Faithful

Hannah working this week at English camp. She did an incredible job working with around 30 children doing crafts. So proud of our girl!

Possibly my favorite picture of John and Laini ever taken. This typifies their relationship--in a room full of people, I am pretty sure they only see each other. My children are blessed with incredible friends.

Blessed be the LORD, for He has made marvelous His lovingkindness to me in a besieged city. Psalm 31:21

I have dreaded writing this blog, and so I have put it off until now, our last full day on the field for this term. I got very little sleep last night, and I finally got up around 5 this morning and have been puttering around the house. Our bags are packed (except the laundry that is drying on the racks), the house is clean (except for under the stove and vacuuming), and we have very little left to do here, except the thing we dread the most--saying goodbye.

I could write a whole blog about leaving. I could tell you about the tears shed, how we dread saying goodbye to the Lewises, to Plzen, to the Czech Republic, to this life for the next year. I could write about how excited we are to be going to America, to our family, to our friends, to our church...and all the hellos we are looking forward to saying in the next weeks and months. Those would both be easy topics to write about this morning. But the purpose of this blog has always been to give you a glimpse not of the called, but of the One who calls. And so, this morning's blog is about the ways He has been faithful to me in the last three years on the mission field.

• My children: The hardest thing I have ever done is watch my children struggle through the last three years. No mother anywhere treasures the suffering of her child. My children have had great experiences on the mission field, but they have also had difficult, scary, and heartbreaking experiences on the mission field. They have made tremendous friendships, but they have also had to say goodbye to those friends again and again and again. They have lived in two cultures that are very, very different from their own. They have been yelled at by complete strangers on the street for not wearing a hat or not being bundled enough against the cold. They have had to learn one beastly Slavic language only to move to a place where the Slavic language spoken is just enough different to be incomprehensible. It's been hard, and they have struggled. But they have also thrived. Sarah Beth discovered a facility with language that shocked us all--she picked up tons of Russian just by listening on the metro and walking in parks. Hannah discovered she was a natural musician, even though her music teacher didn't speak English, and she took lessons in Russian and Czech. John John discovered that his love for all humankind is a pretty good way to make friends in spite of language differences. And their Mom discovered that no matter how much I love my kids...God loves them so much more. He is beyond trustworthy. He is beyond merciful. He is beyond compassionate.

• My husband: Let me say this about Marc--he never struggled to be on the field. Never. He struggled to watch the rest of us struggle, because he loves us, and he wants us to be happy. But he was a pig in slop from the moment he set foot on Russian soil. Never in my life have I witnessed anyone fit into a job more perfectly than Marc fit into being a missionary. He worried about the language, but he speaks and understands far better than I do, and certainly far better than he should with as much language training as he received. He discovered a love for anthropology and ethnography that surprised him. And his passionate love for the "little nations"--ethnic groups within the many republics that comprise the Russian Federation--is contagious. I dare you to talk to him about the Chuvash and then try not to pray for them. It's impossible. His passion for the unreached people groups of Russia is inspiring. He makes me want to move to some tiny village and pump my own water in order to reach them. (That's a running joke with my missionary friends...Marc is, at some point, going to convince me to move somewhere where I have an outhouse and have to pump my own water. Wait and see.) When we are gathered at the throne, and every nation and tribe and tongue is there, including the Chuvash, the Mordvin, the Karellian...I firmly believe some will be there because God chose an ordinary video guy from Middleburg, Florida, and then showed him he is more than just Luke telling Paul's story...he's Paul, too.

• My family: Want to know people who are excited about missions? Talk to my parents and sisters. No one, and I mean NO ONE could have had a more supportive immediate family than mine. They have visited, sent packages, called, sent cards, talked on skype, and just generally been the most incredible support system anyone could have. When volunteer teams come to work with us, inevitably someone asks, "And what do your parents think about you being a missionary?" I always say the same thing. I've said it for a while now, and it's absolutely true. I am 100% the person my parents raised me to be. I'm sure they would have loved nothing better than if I had stayed in Middleburg and they could have been at everything for my kids. But never once have they complained. Never. I'm sure they would love for us to return somewhere a little easier than Russia. But they have never been anything but supportive. And when the time came for us to go, they never suggested that God should send somebody else's child and not theirs. It has been hard being away from them, and when I see my Momma and Daddy tomorrow night, I'm pretty sure there will be some jumping up and down, but just like God loves my children, He loves my parents and sisters far more than I can even comprehend.
  

