Looking Ahead

We’re finding ourselves doing a lot of reflecting these days. At the same time, we’re spending a good bit of time looking ahead. Talk about being pulled in two different directions!

We’ve been in Central Asia for seven months. We arrived in the Summer. We enjoyed the brief Fall and, we’re now seeing the passing of Winter. That’s not to say that April in this part of the world is not able to get a parting shot from Winter, but if Spring isn’t here, we can see it. There are some shrubs and trees that are displaying blossoms of various colors. We’re careful about making too much out of these teasing indicators of Spring – but we are hopeful that we’ll wake up tomorrow and find that Spring has sprung.

We’re looking ahead to June 2nd, our return to the United States. It will be great to set foot on our home soil and see family after these months away. We’ve been asked numerous times, “What are you going to do first?” or “What restaurant are you going to first?” There are different answers to those questions. We could say that the first thing we’ll do is line up to go through immigration control. We’ve thought about the restaurant question quite a bit. I don’t think we want to plan that with all the uncertainties.

More than restaurants, we’re looking ahead to a new job and setting up a new home when we get back. Our plan is to continue in ministry through serving in the area of missions. We’re still working through the process of determining the specific role we’ll play, but we’ll be based in the Northwest serving in various places. We’ll continue our involvement assisting with church planting in Japan. Beyond that, there are several other opportunities of short term assignments in Africa, the Caribbean and various places in Asia. We’re a bit overwhelmed by the possibilities, but we’re confident that God will continue to give us direction in the days ahead. We’ll have the privilege of working with a great OMS Northwest team which has been put together recognizing the strengths of the gifted people on the Northwest team.

We’ve been asked, “What will you miss in Central Asia?” The answer to that is easy. We’ll miss people. We’ll miss our partners who have made it possible to survive these months away from our family and friends. We’ll miss people that we’ve worked with getting through a difficult period in the history of the school. We’ll miss brothers and sisters we’ve met from around the world (South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, England, Germany, Russia, Korea, Central Asia, Nigeria, Canada, and even the US) in the various church’s we’ve attended.

We’ve been on quite and “adventure” over this last year and a half since we were first approached about coming to Central Asia. There have been struggles and stumbles. There has been laughter and celebration. We’ve seen numerous examples of God’s graciousness and kindness during these months. So, we look back at what has been and ahead at what is yet to be. The temptation is to reflect and dream without focusing on the here and now. We have a job to finish in these next eight weeks. We might not complete the task of obtaining a license, but our role will be to continue to build a team that can move on into the future training church leaders for Central Asia. May God help us.