Cloudy days

Who would have believed it? We just spent our coldest August of our lives and we are on the equator. Altitude will do that. Our school is at 7300 ft and almost all of our days have had varing degrees of clouds. In fact, last Saturday we were out early for prayer and a walk and not a cloud in the sky. By the time we finshed breakfast, it had clouded over and the clouds remained for the rest of the day. It was July when we left Michigan and we were going to Africa. So we made some packing mistakes. We were warned that it's winter over here now, but our brains just wouldn't let us reach for the sweaters. Oh well, we just wear our long sleeved stuff... alot!

As for our spirits? Mostly we have had sunny days. There is so much here to rejoice in. The kids are great. The staff is caring and supportive. The mission is clear and important. Yet we still let ourselves lose focus and have cloudy days at times. Jeff's was Sunday. He was frustrated with some detailed forms he had to fill out. This was compounded with the fact that the college football season had started and Michigan laid an egg. Somehow he thinks if he could have watched the game, the outcome would have been different.  That's a lot of pressure on one man!

For Jane, Mondays are hard. She still misses her little guys coming and filling her house, heart and arms. Mondays are the times she thinks most about what our kids are doing in the states and distance and time zones make the seperation hard to bridge.

Not complaints, just sharing. Last night before we went to sleep after a long day, we rolled over and asked each other "Are we making a difference?". Too soon to tell?  But it sure helps to clarify the tasks. Cloudy days or not, our "audience" stays the same. Col. 3:23 - Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.  Our theme for the dorm this year is "An Audience of One".  We are trying to instill in our girls that they are to live their lives for the Lord, not for others attention or approval.  The same goes for us. We are here because Christ asked us to come. That really simplifies things. That clears away the clouds.

Sacrifices

The students have arrived, the staff is prepared, and yesterday we had our first worship service together.  As I stood among the students while we sang, I was overcome with emotion. To hear 400+ young people lift up their voices together worshipping our Lord was so powerful and beautiful, an amazing choir!  Then I thought of their parents and how they were worshipping at that moment.  Some were under a tree with no walls around their songs.  Some were worshipping with new church plants singing praises to God for new believers and praying for other hearts to receive the Good News.  Some were meeting in secret knowing God hears their quiet calls to worship.  I prayed that God would let these parents know that their children were celebrating and basking in the Savior’s love!  I prayed that these parents would know that their children would be taken care of to the best of our ability spiritually, emotionally and physically.

Saying goodbye was hard for the girls and their parents.  My heart broke for them.  Thinking about the beginning of school back in Grand Haven and not having my daycare kiddos back in my home and Jeff not being at Lakeshore Middle School, broke our hearts.  But I know God’s tender love and care will cover sacrifices made when answering his call.

The chapel at RVA

Goodbye LMS, hello RVA
Jeff's first day of teaching 8th grade math in Kenya

Ed

We have been in Africa a bit over a month. Things are going well if you ignore the fact that Jane has packed the wrong shoes. "What was I thinking!" is a direct quote. Jeff has jumped from adventure to adventure, first drinking coffee and now bookmarking his favorite zucchini bread recipe (lemon poppy seed is next). Our home is pretty much settled except for those darn bathroom towels that don't match. The dorm is close to being ready. Jeff has his class lists for his 2 sections of 8th grade math and we finally found a printer that we could get to work. We both feel like it is the calm before the storm.

Our dorm has 15 ninth grade girls from 6 different countries with 6 of the girls being brand new to RVA. The schedule starting next Friday is packed like a a missionary's suitcase heading to Africa for 2 years.  The setting here is amazing and the people are better. Tonight we were heading out to get lost on campus. We do this every night, the getting lost part.  It's dark at 7:00 and the campus is on a mountain side. Finding your way for the newbies can be pretty confusing.  As we were walking, we ran into the art teacher, Ed.  Ed has been here for 18 years. We mentioned we were feeling a bit overwhelmed. He empathized, smiled and nodded. Then he said, "If you can remember to find time for Jesus and each other you will do great."

The exact right thing at the right time. Thanks God! Sure there are times when God is silent and we feel alone. But the majority of the time, when we are open to Him, he shows up with skin on. Sometimes we are the ones reflecting God's love. Tonight it was Ed.  Thanks Ed!

When Do I Get An Aid?

When Jeff was a small boy, each Sunday morning the family would pile into a four door, blue, Impala and head to church. At some point they would count how many people were in the car and often the number was 12 1/2 (2 parents, 8.5 kids and the Jeager twins - Jeff was always counted as the half).  This Sunday we rode to church in a white Toyota suv with the steering wheel on the wrong side and 12 1/2 people in the car (this time the 1/2 being Lincoln, not Jeff).   What are the odds?

This was the second time for this 40 minute trip and things were already looking familiar. As we left the asphalt and continued on the narrow dirt road, we had an excellent view of the rural community. Wash being done in the river, papayas being sold, cattle herded, business being carried out and cell phones.... a very diverse picture. It dawned on us that this was a typical day for them. For us being transported by our ABO leaders, it was a cross between, learning, worship, community, all of it very new.

6 1/2 of us were dropped at the church where we were to worship and teach.  It was a wonderful 2+ hours of sharing and worshipping God. For the second Sunday in a row, way too much wonderful food was made for us. It was humbling, also uncomfortable,  how we were held in such high honor. After lunch we had time to talk with Janet, who is the pastor's wife, and serves in ministry in the church. She is an amazing humble servant of God. She is Mary and Martha all rolled into one. Relational with a servant's heart.

