God Provides
God PROVIDES.
Last year, when God said go to Sulimanyah, I said yes, not knowing where the money was going to come from. God gave me supporters…It was thousands of dollars, and when I got back, I still owed over $1,000.
God provided. Almost to the very penny when I got back.
So, when He called me back here this year, for a longer period of time, I questioned where the money was going to come from. Heck, being here over the past few months, periodically, I still questioned how it was all going to get paid off!
How dare I? How dare I when He had just shown me His provision in a powerful way! When will I learn??
The Courtney’s agreed to let me live with them and eat with them in exchange for sometimes watching their children. This was a huge blessing, because that accounts for most of my expenses here.
GOD PROVIDES.
In the beginning, God gave me supporters with generous donations. Some big, some small, all generous. Even with these generous donations I am very grateful for, I left with over $3,000 still left in debt, not yet accounted for.
GOD PROVIDES
I received an email about a week ago, saying I still owed a little under $3,000.
I received another email this week saying that there was $750 that hadn’t been included yet, so it dropped me to a little under $2,000 thanks to donations from my church in Waco and from an anonymous donor, of whom I am very grateful for.
GOD PROVIDES
Last Friday, I found $110 dollars that I had hidden away when I left America that I didn’t know I had.
GOD PROVIDES
Yesterday, as I was counting what I had made teaching English here and various other small, random jobs, I realized that it was going to be enough to cover the rest of the balance. Perfectly.
GOD PROVIDES
Thank you, Lord!
And thank all of you who have supported me. Prayerfully, financially,etc. I am beyond grateful.
Since you last saw me…
Ashley once did a “since you last saw me post”. I thought is was genius. So, I’m going to shamelessly copy her:
- Ashley and I filmed a commercial for a local salon. After teased hair, orange skin, WAY too much make-up, 1 manicure, and 1 pedicure…we filmed a commercial. (And had to go teach class like that. My student who speaks the least English said: “You look very beautiful today.” Interesting.)
- The celebration after Ramadan: It was so fun to see the city alive again!! People were everywhere…kids riding horses…everyone dressed in fancy new clothes…chocolate being passed out all over the place…it was so fun!
- Cats invaded. Many of you may know of my distain for cats. And they are currently EVERYWHERE. They multiplied and there are cats all around our street. (And if you leave a door open..beware…they will come in.)
- PLC sent 3 kids to surgery successfully!
- Emma and Jenna have now learned letters J, M, E, N, A, E, I, O, U, L, R, S, T, and now P. Whoot!
- We had a rodeo in pre-school. (Including calf-roping, barrel races, oil relays, quick draws…)
- I have finished teaching 2 classes at Millennium (where I teach adults English at night) and am on my 3rd.
- A new, BIG grocery opened
- No one could ever find season 2 of lost. At least, a non-corrupted version.
- Matt and Cayla came and went. (Although they are coming back!)
- Jessica, Jeremy and Cayla had birthdays
- Micah turned 2.
- Josh left. 😦
- Jeff and Erin had their baby!
- Ashley and I made sorbet. It took 8 hours and I don’t think I’ll ever do it again, but you know…it wasn’t half bad.
- It rained for 5 days straight!! It. was. awesome!
- It cooled off and is actually kind of cold.
- Showhan taught us how to make yuprah and shifta. Way more work than I thought.
- Bella, the beloved dance video Michael loves (and hated by everyone else), has been replaced successfully by a video about balls. Thank goodness.
- Micah talks more everyday and learns new words all the time. Our new favorite is “shooey, shooey, cat!” Thanks, Ash!
- Emma is like a sponge and just soaks up everything. She only has to hear Bible verses once (so far) and knows them. She learns sooo much sooo fast. It’s crazy cool!
- Ruth, whose Irish, has now been 2 America twice since I left America.
- Ashley and moved back out of the Courtney’s house into the Priors.
- We moved back to the Courtneys. (Although, when Ruth gets back, we will move back across the street.)
- A giant hole was dug in front of house in the street. No one knows why.
- Ashley and I finished Friends. Seasons 3-10.
Ok, I think that’s more than anyone wanted to know…I’d say I’d try to be better about posting…but I’m trying not to make promises I’m unlikely to keep…so let’s just say, “Inshallah, I’ll post more often”
Daryan Passed Away: March 20, 2009 – September 4, 2009
Daryan passed away earlier this week. After over a month in the hospital in Turkey, his body finally just gave out on him a few days ago.
It’s hard to write this, so I didn’t for several days, but I knew that I needed to in the end. We really thought he was going to make it. We really did. I did. I don’t have any profound words to say, or anything to make this ease the pain of anyone, but I know regardless of what’s going on right now: God Was, and Is, and Is to Come. No matter what, blessed be the name of the Lord. I don’t understand it; I can’t fathom it, but He is still Worthy.
Pray for his family. Pray for the staff here and abroad. I know many of you have read this same post over and over on so many of our blogs. But, please, even though you just read another post about it, don’t neglect to pray. People are still grieving and will be for a while. May people be drawn to Him during this time.
