Trust and Patience

Trust and patience have been a huge factor in my life recently. The questions of what I will do when I go back to California have already begun to come up. I still don't know what I will do, or even what I want to do. Trusting that God has a plan for me is a given. Albeit, that has been a theme in my life for several years and it has taken me several years of personal struggles to realize that and to truly believe it. But waiting for that plan to happen has never been a strong suit for me. I still struggle with patience and not knowing what will happen in the next year, or even next few months. But God showed me this weekend, through the testimony of a new friend, that God will take His time and our job is to rest confidently in Him and to be patient. God is faithful to us and will keep His promises to us.  I found a quote online that I will share, I don't know where it comes from though : "God has perfect timing; never early, never late. It takes a lot of patience and a lot of faith. But it's always worth it in the end." The testimony I heard confirmed that. She went through the last 10+ years trying to find the perfect job that she believed was God's will and plan for her: translation missionary ministries. She found a good translation job with the government, but never found the perfect job to serve in the mission field, until recently. But until she found that job, she was faithful to God and trusted Him and His will for her. Her testimony encouraged me to continue trusting God and trust His timing.

"A man's steps are from the Lord; how then can man understand his way?" Proverbs 20:24

Again this weekend, God reminded me to trust Him in everything, especially when I am feeling overwhelmed. These last few weeks I have been feeling a little overwhelmed dealing with the problems that arise in organizing a huge camp this summer. My thoughts have been concentrated on finding a house or houses to accommodate our teams, finding a team for our teens camping trip, and also on my Kid's Day event. Yes, I had another Kid's Day last Saturday. I went in expecting to have around 15 kids total for the day, but ended up with 29! I had my moments of panic when I realized I didn't have enough papers for all the kids, when I didn't think our snack would be enough, and when the kids wouldn't sit still during the lesson or even during the craft time. I had to chase kids down from tables and bookshelves several times throughout the day. I had 17 kids in my younger class with only one other helper. There were times I didn't think we would make it. I just prayed so hard that God would get me through it and that no one would get hurt. Other than an incident where one kid was throwing crayons at another kid, no one got hurt. And guess what? God got me through the day!

Since then, I have heard more news about the housing situation for our teams. We still don't have a real confirmation yet, but it is looking hopeful with possibly another backup house in case the first one doesn't work. And even though looking for team members for the teenagers is still up and down, we have finally found a week that works for most of our teens. We still have several possibilities for team members, so things are hopeful and looking up. When I was sharing some of this with a friend today, I was reminded of a song from my childhood that seems to fit perfectly with this theme I keep struggling with. It goes something like this:

"God is bigger than the Boogie Man, He's bigger than Godzilla or the monsters on TV. Oh God is bigger than the Boogie Man and He's watching out for you and me!" Veggie Tales

Why yes, I did just quote a song sung by a cute little asparagus! But there is truth to this song! God is bigger than anything we can imagine. He is bigger than the monsters that are out in this world, but He is also bigger than the monsters in our hearts. He helps us overcome our fears of the future, our stresses over the little things in life, and He gives us strength to do it. Why does He do that? Because He loves us with an unimaginable love.

"For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16

I will never be able to truly grasp the entirety of God's love for us, but I know that because of this love we have been saved through His Son Jesus. And through Jesus we can have a personal relationship with God, one where we learn to trust Him in everything. And we trust Him because we know He has a plan for us. We just need to wait patiently and trust in His faithfulness towards us.

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you  a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the Lord." Jeremiah 29:11-14a.

Languages

Last Sunday evening, my roommate invited me to her church's evening service. They were having a special speaker from Wycliffe Associates come and talk to them about his work in China and about the work to translate the Bible. I had the privilege of being invited to have dinner with him and another family from that church the following evening. It struck me how many languages there are out in the world that don't have a Bible or even a way of writing down their language. We take our language for granted, whereas this man is helping a people create their own alphabet/language and translate the Bible at the same time. I can understand how difficult that can be, but this man and his organization continue diligently to spread the Word. They know how important it  is to spread the gospel to all nations and all corners of the world and I can appreciate that.

