doing what I'm told. That's actually why Kathy & I get along so well. She tells me what to do and I do it! :)

I spent most of the day going through filing cabinets and files, trying to determine what we needed to keep for future use or reference, and consigning the rest to the scrap paper pile or the shredder. My office looks like a bit of a disaster zone! And I haven’t even started on my desk yet!

Up until last night, we weren’t sure if we were going to be doing a presentation at a church up near Orillia this evening or not. I had just begun working on putting an appropriate one together in case it was a go when the pastor finally called and asked if we could do it next Sunday instead. That was great with us because it allowed us to concentrate more on our time with Josh & Melissa today. And when we saw the traffic on the northbound highway just crawling through Barrie and further north, we were doubly thankful. It’s a holiday long weekend here, but we never expected the northbound lanes to be so congested! That being the case, it’s doubtful we could have made it to the church on time even if we’d left considerably earlier than normal.

Next Sunday, we were originally scheduled to do “An Evening With Wycliffe” presentation at a church in Aurora. But the event was cancelled due to an anticipated poor turnout. For another event earlier in the summer, they had anticipated a turnout of at least 100 people. Only 17 showed up. We can take a hint :)

This coming week promises to be busy with appointments and visits with friends and partners. And more paperwork and packing. I’d better go to bed in decent time tonight to make sure I get my beauty sleep. You don’t want to be ugly when you’re doing paperwork or packing, never mind visiting people!

The Cost of a Good Night's Sleep

Preparations for departure are continuing to ramp up. We purchased several packages of Ziploc bags and garbage bags for added protection in storing personal effects, along with a few rolls of tape to help seal boxes and bags, and have started packing. Several friends have offered us storage space in their basements for our temperature and moisture sensitive stuff. Non-sensitive stuff will go into my father’s barn like last time. We’re thanking God for each of these folks because the cost of a commercial storage unit is just not in our budget! It’s another example of the importance of teamwork in our ministry.

I’ve started making some inquiries about the cost of shipping a few things overseas via airfreight. Some of you may be wondering why we don’t ship by sea. Wouldn’t it be cheaper? The short answer is yes. But for what we have, shipping by air will not cost that much more, provides less opportunity for theft, will be much more direct, and will take only a couple of days max compared to several months by sea freight.

One of the main things we want to ship over this time is a box spring & mattress. Isn’t that a bit extravagant, you ask? Well, first of all, you need to be aware that box springs & mattresses as we know them are not available anywhere in Burkina. They simply don’t exist. Nor is there any company importing them.

During our past terms in Burkina, we’ve tried virtually every form of bed available except a roll-up nylon mat on the ground (which is about as comfortable as an air mattress without any air). When we first went over to Africa, someone suggested a waterbed, reasoning that the water would help keep us cool in the hot season. So we tried that… and discovered that exactly the opposite was true! Both the air in the room and water in the bed would heat up over the course of the day. At night, however, the air would cool a bit, but the water took much, much longer for any noticeable drop in temperature. The end result was like sleeping on a big hot water bottle for most of the night! And no matter how many baffles are in there, anyone turning over would cause the other to bounce around like a ship at sea (and a stormy one at that!).

We’ve slept on camp cots with thin foam mats. That’s doable for a couple of nights, but soon gets quite uncomfortable. There are thicker foam mats, but it’s soft foam that you sink right down into. Imagine spending hot nights with that stuff wrapped around you like insulation and you’ll be cooking just thinking about it!

A few years ago, they came out with a harder foam for use as a mattress. The problem was that it was too hard. It was like sleeping on a table! (Go ahead. Ask us how we know that :) Thus the box spring & mattress idea, born out of desperation to get a good night’s sleep. After trying everything else, we're convinced it’ll be worth every cent that it costs to ship those things over there!