I am tired this week. We have began making plans for our first trip to Uganda and Rwanda. We are certainly excited but to say the least overwhelmed. This week started the shots. Shots, shots and more shots. To say the least, Grace is reconsidering her excitement about traveling to Africa. Madelyn could get hit by a truck and brush it off but Grace; Imagine a very large nurse with a needle in one hand and a determined look on her face, wildly poking at a moving target that is Graces arm with my hand around it. The odds of the needle going into her arm rather than my hand is not 1:1. My hand is in serious danger and I just had the same immunization and I certainly don't want it again, in the back of my hand. We made it. She is now immune to Meningococci. Near fatal death if caught by a teenager but fatal if caught by an 8 year old. The argument, It will be good for you in the long run did not help matters.
I have been continuing my class on the Prison Epistles online at Harding. I absolutely love it. I was sitting on a plane coming back from San Diego after a weekend plagued by delayed and canceled flights, and I realized that I had actually been reading my bible and my text for about 10 hours. I found joy in this. I do not boast because I have to say most of the time was re-reading what some British commentator had to say about Philippians. He doesn't write the way I talk. I can understand why some people get so excited about the depth of this kind of study. I can tell that I already have more confidence and ability to speak God's word (not really very good at it). I find that filling a half hour at bible study is easier. Part of this is that over the last 3 months I have continually prayed for God to give me a greater gift for speaking his word out loud to others. I'm not a great speaker nor a great student of the word but God has energized me through the deep meaning of his word. The pace at which one is expected to read the textbooks and write papers is nearly overwhelming. I certainly need prayers for this. Oddly enough I have been fasting directly for this issue and even my patients ask nearly every day if I have lost wt. Don't know how you can tell in a man who was already at 136.
Our prayer requests are for our trip to Africa. We want to be an encouragement for the Cashes. We ask that we will not be a burden on the Cashes. We ask for a safe flight. We pray that God will connect us to the other missionaries in Rwanda the way he has to the Koonces and the Crowsons.
We ask for prayer for fund raising. We pray for people and churches who can first pray for us and then pray for their giving. We ask God to provide for us in a stable way during our commitment. We pray that God will move churches and people in the year to come and prepare them financially for this giving. We have been in contact with multiple churches and ask that the Holy Spirit will weave our path in with theirs.
We continue to ask for prayers for our families as they are still trying to grasp this entire issue. They are praying and being faithful to this commitment of prayer.
I continually pray for all of you who have prayed for us.
God bless.