The province of Quebec is considered one of the least reached areas of North America. The gospel has not been spread very successfully here and only 1% of the population here is considered to be Evangelical Christians. It can feel like a hostile place for Christians, but I know it is not as hostile as other places around the world. Some might consider it difficult to come here because of the language difference, but even our natural language (or mine at least) of English can help in some ways. It has helped me immensely that I have been able to learn the French language since coming here. But the fact that I speak English can sometimes draw people because they want to learn or practice the language. Sometimes one can share the gospel in English, but if you want to make a real connection with a person, speaking their native language can be such a blessing to you. I try to thank God every time someone gives me a compliment or comment about my French because I know I would not be here without Him. I am very thankful for how far He has brought me in this language and I hope and pray that I will not lose it. I am thankful for the lessons I am learning about language.

I will leave you with one prayer request, for my friend Edith Côté (pronounce like: coatay) and her family. I met her when I was just starting to learn French and we bonded over learning English and French. She helped me with my French and I helped her with her English, and she would come to my English Conversation events. We used to take the bus together before I moved to a different part of town. She has invited me to her house for dinner several times. I spent Christmas Dinner with her and her family, and just recently celebrated her son's 16th birthday with her and her family. I have tried talking with her about the gospel and a need for a savior. She seems open to hearing what I have to say and often agrees or says she likes those ideas, but something is still missing for her to fully commit. Please pray for me as I continue to try and minister to her and her family. Sometimes I lack the words or the courage to say something outright and I pray that God will equip me for it. I am very thankful for this friendship and this opportunity to minister to her.

Only God could have made two people from two different languages come together. God can make it become a ministry. Only God can change a person's heart. I pray that this relationship brings God the glory.

Thank you for your prayers.

A Visit From My Mother

My mother came for a visit last week. She came just at the right time, when we were having abnormally warm weather. With temperatures in the high 20's and 30's we had a great time taking advantage of the sights and warmer weather. My Mom was here for a brief week, but it was a full as well. We spent a whole day outside walking around the old city of Québec, we made a two day trip to Montreal, saw a hockey game, went snow-shoeing, saw a concert, went to the ice hotel, and went to the Winter Carnaval. We did and saw a lot. It was go go go for almost the entire week. But I enjoyed it.

Now that I look back on our time together, I am very thankful for the mother I have, for the mother God gave me. We have had our moments where we are either best friends or enemies, but throughout it all, she still loved me. She has been there to support me and to give me advice and correct me when I need it. I have missed her, even though I sometimes won't admit it.  Thank you Mom for coming to see me in Québec, I hope you enjoyed it. God has been very good to me here, and I hope you were able to see that as well. 

The Un-Glamorous Life

I have been having lots of people tell me how lucky I am to be living here in Québec, how they feel like I am seeing so many wonderful things, and how interesting it is to live in a different culture and language. There are a few perks about living in a different place and being able to see new things, but it's not all it's built up to be. When people tell me how exciting my life seems, they make it sound glamorous and thrilling. I'm here to tell you that it's really not that glamorous.

The cold weather has indeed officially begun. The days are at hand when you dread going outside and putting on four or more layers just to stay warm. Some days you want to just stay home and inside all day, but when that happens then you wish you went outside or somewhere because you missed being able to have any social aspect during the day. If I am already experiencing these days of dreading to go outside but feeling guilty for staying in, I am in trouble because it's only January and we are sure to have at least three more months of this! (That is if  this year will be anything like last year.) And that is just the weather.

Sometimes the work isn't that fun either. I am sure many of you know what I am talking about, that tedious work that one has to experience at least once in their life: paperwork and filing. My work in preparing for the English Camps this summer has already started and this year my work load is going to be higher. Last year I had to deal mostly with the teams that were coming. This year I am doing that again as well as organizing all the children's applications and registrations. So far I am just getting ready to receive registration forms which includes updating forms and our website. That isn't too bad, for the moment.