To learn more about him and his story, check out: www.preemptivelove.org/blog
Daryan…Pray: Aug 31st
They are going to try to take the tubes out of his lungs today. Pray today. It might be his last chance. They may not int-abate him again. Pray, please pray. Today, right now. Pray. God is still the God of miracles.
Check out his story at www.preemptivelove.org/blog
Barat: The holiday we didn’t know about
On Wednesday night, Ashley and I were in the kitchen, chilling, eating dinner, when we hear these loud pops. These are not uncommon. The kids in the neighborhood have these “firework” type things, that pop when you throw them on the ground. They had been especially popular the past week or so, since we had a giant firework display, complements the PUK, since they won the election.
However, the kids got a little ambitious, and started throwing them at the house. Wouldn’t have been too big of a deal, however, these things are LOUD. So, I go outside, tell them to stop. Do they? No. But, not all of them now are aimed at the house, some are back in the street where they belong.
An hour or so later, Josh comes in and asks us if we knew it was halloween. We didn’t. Apparently, it was a holiday that they celebrate 2 weeks before the beginning of Ramadan, and they call this holiday, Barat. Basically, all the kids go door to door and get candy.
We didn’t know.
Then, our neighbor friend that comes in “unexpectantly” all the time, Baveal, comes in, “hello!”, he shouts, with his hair all spiked up. We give him some pixie sticks, and then realize we are going to need more candy.
So we race to the corner dukan, and get a container of candy and then grab the stools and sit our side. And wait. We must have looked so funny because we were so excited to join in on the fun…excitedly waiting for a kid to come by. Maybe too excited.
Anyways, we start to see kids come by, and so we give out candy to everyone we see, which wasn’t too many. We were a little late in joining the fun. (That’s why the kids were throwing the things at our house.)
It was a cool night through, because after the festivities ended, we hung out with the neighborhood kids for a while, playing games, singing songs, playing tag. And they definitely got more candy than anyone else, because we had so much left over.
Oh, well. Such was the holiday that we didn’t know about, but tried to celebrate anyway. 🙂
Teaching English…who woulda thunk?
I’m currently teaching English a couple of nights a week to college age students and older at a school in the city. First of all, it’s funny, because after this past year, I really didn’t think I would be “formally teaching” again, or at least, not for a while. But, here I am, and.. I’m actually kind of enjoying it. (I’ll also be teaching 2 girls here pre-school here starting in Aug and co-teaching a gymnastics class…and by co-teaching, I mean helping out my fellow intern/new roomate Ashley. She’s really the master here..but I’ve had a few years experience myself. 🙂
Granted, this is a different age group (middle school students verses college age and older) and the group I teach here, pay a fee for classes, so they may be a little more motivated, but it’s funny…some things are very different, but some things never change.
Things that are different:
1. They are paying for their education and seem to genuinely want to learn.
Things that are the same:
- Students still talk when the teacher talks.
- Cell phones are annoying!
- Students still cheat. All of us have had issues with that and administration saying it’s not a big deal because in the end they are only hurting themselves. Although I partially agree, yes, they are hurting themselves, I find it frustrating that it is tolerated and wonder if they will ever learn. I’m told it’s the culture.
- Some things are literally foreign to try to teach.
- ie: Dating. There were several sections of a chapter recently that used dating as an example/the basis for the section. Dating is literally a foreign concept here. No one dates, at least, not one-on-one like we normally think of when we say dating. It was interesting trying to explain this concept.
5. Students still laugh at their teachers. For some reason I still haven’t quite figured out: They think I’m funny: Or, at least, they laugh at me often. I mean, who wouldn’t: I’m constantly drawing funny drawings to explain, acting obscure words out, having them interact in ways not normally associated with traditional school. Apparently, I’m funny. It’s kind of nice to be funny..not a word typically associated with me..but hey…I’ll take it, even if they are laughing at me. 🙂
Even though there are days that I do not want to teach, I’m actually finding I’m enjoying it. A lot. They are a fun group. I’ll keep you updated as the semester continues.
Daryan Update
Daryan pulled through surgery ok, but a huge part of the battle is whats yet to come (recovery and weight gain)…please pray for him as he recovers from surgery and as he returns to Iraq. Pray that he will be properly nourished and will recover properly.
I’m here…
hey guys,
Just a quick update. I’m here! Yeah! The team and the interns are wonderful and we are all very busy with work…So, I might not be able to update quite as often the next couple of weeks, but I will do the best I can. 🙂 Just wanted to let you know I’m here and loving it! (Tonight is one of the interns birthdays, so we are going to have a little fiesta…) Fiesta because she loves Mexican food. Ok, will blog soon.
It’s been awhile…
It’s been awhile..
Not that I haven’t written posts, I just haven’t published them…it sort of became my “online journal” for a while, and I didn’t want to publish anything I wrote…I got a little “web-shy”, BUT, now I’m back (for all 3 of you that read this). I’m about to leave for 6 months and honestly, none of it truly hit me until yesterday…and it came like a flood.
