Reasons & Enduring

With having said good-bye to friends this last week, I'm thinking of my own departure coming up in 5 months. This is my last term here until God directs otherwise. So I’m starting to do some clean-up around my desk, sorting some papers, and found some of my early prayer letters and a letter to the director regarding my future. Would you like to know why I have spent all these years here? Written 21 years ago, it's still my heart. Let me share part of it with you (written July 24, 1986):

The end of my short term is coming up in five months. I have had to do some serious consideration as to what I should do after this. Having been here already two years, having gone through the initial adjustments and struggles, having stated building relationships with the nationals, having a basis of the language, and having learned the work and my role as a nurse at G. H. I can’t see throwing all this away only to go somewhere else and start all over again. Through various things I have read in Scripture and books by Christian leaders, through what I have seen in the last two years of myself, and with lots of prayer, I have decided I would like to return for another term. It is difficult for me to say career. We take our life really one day at a time. I know my life is committed to the Lord, for His service, for life. As Eric Alexander said of Paul, he had two motives that formed his life and thinking: 1. for the praise of His glory, 2. for the sake of the Gentiles and a third one could be added –for life. II Timothy 2:10 also encourages me to continue here in this ministry. “For this reason I endure all things for the sake of those who are chosen that they also may obtain salvation which is in Christ Jesus and with it eternal glory.”

An Old Hymn

Old hymns are really beautiful. So poetic. Recently this has been one that I have decided to at least memorize the first verse. When I think of the love of Christ, without reason (unconditional), never-ending, that pulls me to Him, I am just amazed. He calls us to love one another in this way too. Do we do that? No. Well, we do try. But maybe too often we're pushing people away more than pulling them to us. I have been reading Everyone is Normal Till You Get to Know Them, by John Ortberg. This is a great book about learning to live in community. God has invited us into the Fellowship of the Trinity. Jesus has prayed that we may be one, just as the Father and He are one. He paid an enormous price for us to be admitted into this Unity --death on the cross. And how do we respond to this? How are our lives changed by being loved with everlasting love? How are other lives being changed? I'm learning much from this and having to check my motives and my actions.

Loved with everlasting love,
Led by grace that love to know;
Spirit, breathing from above,
Thou hast taught me it is so!
Oh, this full and perfect peace!
Oh, this transport all divine:
In a love which cannot cease,
I am His, and He is mine.

Heav’n above is softer blue,
Earth around is sweeter green!
Something lives in every hue
Christless eyes have never seen:
Birds with gladder songs o’erflow,
Flow’rs with deeper beauties shine,
Since I know, as now I know,
I am His and He is mine.

Things that once were wild alarms
Cannot now disturb my rest;
Closed in everlasting arms,
Pillowed on the loving breast.
Oh, to lie forever here,
Doubt, and care, and self resign,
While He whispers in my ear,
I am His, and He is mine.

His forever, only His;
Who the Lord and me shall part?
Ah, with what a rest of bliss
Christ can fill the loving heart!
Heav’n and earth may fade and flee,
Firstborn light in gloom decline
But while God and I shall be,
I am His, and He is mine.

George Wade Robinson, 1838-1877

Trip to Niamey

Earlier this month I went to Niamey with a few friends. One had family members come for 2 weeks' visit, so we took them around to the tourist places in Niamey. The Grand Marché, the Petit Marché, a ride on the river in a canoe looking for the hippos (found one with its baby!!!), eating Shish-Kabobs by the river watching the sun go down, and tracking down the giraffes an hour down the road out of Niamey. We took lots of pictures --wish you could see all of them. Here's a few:

What do you feed your ba-bies???

Visit to a Nearby Village

Yesterday I took the girls, M, M, & S, down the road to a nearby village to do teaching with the women. The TBA (trained birthing attendant) who knew of our coming had already informed the women in the morning. Now she went back around to say we were here. She was gone over an hour encouraging women to come. And they came. There were probably 60 women gathered before she herself returned. The girls started the teaching on malaria. Before we finished maybe we had 100 women gathered. They were very interested in the teaching, knowing better how to care for their children, what to do when they had a fever, what treatment they needed. Yet the treatment isn’t readily available. There are young men who are roving ‘pharmacist’. But their medicine is not reliable nor is the treatment they give necessarily accurate.

The girls have been doing this teaching weekly in the village of Galmi going to each larger neighborhood. It’s been encouraging to here reports, how the women have questions and are eager to learn something.

Today I went to Magaria to teach the women. It’s been months since I have been there on a Wednesday. I go regularly to church there, although attending one church one week and the other the next. Then I go out to Jinkai to visit a small growing church once a month. I enjoy these visits, yet I miss getting more in-depth time with the women. So today’s visit was a real encouragement to me as we did a Bible lesson together and had a time of prayer. One of the ladies had a minor stroke earlier this week. She is regaining her strength, but it scares me to think what could happen any other time. She has tried to learn to read but . . .so we worked on memorizing verses. Today she quoted Psalm 23 for me. I encouraged her to keep reviewing this and let God’s Word strengthen her.

