One Day At A Time

Sometimes it is so hard to just keep it simple. With all the stuff that comes at us every day it doesn't take much to set everything off balance. It may just be a case of taking on one more thing than is necessary or perhaps reaching too far in one direction. The reaching usually happens in one of three directions, forward, backward or up (down usually results in a seated or fetal posture so I won't include that here). From the off balance position things usually proceed to a full on falling position because if the situation is not rectified it is impossible to stay off balance for any length of time. Most of the time, for me, I feel as though I am falling forward. I reach out to try and take hold of the future and end up flat on my face. Lately it has been the whole dream of returning to China that has me unravelled. My boss even asked me how I would handle it if the teaching job falls through. I told him I would probably go into some kind of withdrawal for awhile.
Thing about grabbing for the future is that there is nothing of any substance there until it becomes today. There are things in the realm of faith that we can grab, but they are rarely to do with our schedules and expectations.
That is where I am at right now. If you hear a loud thud, that was just me again.

Can't Wait

Well, the time is drawing near for my trip to Hong Kong and I am finding that my mind is easily wandering off to all sorts of interesting places. It seems to show up a lot at work where I have to try and guard against mental meanderings all the time. It gets really bad when I am going to a job that is a 45 minute drive on the other side of the lake. It never seems to happen just before the last exit but rather just as I am pulling up to the customer's house. I am getting better at making myself busy and tying up loose ends I never thought of before, so perhaps there is an upside.

We just went to the airport today to say farewell to my buddy's wife as she was heading back home to Athens while he stays here to visit a few more days and that obviously got my brain going again. It is hard to keep it here.
We ponder quite often what it will be like to live on Cheung Chau island and walk a path so different from where we are now. There have been dreams, words and signs that God has given aplenty and yet it all seems so hard to believe.
I will write soon about some of the cool things that are pointing this out as the right direction and let you weigh them for yourselves.
Gotta run. Friends from Indonesia are arriving soon. So cool being part of the missions community.

New News

Alman Chan

Hey All, long time no blog. There has been some very cool rumblings happening in our lives lately so I thought I would blog them down.

As some of you may know we have had a strong desire to return to China since we left there in '04 to come back to Canada. We believe more than ever now that this desire is actually the call God has on us. The time to see it fulfilled seems to be drawing very nigh, and our excitement may finally surface from under the weight of caution.

In October of last year our friends who moved to Hong Kong met a gentleman who appears to be connected to both our destinies. His name is Alman Chan and he is the principal of the Christian Zheng Sheng school in Hong Kong. This school was founded 20 years ago by a man named Jacob Lam who followed the Lord by faith into a ministry of helping those ravaged by life on the streets and in gangs. There are many God stories surrounding this ministry and the faithfulness of our Father has been displayed daily. After hearing of this from our friends they also said that they had told Alman about our desire to return to China to work with the people there. He was excited about the possibility of having me teach carpentry skills to the boys at the school. He also thought my skills would be useful in helping to build and renovate the school and the orphanages they have on the mainland. With this vision in mind he was able to meet with us in Vancouver on the May long weekend during a promotional tour he was on with a group of his students. The meeting was absolutely wonderful and I was convinced that we had met a dear friend and most sincere man of God.

Since then we have awaited news from Alman regarding the possibility of us coming to work there in the near future. As we stayed in touch it became clear that we should arrange for a trip to Hong Kong for me to meet again with Alman as well as his boss, Mr. Lam. Alman agreed this would be best and so we set out to raise funds for the trip. The overall cost would be about $1800 with flight and food, etc. We sent out a support letter to friends and family to try to raise awareness, finances and especially prayer. This began the process of getting the funds in place to book the flight, but there was still a substantial amout we would need to cover ourselves.....or so we thought. God had other ideas. A couple I know from outside my normal relational circles got wind of our desire to get to Hong Kong and asked me if they could help. They suggested that if I did what amounted to an hour's work in their garage they would pay for my flights. After getting my mandible off the floor I enthusiastically agreed that this would be doable. Their generousity has continued to blow me away as they even offered to drive me to Vancouver if this would help keep the costs down for the trip. Now that the funding is in place and God has so clearly shown His enthusiasm for this undertaking I will be heading to HK in the early part of September for about 11 days. This trip will also include a trip to the mainland to see (and possibly assess) one of the orphanges there. This part of the trip will be with my buddy Steve who is very excited to have me out there. He said he would cover my costs for the flight to Fujian province so how could I say no.

So there it is in a nutshell. I will try to keep this blog a little more current and give some updates on what is happening with us so you don't all of a sudden find out I'm blogging from China again.

Cheers