I guess I write this to ask for your prayers. May I say goodbye well. May I really give all this to God. (I can be a control freak.) May I truely prepare for what God has ahead. May I have JOY in and through all of this. (May I remember why I’m going…why I believe He called me.) More important than any of this selfish, self-pitying stuff: May God be glorified through all this. May what He wants be done.
I’m so excited to be there! I got emails from Aud and Christin today while they were in the Istanbul airport, and it really reignited my excitement! I want to be faithful in the days I’m here…and faithful the days I’m there too.
I’m going to try to update this frequently while I’m there, maybe add some pictures? (I had some complaints that I never publish any pictures.) Dually noted. See you on the flip side!
My “interesting” trip back…
We (Audrey, Ruth, Peter, Chris and I) traveled to Istanbul. No big deal. The trip on Azmar was relatively painless (unless you consider that the plane left hours later than we were told…but that’s kind of normal for Azmar, so no big deal…).
Anyone ever read, “And Then There Were None, by Agatha Christie? That’s kind of what is was like saying bye to everyone…one by one everyone slowly dissapeared. It was sad. 😦 Anyways, Istanbul was fun. So fun, because we really just got to walk around the city and enjoy the ocean (saw a TON of jellyfish) and enjoy the breeze. It was great.
Then Audrey and I get on our plane to London. It wasn’t a bad flight really, we got to debrief with ourselves and really talk, which was awesome. We also got to play an amazing card game, entitled SPANKED. We are bringing it to Baylor. Then we are told that we are being re-routed to Birmingham, England. Because they had to evacuate the control tower. Oh, good. Those are words everyone wants to hear.
So, we are re-routed and then, once we are there, the captain explains. Apparently, the fire alarm went off in the control tower, so they had to evacuate. And we didn’t have enough fuel to circle, so we went to Birmingham to re-fuel. Honestly, it really didn’t take that long, but when Audrey and I first heard the captain say that, we laughed so, so hard (when we first heard we were being re-routed.) Because that makes perfect sense. Of course we would be re-routed. (It was a great moment and the perfect end to the trip.)
Then while we are being re-fueled, Audrey makes friends with a family from Turkey behind us, and I kind of tag-along. Then I start playing a hand-game with the little girl of the family. Little did I know what was ahead. After we played my hand-game, she wants to play one of her own…No big deal, right? Wrong! This game involved hitting me repeatively. I’m sure I was supposed to do something, but those rules were not explained to me…After it’s time to sit back down, the girl keeps reaching through the seat and terrorizing us. She continues doing this for a while…she was a scary little girl….think Finding Nemo…Darla… (Ok, so she wasn’t quite that bad…but she was kind of scary…)
OK, so we finally land in London, and Audrey and I part ways…(It was so, so sad!) Then we each are told (seperately) that we have to go through customs and leave the airport. Great. Neither of us were planning on leaving the airport. (For all those that told us in Iraq that London shuts down at night, you were not kidding!) So, I can only tell you my half of the story, I only heard from Audrey earlier about her adventure…
So, here I am, but I’m being shuffled around the airport, and I get mixed up with all the people who missed their flights because of the control tower mess…so, they start offering free hotel vouchers and courtsey bags with things like toothpaste in them. When they finally get to me, I explain that my flight is the next morning and I’m wondering what I need to do and where I need to go..they tell me they can’t help me and the hotel and pouch is not for me. I tell them, yes, I understand this, but where do I need to go? (Because the last time I came through, they just sent me through the terminal and had me wait inside the terminal for my 9 hour lay-over…not this time. They shut the terminal down.) They tell me I have to leave the airport. Oh, good.
So, I start leaving with everyone, through customs, and fortunate for me, and really, honestly, by the grace of God, I run into an amazing customs lady (with bright red hair and the most amazing accent). She saw my face was red (big suprise, right?), and kept asking me what was wrong. At first I told her nothing, but of course she doesn’t believe me and gets off her seat and gives me a hug. (Is she allowed to do that?) She makes me explain the situation, and then explains to me that I don’t have to leave the airport, just the “secure area”. So she tells me that I can’t have a red face, because you never know when you are going to meet the love of your life, and it just might be Ben Affleck (apparently he came through her customs line before…). Gosh, I have never been so grateful. So, I go through customs(and get a really cool stamp), grab a coffee or chai, really, (per her request), then take my backpack, find a bench, and try to sleep for a few hours. (But of course, these are the “cleaning hours” and so they were cleaning all around me and under me…) It was an interesting night, to say the least, but I wasn’t the only one doing this, so it made me feel better…at 5am, I wake up, go upstairs, go through security, and just kind of wander around for the rest of the time…it was an intersting trip…apparently Audrey had a similar experience in her Terminal, or right outside her terminal…
Ok, if you honestly read all that…wow…I’m sorry it was so long. Anyways, so that was the trip home…I’m glad to be back, but I really do miss Kurdistan a lot…especially the people I’ve come to know and love…I’m adjusting, but again…there’s a lot I’m honestly having toruble adjusting to, and not just culture-shock type stuff…I’m still trying to work through all of this, and I honestly can’t pinpoint all of it, but, my prayer is that what I learned will grow in me, and not die…that it would actually take root and grow…
failing and falling 