Pictures taken in April

Mom, me, and my sister, Diane
















Diane and my niece, Nicole
















High-School Girlfriends : Debbie, Linda, Janet, Leslie, and me
















My nieces and me
















Girlfriends from childhood, Pam, Becky & me

Something New

So it's time to put something new on here. Sorry it's been so long. That seems to be the story of my life. I'm often behind and trying to catch up. Anyway. . .I thought I'd put some pictures on here but I'm not having success. I'll try that later.

I'ts now over 3 months since I got back from vacation at home. It was great to be there with my family and enjoy lots of different celebrations. One being Easter!!! This is one celebration we don't just celebrate on Easter, yearly, but is celebrated or should be celebrated each day. New life in Christ!!!

Another celebration was my birthday, marking 50 years. It's nice to know I'm not alone in celebrating this hallmark. A lot of us are enjoying this together!!! Smiles. Again it's a celebration of the daily life God has given us on this earth.

Then there was the celebration of my nephew's marriage. Darren & Amanda. Their motto is 'Good for Life'. That's how it should always be. A marriage relationship committed for life, with God in the center.

Back here at Galmi we celebrated life in a different sense than the normal. Helene is celebrating life in the presence of her Lord and Savior, Jesus. It was her home going on July that we celebrated on July 30th. That's something to anticipate and eagerly waiting for. Helene was diagnosed with cancer last year and lived a full life until the last few weeks. Her desire was to stay serving the Lord in Niger with her family -husband and 3 children. And that's what she did. She knew and could say, 'God is good, all the time'.

Ahh, to Shop in Niger or The Shops Around the Corners

Being back in Niger I have a day before traveling to Galmi. Of course there’s always this ‘n that to buy, but I don’t have my own transportation. I could take a taxi everywhere in the city to shop, they’re readily available. Being I’m traveling by bus tomorrow I can’t take perishables with me. Can’t get that pizza cheese or sausage which makes for a quick meal (I’ll just have to prepare some meatballs or hamburger patties in advance instead). There are various shops around the corners here. There are a couple of small grocers, various fruit stands, your basic needs canteen and young men on the corners with various items to sell. I go to the grocers to get chocolate mousse mix (taste just as good as my homemade stuff and easier to fix), batteries, cookies and yogurt to eat while here. I buy a few mangoes (it’s mango season!!!) from the fruit/veggie stand outside the grocer. I’m a regular here when I come into town and the man seems to give me good prices. There’s a man with used clothing who always tries to interest me in something. Today I stopped and looked at blouses. I ended up buying 3, brand names too –Sag Harbor, Silk Exchange, & White Stag (J) all for $8. Not bad and they’re in good condition. One is a size 2X but I think it got washed (was to be dry cleaned only) and it shrunk to my size. I walked back towards to Guesthouse and to the other corner to get a prepaid phone card for one of the young men who sell to vehicles stopped at the light. To get his attention I said “Tsss” and immediately he turned. It works. I was expecting some visitors so went to a canteen where I saw they had a fridge and bought was yogurt drinks. They’re really yummy. You drink right out of the plastic bag having made a whole with your teeth in the corner. So my visitors came, had a good long chat, & showed pictures of my time at home. It was 8:30 and I hadn’t had dinner. I went across the street to the bakery looking for something like a pizza but they had none. So out the door and to the restaurant next door to buy some egg rolls, 6 in fact, that I eat all by myself. Yummy. There you have it –the shops around the corners.

Spiritual Life Conference 2007

Spiritual Life Conference is an annual event for SIM missionaries. We all gather in Niamey for 5 days of refreshment in the Word of God and a relaxing and fun time together. We totaled 179 missionaries, including 64 children. Wow, I didn’t think we were so many. The theme of the conference was “Ministry and the Sovereignty of God” based on Philippians 2:12b-13. This reads, “Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose.” I would like to share with you some of the thoughts from the first sessions.

We need to be passionate about living in the awe of God. Is there a daily deliberate passion to worship God? (Ps. 42:1).
We must know God, not just know about Him, and not just know Bible truths. God wants us to know Him. Phil 3:7-8. In knowing Him am I convinced that I’m exactly where God wants me to be?
We must serve God, not just identify with Him, by serving others. Mark 10:45. Learn to serve people in a new tender way in love, seeing their need and share Jesus.
We will reap rewards of living in the wonder of worship. I Peter 1:8,9. Our worship will cause us to have a more intimate relationship with one another. Criticism disappears when we know worship.

Linda, Mirjam (my new neighbor for 4 months), & Ruth.

Kids singing at Family Worship