I surrender all, even the things I don't understand

While this is not the best picture of either of us, I like it because Sarah Beth is wearing a tiara--just like the princess she is at heart.

I surrender all.
I surrender all.
All to Thee, my blessed Savior,
I surrender all.

As usual, I am up ridiculously early. We have a team coming in from Texas this morning, and I'm feeding them tonight, so I have lots of work to do. And when I have lots of work to do...I don't sleep. Add to that the fact that Sarah Beth leaves for Uganda tomorrow, and it's a recipe for little sleep. Sigh. When I get to heaven, I'm going to need to sleep for a thousand years just to make up for the sleep I didn't get here on earth.

When we left the States, the goodbyes were terrible. Awful. Friends, family, a beloved church...I literally had to get a different kind of contacts because I had worn out my tear ducts and my eyes were so dry I couldn't wear regular contacts anymore. Now THAT'S a lot of crying! So when I arrived in Russia, I assumed the goodbyes were at an end. I couldn't have been more wrong. It seems that we have done nothing in the year and a half we've been here but say goodbye to people. This week, we say goodbye to the Wickers, the other half of Engage Russia and our dear friends. Besides losing Marc's partner (and ask anyone...they made an incredible team), I am losing a friend and one of my favorite students, and the girls are losing two very special friends. John John is losing Uncle Tim, who has great shoulders to ride through Moscow on because he's so tall. While we are looking forward to seeing what God is going to do with this amazing family, we are selfishly so sad that they are leaving Russia. And they are only the latest family we've said goodbye to...we have said goodbye to many, many friends in our time here, and we know that more goodbyes are on the way as we prepare to be the ones to leave. And that doesn't count unexpectedly having to say goodbye to my dear, dear Teri. So what does all this have to do with surrender?

A lot, it turns out. When we surrendered to be Christ's, we surrendered everything. Our hopes, our dreams, our aspirations, and our relationships. Trusting Christ means trusting Him with everything--even the things that make no sense to us at all. I will not understand Teri's death while I'm here on earth. Never. I will grow from it. I will mature through it. But it won't make sense to me here. I cannot understand many of the circumstances surrounding the goodbyes I've said here on the field. I'm not sure I will ever understand them. But if I am really trusting Christ, then I have to trust that He has all these things in His hands. He is faithful and trustworthy, and so I surrender to Him my need to understand things. I don't have to understand. I just have to trust. I have to admit, though...that's a tall order some days. In fact, it's a God-sized order, one I am completely incapable of fulfilling on my own. So I daily (hourly, minutely) lay down my desire to know and understand, and ask, instead, simply to trust and obey.

Well, there are clothes to iron and pizza crusts to make, so I'd better run. Please pray for the team from FBC Allen, Texas, Hannah and Marc as they are going this week to Cheboksary, Russia, for a mission trip. And please join us in praying for the team from Hinkson Christian Academy here in Moscow that is headed to Uganda tomorrow. Sarah Beth is a member of that team, and she is beyond excited about leaving tomorrow. Her mommy has a few butterflies, but I know she is going to have a life-changing ten days. Wherever you are in the world, I pray that you are daily surrendering your everything to the One who holds the world in His hands, and that you have a breadmaker working on pizza dough right now, too. Blessings to you and yours!

His,
Kellye

Counting it all joy

Sarah Beth and her friends, Rachel and Rebecca Tarleton, at TGIFriday's in Moscow. These girls are pretty much just part of our family--what a blessing they are to us!
The whole gang at TGIFriday's. The girl in the pink at the table behind us is one of Hannah's closest friends, whose mother also had a birthday on the 17th, so we all ended up there together!
A really lovely thing about Russian culture is how much they love flowers. Rebecca and some of S.B.'s other friends gave her beautiful, bright flowers for her birthday. (This is my classroom, by the way.)
More flowers, and more girls we love. Here are Sasha Afanasenko, Amanda Lokke, and Rachel Wicker with Sarah Beth on her birthday.

Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. James 1:2-4

Oh, my goodness! What a week! It has been a busy, busy week, so I am looking forward to a slow, easy Saturday. Sarah Beth is off to the circus for a friend's birthday and then to school for her last Uganda team meeting this afternoon, so she'll be home much later tonight. Hannah spent last night with her care and community group from school. Today, she is headed to school to meet her friend, Chrissy, and then they are going to the mall for lunch and to Chrissy's house for a sleepover. So I won't see her until tomorrow when she meets us for church. For today, then, it's mostly just me and John John. (Did I mention Marc is in Rome?) We have a project to work on for school and some cub scout stuff to do, so we won't be bored.

Tuesday was Sarah Beth's birthday, so we had a great time going to TGIFriday's here in Moscow. Then on Wednesday, she and a group of friends went to Red Square to take pictures and came back to our house for pizza and cookies and a few episodes of The Office, which Sarah Beth got for her birthday. I think she had a wonderful celebration, and we were so thrilled to get to celebrate our princess' 17th birthday. Considering her puny, sickly start in the world, she has turned out pretty well!

