More new beginnings!

This week has continued along the same way as the last ones since we’ve been here in Greece. New learning experiences, new challenges, new glimpses of the power and glory of God.

Let me share some of the good things happening first:

We are building relationships with some new Greek friends. We are able to drive (OK Mike is) around without getting lost most of the time. We are privileged to be partnering with you all to serve Christ here in Greece. It is an awesome responsibility and an awesome joy (most of the time!)

We are where we KNOW God wants us. We are uncomfortable but not without cause. We are SURE that God is working in our lives right now to mold and shape us into instruments that He can better use for His purposes.

Think of the roads you drive, very few of them are totally smooth. There are potholes and curves and hills and valleys along the way. We know what that’s like. We’ve just left the familiar and comfortable for a new road. It has bumps as all roads do. But we are confident that God is leading us and is very present by our sides each step of this new drive. In fact, we are much more aware of His presence and His provision for us here each day than we were when we felt so self-sufficient back home.

We are trying to learning THANKFULNESS in all things. While this feels strange, it does shift our focus from our circumstances to the sovereignty of God. It reminds us that HE is in charge and that we are not merely just wandering aimlessly. We know the character of our God is good and that He works all things together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purposes.

So on with the week:

Monday: Calling customs agent only to find the truckers’ strike was still on and would most probably continue all week. Spent the day helping do some “spring cleaning” at the HM office. In the evening we served the weekly Love Meal to refugees and homeless. This week was a challenge because we served a beef dish and the people were so excited for it that they wanted, begged for, endless refills. Some even tried to trick us, by hiding bowls under the tables 

Tuesday. Ministering to the refugee women and children as they come to the hall to take showers and to do laundry. While this might not seem to be such a challenging thing, it is for me. There are always too many clothes to wash and not enough time in the day to get them all done so some sort of system needs to be put into place. The question is how? I’ve given out numbers now which seems to work somewhat but then there are always the exceptions. Women who have five children and one load is not enough for them. Ones who stay there for 5 hours waiting to do one load. Those who attempt to sneak in a load while I am out getting more towels. The ladies arguing with each other about who is next, etc. It doesn’t help that I can’t distinguish well between them as many are wearing head scarf’s and I can’t tell one from the other very well. The constant begging, please please, in languages I don’t understand.

Then the showers: if the ladies take too long we run out of hot water for the others. So this week, I finally had to try to peek in the showers and tell them to turn off the water. 10 minutes is what I try to tell them. One woman, very pregnant, was in for almost 30 minutes. She would turn off the water when I asked and then turn it back on again when I left. How does one handle this situation, am I going to drag a naked woman out of the shower? It’s quite stressful for me and I am trying to respect their privacy in the shower and yet they are not doing what I’m asking, what to do? As I mop the floor, I pray, “God please give me wisdom to know how to handle this, I can’t even do this simple job without your help.”

In the midst of this chaos, and it is chaos, I had the opportunity to spend about 15 minutes combing out a young girl’s hair. Her mother was busy bathing her younger siblings and this girl had already showered and was struggling to get a fine toothed comb through her thick dark hair. I motioned to ask if I could help her and spent the next minutes gently working through all the knots in her hair. (Girls, I remembered how you always complained that I yanked yours, so I was trying to be real gentle!) It was such a joyful experience of showing her the love of Christ as I served her. She was smiling and I was smiling and I just loved on her. I must tell you my heart just swelled as I was able to spend this time giving this little girl, who has seen too much of the world and its pains and struggles, some special attention. That 15 minutes made this whole week worthwhile. In the midst of chaos, God brings joy!

More chaos this week:
Going to a Greek hospital this week for a chest x-ray and TB test for our visa application here. Two days: 4 hours. I felt very vulnerable putting my physical body in the hands of strangers whose language I did not understand and submitting myself to procedures I did not comprehend beforehand. When the lady approached my arm with a needle (and not wearing gloves) I thought, OK God if you want me to get AIDS it’s in your hands. Dramatic, I know, but what I was experiencing at the moment. After she stuck the TB test under my skin, I finally was brave enough to look and was surprised that she had not drawn blood which is what I thought she was supposed to be doing, wrong again-a common occurrence for me here!

Calling daily to the customs broker to see if we can get our container. The truckers have been on strike for two weeks now. Neil Macris went to the port again (4th trip) for us on Friday, we paid a lot of money that we weren’t expecting to pay (for storage since it’s been on the dock almost one month because of their strike) and we think it will be delivered to our house on Monday. We’ll see.

Language school began Wednesday! Now we know why older people like us don’t do these kinds of things-we don’t like feel so stupid at this time in our life. When we’re young, we expect to not know many things, but once we’ve hit middle-age we think we have a pretty good handle on things, but let me tell you-it’s difficult!! The first day our teacher called on each of us (only 5 in the class) to READ GREEK WORDS!! This is particularly hard when you don’t know the sounds of the letters of the alphabet. I was praying not to cry as I was so nervous and uncomfortable. Another tip: when one is nervous and scared, the brain does not function at its best!

We came out of our 3 hour class with our heads spinning. We walked to where we had parked our car and found that the license plates were missing and there was a parking ticket on the windshield. To make a two and one half hour saga short, after many, many tears and trips to two different police departments, we paid a 40 euro fine and were able to get the plates back that same day. We heard this is quite unusual as they normally make you wait 20 days to get your plates back. Thank you Lord.

Wednesday evening: as if we hadn’t had enough, we then came home and were trying to negotiate terms of agreement for a buyer with our house in Wheaton. We were trying to communicate with our realtor and our attorney through a very slow dial up speed connection on the internet. As it stands right now, we signed a contract, BUT it is with a 30 day contingency that the buyer has to sell their house in, so we are cautiously optimistic.

Thursday: Another trip to the hospital, Greek homework and studying. Doing laundry, having it get soaked in the rain (a 15 minute downpour while we were away) and having to bring it in, wring it out and re-hang it only to get it caught again in the rain the next day as we were out for a walk!

Friday: Language school again. This time Mike said after class that he’s not much of a crier, but that he was working hard not to cry in class that day. We are the oldest and slowest students in the class and the others are able to grasp the material much quicker than we are. Two of the young ladies are fluent in at least two other languages; one even works as a translator! School has been the hardest thing Mike has had to do here in Greece. I experience this same sort of being overwhelmed in almost anything I do here: helping the refugees, trying to drive and park the car, at the grocery store etc. I can’t believe this is the first time Mike has felt this way here.

Phone saga: We applied to get a home phone and internet Dec 15th. Still no word. We keep making attempts to connect with the right people through our landlord, the builder of this house, etc. and are still trying to get connected. We spend a couple of hours a week on this process. We are so grateful for the generosity of our downstairs neighbors who enable us to share their network card with them and thus are able to use the internet most of the time. So if we are slow in communicating with you all, please forgive us as we are not up and running yet on our own.

Thanking you all for your love and support. We value your partnership more than you know.
May God continue to richly bless each one of you.

A story for another time: trading the riches of home for the riches of Christ.