What's kind of fun and exciting is dealing with teams and team members right now. I am already juggling teams and trying to fill holes. This is kind of what the process has looked like so far: Send invitations to old teams to see who will come again. Wait. Three teams have said yes! Yes! Wait, only one team will be full. Wait. I have an interest from this church and that church and that group. One church changed their mind, one group wants to commit. I have three vague emails asking for more information. I have one small team, I put them with team 1. I have a larger group of two families, I put them with team 2. Wait. I think the smaller team would go better with the bigger team and the bigger group with the smaller team. Suggest a switch. Wait. No, won't work. Larger group of families might need to split up. Smaller team is staying with team 1 and teams 1 & 2 still need around 5 more people. Wait to hear from the two families. Still waiting. Haven't heard from other churches who showed interest. Still waiting. I sure hope team 3 has enough people.
Juggling. That's what this part of the job is.

Filing and paperwork has been added to my list of jobs to do. I recently received a gift from my pastor of two huge boxes full of "who knows what" from the MA's files of five years ago. So I got to work right away of first finding out what was inside. I found  lots of old lesson plans, extra song books, lots of loose-leaf notes, stickers, cards, information and lessons from older English Conversation activities (which will come in handy), and five years worth of old registration forms. First, I organize: English for Kids, Francofun, English Café/English Conversations, registrations, extra materials. Second, I sort: use again, keep for files, trash. Now I have the contents of those boxes in nice piles on the floor of my room which thankfully only takes up a corner, for now. Now the really fun part begins, which I am already dreading.

We used to have a document of all the contact information we had for all of the families that have come to English for Kids camps over the years. Sadly that information got lost when a computer was stolen last fall. Since we don't have a backup, that I am aware of, all that information has had to be put into a computer again. This time we do have backups. My dear friend Suzy, who was in charge of the kids registrations last year, was able to input all the information she had from registration forms over the last three years. She gave me that document and now I need to update and add to it with all the old forms I found. Thus begins my tiresome job of inputting information onto a computer document on Excel. And I barely even know how to work Excel, so this will be fun. Maybe one day I will let you know of the horror stories of sitting in front of a computer for hours while trying to make illegible writing legible and trying to understand it myself.

But I'm already getting tire from writing this post. So that will be all for now.I hope you enjoyed a small glimpse into the mundane work or a missionaries associate. I am praying that I don't burnout in front of the computer over the next few months and that I will get it done. Diligence is a difficult thing, but if you don't get it done now, it won't get done.

So I hope you have a good end to the month of January. And here's to all the office workers and secretaries I know, with God's help we can get it done!

A Welcoming Christmas in Québec

This year I spent the holidays here in Québec. I had the wonderful blessing of being able to go home for Christmas last year, but this year I did not quite have that privilege. I had been given the opportunity to go home, several people offered to pay for my flight, but I made it my choice to stay here. Some of my plans with friends here had fallen through and it was starting to look like a sad Christmas, but God turned things around in answer to several prayers.

I ended up being invited to spend a long weekend with a friend with her family in Toronto. She was leaving that Saturday and this idea came forward Thursday. It was a little bit of a risk taking this last minute trip, but I had no concrete plans for the days leading up to Christmas Eve, so I said yes. We left Saturday morning around 10:30am and arrived in Toronto 12 hours later. We did make a long stop to have lunch with some friends before we ended up driving through a snow storm. It was a pretty good storm where we couldn't see anything in front of us. We made it safely after waiting the storm out at a McDonald's. We were wonderfully welcomed by her parents and a cup of tea around the fireplace. It was a lovely way to end the long day. On Sunday I went to church with her and her parents, and then we went to her sister's house to celebrate their extended family Christmas. It was a decent sized gathering of 20 people including two toddlers and two babies. It was overall so warm and a fun time with their family. The guitar got pulled out as we sung Christmas carols in the living  room. I felt very welcomed into their family, and it was such a blessing to take part in their Christmas celebration.

My friend Lindsay and her parents.

The rest of my time there was spent doing some touring around the city and visiting some friends and seeing the new Star Wars, which was really good. It was very sad for me to leave because I hadn't felt so much at home with another family in such a long time. I was very thankful for them.

My friend Lindsay and I.