I am reading a great book right now, Just Enough Light for the Step I'm On, by Stormie Omartian. The chapter I worked on this week was focused on trials, on finding the light when we go through testing from God, and so I've been thinking a lot about the times in our lives when things just seemed so awful we wouldn't be able to bear it. There have definitely been times of testing in my life. Some of those tests I have passed with flying colors and have not needed to repeat. Some of those tests, unfortunately, I have taken again and again and again, because I can't seem to figure them out. And, of course, there have been tests and trials here on the mission field. Sometimes, those tests have involved dealing with a different culture, different attitudes and a vastly different language. Often, those trials have come in the form of not understanding what other people were doing or why they were doing it. (In those cases, I am definitely learning to (a.) keep my mouth shut, and (b.) try to give everyone involved the benefit of the doubt.) Even something like Marc's travel schedule, which is pretty intense and hard on the family, is a test for me. And one thing I've become convinced of is that surviving these times and even thriving in them is all about intentionality. It all comes down to what we choose to believe, to listen to, to allow ourselves to think.

Let me give an example: this week, Marc is in Rome. Now, Roman history is definitely one of Marc's loves, and he is having a wonderful time being in Rome. But he isn't just in Rome. He's in Rome with his close friend, Mike. And Mike brought his wife, Teressa, who is...you guessed it--one of my close friends. Now, I'm sure you can do the math and figure out that three of our little foursome are together in Rome, one of the most amazing cities in the world. And the one who is not there? Yep, that would be me. And where am I? In Moscow...where it is, even as I write this, snowing. And I have teased Marc about being upset and mad that he is getting to have this whirlwind life while I sit at home with the kids. Then, unfortunately, I realized that I was kind of joking and teasing...and kind of not joking and teasing. I realized that I was kinda, sorta, a little bit upset that my life is so much less exciting and fun than his life. (By the way--he hates his travel schedule, too--he wants to be with us, but that's a whole different blog.) Ouch! How did that bit of ugliness creep in? Because I was believing the wrong thing, listening to the wrong voices, and thinking the wrong way about the situation. So I had to be intentional--every day, I chose to focus on something I was grateful for in this situation. I am thrilled that Marc is with his friend, Mike, who has known him forever and who loves him like only a life-long friend can. I am thrilled that Marc is in Rome, this city he has studied and loved from afar (don't even get me started on how many documentaries I have watched over the last twenty years about Rome!). I have had some time to myself the last couple of days while the kids were still in school, and I have really taken the time for myself, something unusual for me. I am usually a whirling dervish of cleaning and cooking in the afternoons, but I have read books and taken naps the last two days...and really enjoyed it. I have had time to focus on the things I am grateful for here--friends, students, church partners, my fellow teachers, my kids' friends, my parents and sisters and their families, the great company that takes such good care of us here. And because God was faithful to point out to me my little pity party and showed me the blessings of my life so clearly, I have had the best week. I'm tired. Okay, I'm exhausted. And, of course, I miss Marc and can't wait 'til he gets home. But I'm joyful and content that God is working in my life in a tangible way, that some day, my faith will produce endurance, and endurance will have its perfect result, so that I may be perfect and complete...lacking in nothing. That's a big goal, to be sure, but I serve a big God.

Wherever you are in the world, I pray that you are finding joy in your trials, big or small, and that you are enjoying your second cup of coffee with fat-free french vanilla creamer in it. Blessings to you and yours!

His,
Kellye

17?! How is that possible?!

One of my all-time favorite pictures. This is Sarah Beth and her friend, Rachel Tarleton. I don't even remember what they were tickled about, but I do remember them rolling around on my floor giggling like little girls. She is blessed with good friends.
Sarah Beth with Katie Lehman, her English teacher. Katie is just one of those teachers--she has convinced Sarah Beth that she is capable and smart and that English is fun--something her mother couldn't do.
Sarah Beth with her soccer coach and Uganda chaperone, Sarah Schnaidt. Miss Schnaidt is so encouraging to our girl. She is blessed with adults who love her.
Sarah Beth with Ringo, the teddy bear. (She got Jude for Christmas last year. See a pattern?)
Sarah Beth's amazing poster for Hamlet. She is really creative, and this is in her English teacher's classroom. Sarah Beth loves Hamlet almost as much as I do.

How blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in His ways. When you shall eat of the fruit of your hands, you will be happy and it will be well with you. Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine within your house, your children like olive plants around your table. Behold, for thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. Psalm 128: 1-4

I have only a few minutes this morning--it is Sarah Beth's 17th birthday, and she requested buttermilk biscuits for breakfast, so I need to get cooking (literally). I know every mother who reads this will understand how I am feeling today. Wasn't it yesterday that she was a tiny baby? Wasn't it yesterday that we took her home from the hospital? Wasn't it only yesterday that I took off the tip of her tiny finger with the fingernail clippers? Okay, so I wasn't mother of the year material early on.

