The kids have been so excited for this holiday! They've planned a skit, they are getting to skip school Thursday and Friday, and they are going to hang out with their American Missionary friends! It is an American Holiday and that is who we are :) So, we are planning to celebrate Thanksgiving with our American Missionary Team! Wahoo!!!! Do you feel our excitement? We are so blessed to be a part of Josiah Venture. A great group of Christian American friends!
I went shopping today and bought olives, pickles (green and black!), veggies of all kinds for a veggie platter, and ingredients for my Beppe's (Grandma's) apple crisp. Everyone has signed up to bring something, so their will be a lot of food! Just like at your homes :)I don't know what else to expect besides a lot of food, other than feeling blessed to be a part of JV, blessed by God, good family time, and good conversation with friends. I still feel like the "newbies" in the group (even though there is a newer family that arrived two months after us). So it's a lot of fun getting to know all of these precious people.
And like all of us do before we leave for a trip, I'm cleaning. Sweeping, doing the last load of laundry, sweeping, and I can't wait for the kids to get home to clean their rooms. I might get impatient and do their rooms for them. A vacation is just not relaxing if you leave your house with something out of order. Or is it just me?
And as our kids are anticipating this time staying the night for two nights and having three days with friends who speak their own language, and have been anticipating it for weeks now...
I'M LOOSING HOPE, wondering if we will go...
Alisha is very sick :( And it is breaking my heart because I am also looking forward to this time of fellowship and family time. And whatever other blessings this Thanksgiving Retreat will bring.
As I sit and write, Alisha is asleep on my lap with the throw-up bowl between her and the computer. She had a fever yesterday and hasn't eaten anything for 32 hours. Her fever is gone as of this morning, but the vomiting has begun. Poor girl!
I had a little hope yesterday, that maybe she would feel better. I've been so careful to keep hands washed and sanitize, sanitize, sanitize. So far, no one else is sick! But if there are any sings tonight or tomorrow morning of sickness still lingering, we will have to change plans.
..................
And I think quietly to myself, "I wonder why God wouldn't want us to go?" And I'm not complaining when I ask Him, just really seriously wondering "Hmm? I wonder why?" I deeply trust and know that God is in control of all things and that there must be a lesson behind this one. There just has to be because... there's always a lesson!Is the lesson for me, one of my children, somebody at the Retreat that wanted to come, but there was no room for them because of us, etc.?
Is the reason to walk through this disheartening news with the kids and talk to them about how much God really is in control, because I'm planning on doing that? Is it to talk about how God is Good even when it doesn't feel good or when we don't understand? Because we are going to talk about that too. Was something bad going to happen on our drive there that God is protecting us from?
BUT I'M NOT LOOSING HOPE IN THE RESULT. Because I trust that whatever the result, it will bring growth, change, and beauty BY GOD...
Who know's???? ....... God does!
Disclaimer, I know that this is a very little thing in perspective to some news that you have received or situations that are far worse than not going to a Thanksgiving Retreat and I don't want to be insensitive to that.
God can use all situations to grow us, change us, and give us inward beauty. Trusting God's indefinable goodness is a big part!