Janet teaches 5 year olds at the school where the church meets. She has 38 students in her class. We were stunned, that's a lot of fidgeting!  This lovely, hospitable, gracious, mother and wife is so excited to serve Jesus and advance the kingdom. It is mind boggling to be in the presence of one that is so high capacity and draws absolutely no attention to herself. We are in awe of the grace God has granted her! The Holy Spirit is active in Nakuru.

Jane and Janet outside the school.

Polepole We Learn

Hello from Kenya!!

We are in Nakuru attending our three week Africian Based Orientation. 

So it turns out that it is impossible to function without caffeine. Jeff has been trying to get the monkey of Diet Mt. Dew off his back going cold turkey here in Kenya. He made it one week. We are in "class" 8:30-5:00 each day and he was constantly falling asleep. So he joined the Starbucks generation. Another new thing we learned is it's nearly impossible to figure out how old single women on the mission field are. Also, we met a unicorn - a single, attractive male serving in missions. Very rare!

Our training is very interesting and the learning curve is steep. So far we have been particularly engaged with how to approach learning about a culture. If we ask how, when, or who instead of why, we are much less likely to put someone on the defensive. A phrase to remember is, "Just because it's different doesn't mean it's wrong".

The diversity of those called to serve in Africa is impressive - doctor, ex drug addict, dairy farmer from Minnesota, Ethiopian physics teacher, blond California girl, someone living with a brain tumor that just couldn't wait anymore to spread the good news.  We are particularly inspired by the families that are choosing to pick up and move 9 time zones with their children.  One family with three children ages 7 and under have chosen to chip polepole (slowly in Swahili) away at the enormous number of tribes that have never heard of Jesus. They are going to Northern Kenya to a boarding school that teaches students from 8 nomadic tribes in the region. That blows our minds.  We have become even more convicted with the calling God has placed before us, loving on the children of those serving in the field.  We are so excited to support those missionaries by giving them the knowledge and confidence that their children are safe and being loved while at Rift Valley Academy and in our care.

We thought we would not need to learn Swahili because English was spoken at the school. If we want to engage with any national, it will be far more effective if we make an attempt to talk in something besides English. Almost every national we have met speaks at least three languages, their tribe's, Swahili and English. It makes the most sense to learn Swahili if we want to reach others. Pray that our six decade old brains pick it up fast. For now it's polepole.

Shopping in Nakuru.  It looks like we are going to be OK!

Ready, Aim.... THANKS!

When making a decision the normal process is Ready, Aim, Fire. We made the decision to retire and go to Africa with AIM (Africa Inland Mission) in January, 2017. So it has seemed to us like we have been aiming for 18 months. Obviously, we were not ready to leave 18 months ago and the process has been refining, growing and, among other things, a blessing. We were preparing our hearts and getting our ducks and finding their rows. Our new adventure became common knowledge in our community in October of 2017. The delayed firing (or leaving) led to people seeing us at Meijers and saying, "I thought you were going to Africa?", or, "Are you home already?" Yeah, it seems like we have been aiming for a long time.

Mostly, this time of transition has been filled with counting and crying. We have been counting our blessings and, living in Grand Haven for the last 31 years, there are many. We were welcomed in 1987 so warmly by the schools and the football family that had been created. We were loved by daycare familes that have become a part of our own family. We joined a new group of believers that became our church who came alongside of us and loved us instantly. The blessing of Grand Havenites carried through until the last minute when we were driven to the airport by such dear friends and the crying came again. Being called "a big fat part" of a young friend's family brought tears.  (We think he was trying to be inclusive but Jeff has been eating a lot of cake lately:) Many blessings to count leads to many times of crying!

As we have reached the Fire part of our journey, we are just so thankful to have been a part of Grand Haven. Thanks! That surely is not enough! THANKS! No, not yet! Hmm...I know! A BIG FAT THANKS!

Turning the Page

Yesterday was our last day of work at our first careers. Jeff was asked how it felt, "I'm 90% happy and excited and 80% sad and nostalgic". For a couple that doesn't consider themselves overly emotional, these last few days have been filled with emotion more than 100% of the time.  Just as every coin has two sides, great positives have powerful negatives. We have been blessed to work with amazing people. People that love us and care for us and bring out the best in us. Saying "See you later" to these kinds of people is hard.

Jane has been having a particularly hard time saying goodbye to her daycare crews. Those from the past have been physically removed from our home for some time but the connection remains and is just plan painful to put on hold. The bus bunch that was in her daycare and are still coming before school left her in a crying puddle of goo as they left for school the last time, talk about melancholy! The current group that she feels she is quitting in the middle of and already missing and already lamenting the fact that she won't be a part of their growing up, is a special kind of sadness. Jeff loses his kids every year and, although saying goodbye to them was more emotional than usual, all in all it was pretty normal. Saying goodbye to people that you have worked with for decades, in one case 3 decades, really made a hole. No longer being a part of the Lakeshore Middle School team makes him so thankful for those people and yet empty. Saying goodbye to his Christian brothers from both Lakeshore and Grand Haven High School... it's best just not to think about it.

So yeah, turning this page is really hard to do. It's that whole coin thing, such rich blessed careers leads to a painful moving on. Then we think about the why we are doing this and our courage begins to rise. We have seen multiple amazing answers to prayer to get this far. It doesn't lessen the loss to be moving on to something that we are wholeheartedly committed to do, but it does help your brain wrap itself around this overflowing emotional turmoil that dominates your thoughts. Turning a heavy, beautiful, wonderful, relationship filled page to an adventurous, unknown, God inspired page is pretty blessed, don't you think?