A Thankful Heart!

“Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done. Sing to him, sing praise to him, tell of all his wonderful acts. Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.” Psalm 105:1-3

I have been reflecting on how thankful I am this week, and in light of Thanksgiving being tomorrow, I thought I would devote a blog entry to my gratitude.

I have been overwhelmed by the goodness of out God over our past two months here in Mundri. Our transition has not been easy, and trust me, we still have our moments of frustration and irritation with living here. However, overall, we are beyond grateful of God’s grace and patience with us in this time. He is such a faithful God and has provided for our needs in so many ways. Here are some things in particular that we are grateful for:

Our staff (minus Justin and Scott) dressed up for Anna's
Greek God/ Goddess birthday party

1.     Our teammates. It has been very helpful to transition to life here alongside our team. The Wallaces moved here 3 weeks before we did, and Justin came a couple months before them. For the most part, we have all been going through similar adjustments together. Larissa and Scott have both lived here for many years, so it has been beyond helpful to learn from their wealth of knowledge about life here as we have been adjusting here.

Will and Larissa after killing a
snake- even more impressive
than killing big spiders!

2.     Freedom from fears. I was scared about many things before we moved here. I think Satan was having a heyday trying to discourage me and make me think I didn’t have it in me to succeed here. However, God has continued to remind me of truth over and over again while we have been here. He has spoken our calling to me many times and I have been more and more confident of our purpose here. I have been surprised by how strong God has created me to be and how much I have been able to adjust. What a good father! I’ve even become quite the spider killer- who would have thought?! ;)

3.     A husband who kills spiders. Okay, so I know that I just said I am quite the spider killer… and I am. However, I have my limits. When a spider is beyond a certain size, I simply yell out, “HUUUUGE spider!!!” (with a squeal) and my manly husband comes quickly (with his flip-flop already raised in the air) and smacks it dead for me. Yeah, I married well :).

4.     Will. Not only does my studly husband kill massive spiders for me, he also deals with my many emotions- which deserves quite an award! Will continues to amaze me with his ability to trust the Lord in new places and adjust to whatever God calls him to. I’m blessed beyond measure to married to such a Godly man, and for that, I am grateful everyday.  

5.     A new church community. Will and I have started to attend a church that is very close to where we live. We have felt extremely welcomed and accepted into this church family and we are very excited to get to know all of them more as time goes by. We can’t communicate very well with many of them yet, but that will come soon.

6.     Our language helpers. Mary and Francis have both been such an answer to prayer! They have been a huge help with language, but also have both become our friends. We are grateful for our time with them each week.

Look at that smile! These kiddos are just beautiful.

      7.     The children in Mundri. I have a huge heart for children. The more that we travel around the world, the more I realize that children are children no matter what culture they come from- and to me, that is such a wonderful gift from God! The children here are beautiful, fun and energetic and I have loved starting to get to know some of them and simply just tickling and smiling at others. Children are such a gift to this world!

8. Reminders of God’s beauty. God has continued to remind us each day of His beauty. One way that he has done that is through the beautiful sunsets and sunrises that He paints here. They are truly breathtaking and have been a great reminder of His presence in this place.

I hope that you have time in this week to reflect on what you are thankful for. I hope also that you have a wonderful Thanksgiving celebration. We will be celebrating with our staff tomorrow by cooking a Thanksgiving feast. I will try to post pictures of it soon. Happy Thanksgiving!