• Myself: It is not possible with mere words to explain every way in which God has been faithful to show me who I really am in Him. I will say that I am not returning to Florida the same person I left. I have never been more miserable than I was the first few months we were in Moscow. I really think I cried most nights. I missed my family and friends and church, but most of all, I missed my life. I missed being "someone." I missed being confident. I missed knowing how to buy meat. :) But even in my misery, I knew that I was not alone. Standing at my kitchen window, looking out at the city, I knew He was with me. And it wasn't because I felt something or had some emotional response to something...I knew because He promised He would be and because He is always true to His promises. He said He would never leave me nor forsake me...and He never did. And no matter how I felt, no matter what my emotions told me...I knew He was true and faithful. And even in things I haven't liked or enjoyed--conflicts, moving, saying goodbye again and again, struggling with my weight, missing my family--even in these things, He has been faithful. Faithful to show me who I am in Him. Faithful to show me that He is in control. Faithful to love me even when I am not very lovable. And faithful to grow in me a love and a passion for the people to whom He has called me. He is faithful, faithful, faithful. I will proclaim it until my dying breath. He is faithful.
  

And so begins our last day of this term. I could write so much more--about priceless friendships, precious colleagues, and beloved national partners. About people we pray for daily to come to know the Lord. About people we will miss terribly. But it all comes back to the same thing...He is faithful and compassionate and merciful beyond measure. He has loved me so much that there is no way to describe it adequately. And so, as I prepare my heart to climb aboard a jet in the morning and set foot on American soil for the first time in a long time, I am so thankful for the experiences and relationships and joy that He has given me in the last three years. And I am thankful for the struggles and difficulties and heartbreak of the last three years. And above all, I am thankful for a God who has so passionately pursued every part of me. Wherever you are in the world, I pray that you know how faithful our God is from your own experience, and that you are almost ready to fly home, too. Blessings to you and yours!

His,
Kellye

Finding the secret place

Hannah with her pal, Beary Bear. He was a gift from her good friend, Robert.

Me and the Han on Red Square. She doesn't quite look like she did when we left the States three years ago. We've decided to invest in a dungeon for both our girls. You think that'll work?

You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have loosed my sackcloth and girded me with gladness; that my soul may sing praise to You and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to You forever. Psalm 30:11-12

I only have a couple of minutes this morning, but I thought an update was in order. We leave the Czech Republic two weeks from today for the States, and we are deep into packing and chaos. :) Actually, at this point it's going pretty well, so the chaos is at a minimum. If we could get the temperature to cool down a bit, that would help. However, that isn't going to happen this week, so no use complaining about it. Suffice to say that it's a little bit like living in a sauna.

I had an interesting experience last night. I was looking through some things on a flash drive and found all of my writing for our original IMB application. Wow--was that an interesting read! Some of it tickled me a little...some of it made me teary. All of it made me stand in awe at the way God has worked in my life and in the life of our family in the last three years. So much of what He has done in my life and in my walk with Him has been about learning to rest in Him, to let myself reside in what the psalmist calls "the secret place." For me, that has meant learning to have a quietness in my quiet time, to sit and listen, to pay more attention to what He's saying and doing than in what I'm requesting from Him. You know where I discovered the secret place? In my kitchen in Moscow. Staring out at that city, knowing I could not put into words my anguish for myself, for my children, and for those we were there to minister to--just sitting and looking out the window--that's where I learned about the secret place of God. I'm not sure I could have learned that in a comfortable place for me. Maybe you can. I'm definitely not admonishing everyone who reads this to head overseas in order to really know God, because one thing I've learned is that how God is at work in me is not always how He is at work in someone else. For me it was necessary for God to pull me out of my comfort zone and teach me in a place where I--literally--could not depend on myself. Only in Him, only in His path for my life--only in the secret place is there contentment and joy and success. I learned that at my kitchen table in Moscow.

I'm thankful for the hardness of the last three years. Nothing about our time on the field has been easy or come easily. Language, culture, homeschooling...none of that has been an easy fit for me. (Not true for Marc--give him some totems, below-freezing temps, and a Russian village where you have to pump your own water and he's like a pig in slop.) But it's been in the struggle, in the times where I simply did not know where to turn or what to do or how to act that God has shown Himself completely enough. Enough for me. Enough for my marriage. Enough for my kids. I love my friends on the field, and I adore my friends and family at home, but if that was stripped away from me, I know that He is still enough. Everything else is just my cup running over with the blessings of a God who loves me beyond my comprehension. Wherever you are in the world, I pray that you have found God's secret place, that you know that He is completely enough for you, and that you are taking two little people to DinoPark today, too. Blessings to you and yours!

His,
Kellye