April floods...

Tropical wet/dry climate zones experience some awesome floods. Not awesome as in "Awesome, dude! Let's catch the next wave, totally!" More like, "I am experiencing some awe when I look at all the roads around my house, because they're canals." Canals. Seriously.

Lately, we've used our little Rav4 to auto-wade through some new streets, and we've experienced Suriname's only movie theater. What a pleasure! Fortunately, our work down here does not entirely consist of pleasure-cruising (it really is like driving down a river), but we also get some chances to minister, as well.

• The schedule is set for the summer program, as is the multi-thousand dollar budget. The two of us are the leaders, and we'll have occasional help, once or twice a week, as well as a week with Anna, Amy's sister, assisting, which will be wonderful.
• The last quarter of the schoolyear has begun, and for some students, education has become a little like bad athletics: their leaders have to coach them to finish strong. This has been a great chance to get involved in the lives of students in a more personal way.
• Amy's planning a field trip to a bakery nearby for her 3rd graders. They're studying the way businesses work. In addition to the field trip, they'll be venturing into the free market as well, selling some ice cream to the hungry student population.
• Conner's drama class is three weeks away from the production. Some pieces of the set have made an appearance, but only a few. Costumes, which have not been observed yet, are up to the students to bring, so next week, Conner will take a cue from his alma mater and have a "Dress check" pre-performance.

Please pray that everything continues on smoothly. The schoolyear is almost over, and new opportunities will arrive as the situation changes.

Lots of Kids

Whew! It's been kids, kids, kids in our life lately! Over spring break, we attended a family camp with several local churches. This was not only a nice opportunity for us to relax, but also a great chance to minister to some kiddos. But that, of course, fits best into our bullet point news:

• Kids at camp: Amy and I helped with the 3-7 year-olds, and some of them even spoke English! I think the main value we added was in giving the parents an opportunity to sit back and receive some good teaching on what family means.
  
• Kids at school: The return to the education system from the wilds of the extra-curricular came as a shock to some students, but they mostly made it back safely. We've had some chances to hang out with students and improve our worldview-integration in the classroom, and that's been nice for both of us.
• Kids in bellies: Amy's been dealing with pregnancy like a pro, and we're happy to observe that we've been given a new Item to keep us constantly in prayer.

Lots of Kids

Taking the "Miss" Out of Missionary Kids

I've read a few articles lately on the Desiring God website about the "missionary advantage." You should read them, too.

This week was the final one of last month's budget, and it was fairly tight. Not bad, just tight. We still had enough coins to celebrate St. Patrick's Day in a semi-Irish fashion, and today was payday, so no worries. We didn't worry. Anyway, thinking about money as Amy and I have been, we discussed what I'll call the "missionary kid advantage." Observe:

• Missionary kids generally grow up without a lot of the modern material trappings (note the connotations of the word "trappings). This gives an opportunity for them not to think of a third pair of shoes as something they need. Money is nice, but not necessary.
• Missionary kids generally grow up with their parents being given support. The money they make is less "theirs" to the carnal eye of people like me. This gives the kids a chance to think in terms of all things being given to us for a season, all through the blessing of others (particular One Other) and through no work of our own. Innumerable parallels.
• Missionary kids generally grow up in places where luxury is uncommon. This is not the same as the first point. What I'm getting at here is this: when material blessings are rarer, they are more gratefully received. Missionary kids have the gift of seeing their giftedness.
• Finally, missionary kids often see the need for giving. Their parents live off of giving. The kids themselves live off of giving. They are surrounded by the work of feeding the hungry, speaking to the unevangelized, and loving the unloved. They see the money at work, not just in the offering plate, and they know it does good.

This may not be applicable to you, but I think it gives some useful points to parents (or future parents, like us). Live the missional lifestyle, even if you're not in the third world. Your children will be surrounded by a more appropriate understanding of money than that offered by mainstream society.

He Brings the Dead to Life.

The student mentioned in the last post has become a Christian. God has worked a miracle in him, bringing him from death to life and granting him the faith to continue in his desire to know God better. The opportunity to help a new part of the body of Christ has presented itself, and it's humbling and frightening, but the encouragement of salvation is not just that it happens, but that "He who began a good work...will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus" (Philippians 1:6).

Encouraging News

This last week has been wild. Auditions for the play, fights at recess, and the return of our school director from a two week conference in Memphis have been news on the side as we seek to storm the front lines of lost souls here in Paramaribo. God's been good to us, for sure, and we have some good news to report. One student, whose name you can ask about in an e-mail if you really want to know, has confronted me with a story that amounts to his life, and he's been asking questions like, "Why didn't anything ever feel like it was enough?" and "Why did it seem like none of it really mattered?" Great questions, and ones that God has provided some great answers to in both my experience and Amy's.
Due to the nature of our Christian school, we both have an opportunity to present the Gospel to kids who don't believe it on a daily basis. This student, formerly an atheist and now someone who is very attracted to Christianity but still a little unsure, has had to deal with the Holy Spirit hammering at his heart and mind for the last several months, and I believe that the "Hound of Heaven" is hard after him, and he won't get away. C. S. Lewis once said that about a non-Christian, so I don't feel haughty saying it, too.
In other news:

• Amy's been sick lately, so please pray for her. We don't really have anyone to substitute for us if we get sick, so aching bodies don't get the rest they require.
• Conner may be directing "A Slip in Time" by T. James Belich, a sci-fi murder-mystery, for the high school drama class. Yikes.
• Amy's been able to give some students Bibles to take home with them. The students wanted them, so she was sure to take the opportunity to provide. Hurray!

January into February

It's been awhile since the last post, and I apologize for that. We've been busy with our classes, conferences with parents, youth group, and much more, and things have started to seem so normal that I've been struggling to find a topic to post about. I suppose that most of you read because you care about us, so I'll divulge a little personal information before I go to the bullet points.

• Amy took her class on a field trip to the Presidential Palace, an enjoyable excursion to be sure. She was proud of her students for asking such outstanding questions of their tour guide.
• We spent our first Valentine's Day together as a married couple, and although we weren't extravagant, we did wander around a nature park together, where Amy took some pictures and I slapped mosquitoes. In case you're wondering, I'm still in love with Amy, and she still puts up with me, though why, I don't know.
  
• We continue to build relationships with our students and pray hard that it's doing some good. We can only trust in God as we seek to serve Him, and it's sometimes hard, and sometimes we lose sight of what He's doing and get frazzled about a lack of "results," but the epic sweep of history is the story of His glorifying Himself by building His Kingdom, and we believe He'll do some of that here.