one perk

Our bout of warm weather was short-lived. The past few days have been freezing again. After 9 African winters, I'm still not used to the constant cold (constant because of the lack of central heating). I don't think I'll ever get used to it.

Instead of complaining, tonight I tried to think of the perks of our cold winter weather. But I could only come up with one. It's a good one, though.

I can read at night without being attacked by bugs.

In the summer, it gets a bit buggy here. And since windows don't have screens, the moment the sun goes down the lights attract all sorts of insects, beetles, and moths. I really enjoy reading in bed before I go to sleep, but this is no easy task in the summer. When my bedside lamp is suddenly the only light source in the entire house, it gets a little dangerous to be right next to it. All sorts of flying creatures dive-bomb onto my book, into my face, and through my hair. This inevitably causes me to flinch (and sometimes yelp), and then I hear a loud huff from my "sleeping" husband's side of the bed.

But in winter... No bugs at night! I can read in peace.

blind spots

He's one of our friends. A great guy. A man of God. An incredibly smart businessman. A passionate heart for the Lord. Full of wisdom.

Except when it comes to one specific area of his life. It is frightening to me that someone who is so wise in so many areas can continue to make foolish mistakes in one specific area.

He's stepping into his fourth marriage to a woman that is just like the previous three. I shake my head. My heart fills with a holy frustration to see him continue to fall for this same pitfall time and time again. My heart grieves for his grown children who are being dragged through yet another marriage relationship and who have been so personally affected by the women who have come in and out of their lives.

He has a blind spot. An area of his life that is painfully obvious to others but completely unseen by him. Over the years, Niel has had some difficult, but necessary, conversations with him about it. But he still doesn't see. Or doesn't want to see.

We all have blind spots: areas of our lives that we don't even realize are in error. I pray that my closest friends will adamantly point out to me any blind spots I have that are separating me from God in some way, hurting myself or others, or are distracting my focus from what God has called me to do.

In case you were waiting for one, that's an open invitation to speak into my life.

blankets of fog and prayers

When we pulled out of the gate at 7:30 this morning, the road was blanketed in a thick fog. I was following Niel, but could barely see him driving in front of me. When we turned from the dirt road onto the two-lane "tar road", the fog thickened even more.

My eyes widened and my breath seemed to get stuck in my throat when I suddenly saw a pickup truck coming right towards me. The pickup driver was stupidly attempting to pass a truck (even though he couldn't see more than 30 feet in front of him), and ended up barreling towards me in my lane. The truck he was passing was immediately next to him, so he couldn't move back into his lane. And with no shoulder next to the road, I had nowhere to go either.

As I slammed on the brakes, all I remember thinking was, "Jesus!" My mouth didn't open. I didn't even make a sound.

Mere feet away from a head-on collision, the pickup swerved onto the grass on the side of the road and flew right past me.

My first thought after "Thank you, Lord!" was "Someone must have been praying."

Thank you for every prayer you pray on our behalf...

q's and a's

Tonight was awesome.

We did something we've never done before. We had a Ministry Q&A Panel for all our interns, Outreach Staff, and Thrive Trippers. The panel consisted of Niel and I, 2 staff members, 2 interns, and 2 Outreach Staff. Everyone else had the freedom -- and platform -- to ask any question they wanted (either addressing specific panel members or asking the entire group).

There were some very thought-provoking questions asked, and I really enjoyed getting to hear the other panel members' answers. I learned a lot just by listening. It was fascinating.

I also discovered that while I don't necessarily always enjoy speaking publicly, I love answering questions like we did tonight. While part of me fears the on-the-spotness of it (needing to have a "quick" answer), I found myself really being able to share from my heart (and my experiences) -- and loving it. We were able to talk about how we got the vision to start Thrive (and how we stepped out to do it), our biggest challenges in ministry right now, our favorite parts of what we do, and our vision for the future (how we see things growing and developing).

The evening ended with worship, s'mores, and laughter around a bonfire. It was a good night indeed.

bits and pieces

I'm finishing up a curriculum for our LaunchPad program that is basically a New Testament Survey; I wrote the Old Testament one last year (or was it the year before?). In both of them, I point out the glimpse of Jesus we see in each book. It was an awesome journey for me to do that with the Old Testament -- finding the foreshadowing of Christ in all 39 books -- and I'm enjoying that part of writing this new one as well. It's a little easier with the New Testament (mainly because Jesus is more visibly plastered throughout it), but it's also a little harder (which aspect of Him, which glimpse into His character, should I highlight?!). I'm finding it a challenge to narrow it down.

This week I have lots of different writing projects on my to-do list:

• New Testament curriculum
• Email newsletter
• Supporter letter
• Website copy (which thankfully I am no longer working alone on!)
• Emails

And I'm only in the office for a day-and-a-half! Yikes!