I've written a ton about how great I think Sarah Beth is. I totally recognize that I am biased by my absolute adoration for my own child. But if you knew her...you would think she is great, too.
The thing that I like best about Sarah Beth is that she is absolutely her own person. She has no regard whatsoever for what is popular. Her favorite band is The Beatles, but she also loves a Russian singer (I can't remember his name) and old stuff from the forties. She is funny and compassionate and loving and a thousand other good things that I don't have time to list.

And she's a pretty good MK. (For those of you with our company--don't call her a TCK--she gets a little ticky about it.) She watches out for her many "cousins" at school, though they probably don't know that. She has a keen sense of justice, and when something happens that she doesn't think is right, she definitely comes home with an opinion about it. She has managed to embrace the best things about Russia and remain a thoroughly American kid, which is a harder line to walk than you might imagine. She has friends all over the world, and she's traveled to some pretty amazing places, but she isn't arrogant or superior about those opportunities. She is grateful for them, always aware that she is not having the traditional American teenage experience. She is a thinker, but she is also a person who can cut others some slack when they don't think like she does. We could all do with a little dose of that in everyday life, don't you think?

I'd better run make her biscuits. She's a special young woman. I'm crazy nuts about her--and so is her Daddy. Our little olive plant is blooming and blossoming and growing in a way that makes us so proud...God is good! Wherever you are in the world, I pray that you are praising God for the olive plants around your table, and that you made amazing chocolate frosting for your birthday cupcakes. Blessings to you and yours!

His,
Kellye

John John is eight--YIKES!

John John and his friends check out his new video games he received for his birthday.
John John unwrapping the soccer ball his friend, Jae Hun, gave him for his birthday. He is definitely turning into a European kid--he adores soccer (football) and dribbles a ball around the apartment any chance he gets.

O LORD, I know the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man who walks to direct his own steps. Jeremiah 10:23

We have today off--it's the holiday for International Women's Day, which was yesterday--so I am enjoying a second cup of coffee (can you imagine the joy and happiness flavored fat free creamer brings? I don't think you can) while I watch it pour snow. I tried to take a picture of the snow, but I couldn't. I always like for my Florida friends to see why they MUST stop complaining when the temperature drops to 65.

Saturday was John John's birthday party, and today is his birthday. How nice that we had a school holiday on his birthday! He had a great party, with friends and pizza and video games and toys and ice cream sundaes. Today, he will open the rest of his presents, and we will spend the day together, just enjoying each other's company. I am thoroughly looking forward to it.

Not a bunch to report here. Changes in our lives continue to develop and come fast and furious. We are leaving Russia in April for a visa trip to Prague. Marc will be working on a project for the company while we wait on our visas to arrive from the States. We are, of course, losing our work permits, since we won't be living here. But Marc will continue to maintain a Russian visa which will allow him to move in and out of the country with ease while he continues to work for the cluster of Russian-speakers. (We are learning all the new names for things under the company's reorganization. It's starting to give me a little bit of a headache.) The kids and I will have three-month visas, allowing us to finish school at Hinkson. I have to be honest--we are looking forward to our time in Prague for visa renewal. We need a break from the heaviness of Moscow. After we come back, there will be lots of things going on, making the time fly by, but right now, we really need a break from this place. If you haven't been here, I don't think I can explain it. It isn't just the physical harshness of the place--the cold, the snow, the ice, the hour plus to church in the freezing rain yesterday--it's the emotional and spiritual darkness that can, if we're not careful, become really overwhelming for us. It is absolutely the enemy's most useful tool against us--the darkness of the city. It is a constant struggle, and one we cannot win on our own. But I was reminded in my quiet time this morning--the battle isn't ours to fight. It's His. And He doesn't just half-win any battle. He wins it all the way. And so, for right now, we are praying that our great Defender will give us the strength to be silent while He fights this one for us.

Well, the birthday boy is asking for his birthday pancakes, so I'd better run. I have spent some time thanking God for the blessing that our John John is to us. I cannot imagine our lives without him. They would likely be quieter, but not nearly as interesting. Who else would make everyone on the marshrutka giggle by wishing them all "Dos Vedanya" when he gets out at our stop? Who else would charm the collective babushki of Moscow? He is definitely a gift to us. He has a birthday "twink" in our family--my nephew, Daniel, who visited us in December. And his brothers, Ben and Matt, had a birthday two days ago. So happy birthday to the collective birthday boys--John John, Ben, Matt, and Daniel--who have given our family so many years of adventure and happiness and fun. I love each of you so much, and I am proud of the men you are becoming. Wherever you are in the world, I pray that you are allowing the God of Everything to fight your battles for you, and that it is NOT pouring snow on you (except for my beloved Tara, who could use some relief from the Amazonian heat)! Blessings to you and yours!

His,
Kellye