Christmas Eve brought me to the church for their service. The church had a nice program where the kids put on a small play of the birth of Jesus and the pastor reminded us all about the true meaning of Christmas. Afterward, many people stayed for a pot luck supper. It was really good to see so many people in the church come together for Christmas. Many of the people that were there don't have families nearby and so the church does this bring these small families together to create a large family. And it became a large family gathering with people mingling and group games happening later in the evening. It was a blessing to be there. 

Christmas morning was quiet for me, but it gave me time to reflect on the season and make myself pancakes for breakfast while I called my family. My friend Edîth from my English Conversation group had invited me to join her and her family for their Christmas Day supper. So I joined her that evening and spent the night with her as well because we didn't leave her parents' house until after midnight. It was a good experience to see a Québecois Christmas dinner with meat pies and soup for dinner and a traditional yule log for dessert. I enjoyed getting to know her family and play games with them and watch them exchange gifts. It was a little different type of Christmas than I am used to because they are not Christians, but I still felt very welcomed by them. Please pray for my friend and her family, that they will know the Lord.

My friend Edîth and her son. 

The next day I was again welcomed into a smaller family, a couple and their baby. We spent the afternoon together and had a second Christmas dinner together, it was more traditional with turkey and stuffing and cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes. We ended the evening with A Charlie Brown Christmas. It was a calm evening with them, but I am always thankful for the way this family from the church has welcomed me into their lives.

The following week was busy because we had a wedding at our church two days later, and two days after that was a  New Year's Eve party. The wedding was on a beautiful day when the sun was shining and it wasn't too cold, it had snowed a lot the day before and then it snowed even more the day after. Both her family from Québec and his family from France were there as well as many of their friends. And of course it ended in a fun dance party. Then two days later I saw a lot of the same people at a New Year's Eve party where we talked and played games all evening. It was a great gathering and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

My time here in Québec has been short and it will be short, two years is a short period in our lifetime. I am only in the lives of these people here for two years, I hope to keep connections with them but for now I am only living in their community for two short years. But what surprises me is how welcoming they have been. I could have been held apart at a distance because they knew I wouldn't be here for very long, but instead so many of them have welcomed me with open arms. The young adults here have invited me to so many of their events and parties, and I have been welcomed into several different homes of the church. This church that has welcomed so many different immigrants and families who don't have large families here, has welcomed me into their family, and for that I will be forever grateful.

This Christmas season might have been lonely and depressing if I had concentrated on the fact that I was not with my family in California. But God showed me that I have a family here in His church. I will be forever thankful for the small community of Christians that have welcomed me here in Québec.

Light

A lot of things have been happening recently. The weather has definitely changed to winter, the days are shorter and colder, and we finally got snow at the beginning of the week.  I had my last kid’s Day event of the season last week, and am taking my English Conversation group on a small field trip to see the city and Christmas lights tonight. Christmas lights have been up for a while and Christmas day is in one week. One theme that seems to keep coming to me through all of this is light.

Here in December, the sun starts setting around 3:30pm and it is dark by 4pm. It can be somewhat depressing, especially for me when I come from a place where is it sunny almost all the time. And with the snow here, it is very cloudy and mostly overcast. It has been 5 days since I last saw blue skies. So when the sun shines here, I have learned to enjoy it, even though those days are colder than sunny days. (Go figure..) So I have learned not to take the sun for granted, and it makes me smile when I see the sun.

Christmas lights go up early around here. The malls and a lot of stores already had their lights and decorations up by the end of October. One nice thing about the lights here is that they stay up for a long time. A lot of stores have a public display of lights that face the main street, and they keep it up for most of the winter. It certainly brings a little more cheer and light to the short days and long evenings.

