Settling and reflecting, part 1

We have now had a few weeks to settle back into life here at home. Many times daily I am still caught up in wondering what is happening at a care point right at that moment, how MuMu is progressing, what adventures our friends have had that day, and what God is doing with all that we saw and learned. Thankfully, we are feeling more peaceful about major lessons we needed to learn and how God has revealed His amazing goodness in our lives. He is so patient to give us bits and pieces of truth about ourselves so that we aren't completely overwhelmed. Because honestly, this trip brought out some hard stuff.

I mentioned previously that one odd factor in the trip was the fact that just before we arrived, the internet went out at the McAdam's home. We weren't concerned and assumed it would be fixed quickly. Apparently not only is it true that this culture isn't usually in a hurry about much at all, there is STILL a problem and their internet isn't working correctly or often. Let me tell you, that was a struggle for us, to not be able to easily communicate with our precious families and friends who wanted to check in on us. We had been so dependent to tell everything we can to our friends. We love keeping people in the loop, and for something as big as this trip, we planned that we would be able to update them frequently on how God was working, what prayer needs there were, and just documenting the adventure in general.

Not being able to easily call home and communicate with our families, when we just knew we'd be able to Skype with them, was really painful. It was a huge lesson for us in trusting God was providing and meeting their needs, when we could not check in with them daily and make sure. Alli and I both hit a breaking point quickly with that, and our obvious struggle in realizing we couldn't care for these loved ones while across the world was one of the most humbling parts of the trip. There was some u-u-u-u-ugly crying and fit pitching on our part, I hate to say. I believe one of us said, "WHY won't He make the internet work? He could! Why can we not talk to and see our families?!"

Looking back, even a couple days into the trip, we had better perspective and could see how we were having to focus on the tasks at hand, and really just relinquish that desire to have some pseudo-control of our kids and husbands, or at least over conversing with them. That had to be part of God's timing, to narrow our gaze to Swaziland, and to not forget our families, but truly, let that worry go. They survived just fine, our kids hardly even struggled one tiny bit, and our husbands, friends, and family cared for them so well. We had nothing to fear, and God proved that He was their sustainer, without our help. ;-) That theme of sustaining proved to be a big recurring one throughout our time in Africa and applied to many situations. This was just the first aspect of it. 

We had prayed and asked you all to pray that during the trip, things wouldn't all go smoothly. We wanted Africa to change us - for the experience to be more than a cool trip. We wanted to submit to the Lord's will, and realize that He would allow trials and blessings both, that would give us needed stretching, and we were willing to accept that. It was still hard, but it really was what we needed. This short poem really summed up well how I feel about what seemed like a 'hardship' for us: 

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,
Nor flight from all distress, but this:
The grace that orders our trouble and pain,
And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.  

John Piper

Getting there

We left for Swaziland on Mother's Day. Though that could've been hard, it was the best day for multiple reasons, mainly dealing with James and Dean's work schedules, and to maximize the time with the McAdams when they weren't hosting another team. We had worship with our church family that morning, then were blessed by their prayers for us and our sweet friend Rachel who was heading to Rwanda just after us. After running home and getting last minute items, we all arrived at the airport a couple of hours early for our flight. Though my goal had been to leave without our kids there to say goodbye in the airport, since I thought it would be more difficult, things just didn't work out that way. There was little drama, but it was painful for Elijah most of all, to say goodbye. The other kids hugged and were excited, but he was broken hearted and James had to carry him out sobbing. That was pretty tough, but once we were through the gates, Alli and I both could breathe a huge sigh of relief. We had no problems on the first leg to Atlanta, and then had such a brief time between boarding our next plane there, that we could barely get an iced coffee before taking off. We did meet a sweet Texan girl while waiting, who was a nanny in South Africa. First connection made!

I had a love/hate relationship with these informative screens.

Here is the little screen facing me shortly after leaving Atlanta. Ya'll, it was 15 HOURS of sitting, which is so-o-o long. Thankfully, it was already evening and we could sleep some. We were excited but also very tired from little sleep the night before, and were able to rest for several hours. Right on time, we arrived in Johannesburg.

So close!!

 

Our room at Airport Lodge

Amy and Steve had set up our hotel and driver to pick us up at the airport. We met Johan, an older "proper South African" gentleman who was kind and helpful getting us to our room for the night. We settled in, ordered takeout with help from the front desk "girlie" as Johan called her, and then paid to use internet. Electricity is a different current than here in the US, and so we had to use an adapter for Alli's laptop, and tried to call and Skype with our husbands and kids. It was a frustrating hour or so, and going on very little sleep, we were pretty delirious and goofy. Finally we at least let them know we were there and ok, but since I could not use my phone, we warned them we would probably have little regular contact if Amy's internet was down too. Little did we know... 

We slept reasonably well, and had a good breakfast the next morning. Another driver took us back to OR Tambo Airport for a quick one hour flight to Matsapha Airport. When we flew out of the city and saw the landscape change, and knew we were about to see our friends and those we loved, I really felt such joy and excitement. It was the moment we'd prayed for, for months and finally was almost here!