Today, walking home from taking Drew to school, I saw a bald eagle gliding over the trees just past our house. There’s one that lives somewhere near here. We’ve seen it (and another) many times. And that got me thinking about how much we’ve enjoyed being here. University Place is definitely “suburb”. It’s definitely not “inner city” (I’m pretty sure we never saw an eagle in all our years living on the Hilltop in Tacoma). But it’s urban, too. And we’ve really enjoyed being here–to be surrounded by trees, grass and quiet streets. In Puebla, you don’t have too many places like our neighborhood.
But, it’s definitely harder to know and see the neighbors here (as good as they are). In Puebla winter is over by now and it’s mostly all sunshine all day long. Fresh fruit and vegetables are cheaper and more abundant. High, really high, mountains are all around us.
So we are thankful for where God has put us and count our blessings in both places. And “good bye” is a constant refrain for missionaries–with apologies to C.S. Lewis who claimed “A Christian NEVER says goodbye!”
*And “baches” in the title is pronounced “ba-chays”. It is the Mexican word for “pothole”. (maybe it’s used in other countries too; I don’t know).
8 hours driving time. 528 miles. 3 states. 2 time zones. 1 stop for gas and food. 2 mountain passes. 2 stops for the views. 2 snowstorms. 2 rain”storms”. 129 strong gusts of wind. 5 Adventures in Odyssey stories. 2 Thomas the Tank Engine episodes. 1 movie. That’s our trip from Boise by the numbers!
It was a good trip. Our kids, once again, rock when traveling. When Gavin melted down at about the 3 hour mark we knew it was time for food. We filled his little belly (chicken nuggets from BK) and everything was great.
We pulled up to Grandma’s and Opa’s house at 5 PM and everyone was happy. And we were thankful for the safe trip.
We pulled up to our own house at 7:30 PM and everyone was happy. And we were thankful for our own place!
Well, after a full day here, we’re mostly packed, the kids are in bed (Gavin’s fall-asleep time: 5 min; Drew’s: 15; Fiona’s: 30), the gas tank is topped up. We’ll take off about 8:30 am and gain an hour pretty early on (!). Hopefully we can find a place to eat at roughly the five-hour mark (Yakima?) and then get into Tacoma around 5 pm.
It’s been a good time. We’ve probably had better, more serious responses here than just about anywhere else. I think we’re doing a better job of communicating our plans and needs this year than last, but this is a pretty sharp group of churches here. It was a privilege to be here. And, it was nice to get 14/16 days of sunshine, with only one day of rain and another day of …snow!
On the other hand, we’re ready to be back home, to get back into our routine, get Drew back into school, back to thesis work, etc…oh yeah…
The Pipers have a back yard full of puppies here in Kuna–4 dogs and 8 puppies (they’ve sold 3 from when we first arrived). Last week Gavin and Fiona helped give the puppies a bath. Here are the results:
We got an insider’s report of the Hati earthquake the other day when we met with Jason and Sharon Nighteingale. They arrived the morning of the earthquake and here is Jason’s report and Sharon’s. And, we’re sure you could still give to EBM’s work in Hati.
We got our little dose of global warming in Idaho today. Ok, maybe that’s a tired little joke, and very unoriginal, but here are some of the photos:
Update: ok, strike a blow for global warming. The snow is gone and our snowmen are lonely–they’re freaking out it’s so warm! Actually it’s freezing tonight and we’re optimistic they’ll make it through the night!
And we’ll put our Idaho photos into an album that you can see here full size, or below:
One of the talks that we give is about discipleship, based on Titus 2:1-8. It’s a passage that reflects how members of the church are interrelated: older men, older women, younger women, younger men. We like to point out that we all fit in one of those categories! And we’re all to teach and learn from one another: older men being leaders, worthy of respect, older women being reverent and training younger women. Younger women loving their families. Younger men learning and speaking rightly. And you can make a strong case that each group is to impact and help the others, starting from the “olders” (both men and women) and moving to the “youngers”. Each group contributes and learns and benefits from the others.
One of the major themes beside this interdependent discipleship is self-control. We usually never have time to discuss this other than a mention in the time we have. It’s interesting that each group but the older women are specifically told to have “self-control” (NIV). There are three cognates (different forms that come from a root word) that the NIV translates as “self-controlled” and they all spin off the Greek word for wisdom (sophia, from which two of my nieces are named). The initial indication would be that Paul wants these people to let their minds–wisdom–control their bodies and actions. And the older women are given a couple of specific examples for practicing self-control: “not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine.” So a big part of teaching and helping one another is encouragement and accountability toward…temperance, to use the old-fashioned word.
Now Cretans, (or “cretins”?), the people Paul’s letter was directed to, were pretty much the opposite of this: Titus 1:12. And I would say that the U.S., and maybe you could generalize that to Western-market-driven-consumer culture, pretty much is headed in the opposite direction. And young men especially are an out-of-control group. In fact our society celebrates that “out-of-control”-ness and laughs about it and uses it–just look at ESPN.com/Page2, all the men’s magazines, and too many movies to list. On second thoughts, maybe you shouldn’t check them out. So it’s worth paying attention to voices in the church (and outside) who call us all (and young men particularly) to self control. Let wisdom control your mind and your mind your appetites. Contrary to popular culture and a even lot of voices in science and psychology, it’s possible and good.
I would like to start this out by saying that we have the best kids in the world. No bragging, no kidding. They went more than five hours in the car, from Tacoma to La Grande, Oregon without a stop. Ok, having a DVD player in the car helps, but they didn’t watch movies the entire time, more like half (the Incredibles and some old Schoolhouse Rock songs). So they were pretty awesome, and the road was smooth and clear. And we copped out and ate KFC in La Grande–I think we should always be bold and eat at some unknown local place, but let’s face it, it’s so much easier to stick with what you know. And you gotta hate Oregon’s no pump-it-yourself law at gas stations. I shouldn’t mind it, after all, in Mexico for five years that’s how it was, but it still bugs me in Oregon. That’s why we always go out of our way not to buy gas in Oregon (going back we won’t). Anyway, whine completed, there were some spectacular views. Wow. It’s pretty in the Eastern Oregon mountains.
God is good. I sometimes think about all that could go wrong, about bad things that could happen, from weather, to car problems to accidents. And of course all that could happen and God would still be good. But we’re thankful that it didn’t. Psalm 121:6-8.
And we made it in under nine hours (about 8 hours driving time). We’re staying with the Pipers, Scott and his seven girls. Scott is pastor at the church in Kuna. We got here in time for the start-up dinner, a time to meet with pastors and plan out the meetings in their churches. Suffice it to say we’ll be busy. But it should be good. And I need to quit and get to bed here. Losing an hour from Washington to southern Idaho stinks.
And I complained an awful lot in this post. Sorry!
Tomorrow we leave for Boise at 6 am. The kids are in bed, the car is prepped, the house is cleaned, arrangements are made for people to be here, and Barbara-Lee is packing. Yup, in our household I’m usually responsible for my clothes and she gets everyone else ready. And I’m barely able to get my stuff in order.
So we’ll be there for two weeks at an eleven church missions conference. We’ll be in a couple different churches each Sunday and at a few events during the week. It’ll be a good chance to meet different people, lots of ’em, and to see a new area. We were there seven years ago and it was a great time.
At the same time, I really hate the getting ready process. I like being new places, I usually like even the travel, it’s just the getting ready and the leaving that’s not so good. So I’d better go help before I get whacked over the head…tomorrow, 6 am-4 pm (losing an hour by switching over to Mountain Standard Time), 526 miles, movies in the car, fast food lunch…here we come!
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