With the shorter days and lack of sunshine, depression can be a common thing around here. Even I can sometimes feel depressed or lazy because of the lack of sunshine. But I was again reminded of light this week. What came to my mind was a song:

“Thy word is a lamp unto my feet,
and a light unto my path.”
(based on Psalm 119:105)

How often do we forget that? Light is used so often as a word to describe God’s ways, His word, and even God himself. For the past Kid’s Days events, we have been going through different stories in Judges. Last week we discussed Ruth, and ended up concentrating on the light in that story. We had talked about how Ruth’s faith in God had been a light of hope to her, and how later her son became a light for her family. That son became the grandfather of King David, who was a light for Israel in their dark days. And David became an ancestor of Jesus who was the true light that God sent. How amazing is that! That tiny light of hope for Israel, during their dark days of the judges, grew and became the greatest light that would be a light for all mankind.

“The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
on them has light shined.”
(Isaiah 9:2)

Jesus is that light. I love how God used light to proclaim the birth of his Son. When the shepherds in the fields were told of Jesus’ birth, “the glory of the Lord shone around them.” (Luke 2:9) God’s glory “shone,” it shined on them. What else shines besides light? Not a lot of things shine without light of some sort, be it natural or man-made. I think that God’s glory had to be one of the brightest lights that shone on the shepherds that night. God again used light when he created a star to guide the wise men to Bethlehem. (Matthew 2:1-12) Stars are already very bright. They are millions of miles away and yet we can still see their light in the evening. This star had to be big and brighter than all the others for these men to take notice of it. God had something special to share with the world, and they knew it because of that star.

We take stars for granted today, just like we do our sun (which is a star!). We consider stars to be a romantic thing, we make wishes on stars, we have picnics under the stars, and we predict our futures by the stars. But what are stars? They are technically great balls of gas, but they are a source of light. Where does that light come from? From God!

“And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness, he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.”
(Genesis 1:3-5)

The first thing God created was light! God showed himself to Moses and Israel as forms of light; to Moses as a burning bush (Ex 3:2), and to Israel as a pillar of fire to lead their way (Ex 13:21-22). When the Son of God was born, light was used to proclaim his birth (Matt 2:1-12, Luke 2:9). Jesus called himself a light: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12) When Jesus was transfigured, “his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light.” (Matt 17:2) God is light. There is no question about that.

I just hope that brings you comfort and joy this Christmas season. May we always be thankful for the light and not take it for granted. May it remind us that God is with us and that He has overcome the world.

“For the light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness has not overcome it.”
(John 1:5)

Merry Christmas!!!

Thanksgiving

Over a week ago was American Thanksgiving. This has not been my first Thanksgiving away from home, but it has been one of the harder ones. I think that many things made it a little hard for me this year: 1) I knew that I wouldn't be coming home in a few months for Christmas, like I have every other time I am away for Thanksgiving, 2) The people here don't celebrate it, there is no feeling of Thanksgiving at all because they have already moved on to Christmas, and 3) I have no family here or traditions here.

From that depressing list, you might think that I had an awful Thanksgiving, but I didn't! My good friend Jacquelyn suggested that we have our own American Thanksgiving together with our friends here, since we are both American. So we did! The week was full of buying groceries ahead of time, and prepping food the day before. I even had the important job of stuffing and cooking the turkey! (It is actually a very easy thing to do!) Thursday itself was a long day of waiting for me, because I waited in my apartment all day until guests came for dinner around 6pm. I put in the pies, the yams, and the turkey all before my friend arrived to help finish with everything else. But while I was waiting, I was able to call my family back home and talk with them about anything while they were waiting for their food to be ready.

After I had finished that call, it was time to get the food and table ready. Jacquelyn and her husband and two kids came, and another couple from our church came with their baby. It was a full table and we all had a good time. We had so much food leftover! (Isn't that a must with Thanksgiving though?!) Everyone took home several containers home. Later that evening after I had cleaned everything up, I was able to relax with another phone call to my family and eat my dessert at the same time. (I had to let Grandma know how the turkey turned out, that everyone loved it.) It was a good day.

I have had my moments since then when I get sad knowing that I am not there to spend time with my family, or that I won't be home for Christmas. But the Lord keeps reminding me of the many blessings He has given me here in Quebec City. I have been blessed to call these people my friends and also my family. Even if I am not home in California, God has given me a home here in Quebec for the time being. And I am very thankful for that.

Jacquelyn and Jennifer