Living from rest

Living from rest. What exactly is that? You want to know a secret? I don’t exactly know either but its a phrase that has been stuck in my head lately. Maybe its because we are up to our ears in so many projects, maybe its because stress can sink it’s claws into daily life. Time is always something that we all say we don’t have enough of even in the year of 2021 when we own SO many conveniences to help us with our every project, from washing laundry to building a decks on our homes. We have tools to help us with practically every aspect of our life, to make things simple and quick and yet there is never enough time. Our family here is different because yes, we have a washing machine, a gas oven, power tools etc. The rest of the village is completely off the grid. They have no electricity, hence, they wash their clothes in the river, cook over a fire, chop a forest with a machete and they have a lot of time.

I’m thinking our lack of time isn’t really a lack of it but how we spend it. God gives us all 24 hours a day to spend and its our call as to how we choose to spend those precious hours. I’m becoming convinced that, in general, our lives feel full because our minds are full. I just discovered that the average American family has access to more than 10 connected devices. I was shocked, but then I counted ours. Phones, computers, tablet… It’s no wonder that we have no time and feel constantly busy.

What does rest look like? Here is my perspective, and though it may be idealistic it helps me to feel more grounded. I picture living from rest as having a quiet mind. A quiet mind means having time to think before spilling a hurried response. It would mean moving throughout the day pausing to take in the beauty that God created and truly appreciating it. It would mean being attentive and engaged in the lives of the people we share life with and not just nodding and smiling at the 3,489th drawing and inside really not caring to look. When I’m rested physically, the whole world feels like a better place, but when I’m tired… Whew! There is nothing I want to do more than just sleep.

This phase of ministry feels like the opposite end from rest. We’ve been living out here in the middle of no where for two and a half months now, and somehow our to do list seems to grow longer not shorter. Part of the reason is because we have so many projects going on and getting supplies here takes a long time. The other, more frustrating part, is working through all the legal paperwork that it takes to get the airplane legal to fly once it gets here. Along those same lines, Brad has been working for months to get all the paperwork to all right people so that the container with all the tools will get here at some point very soon; but that has turned into quite a feat. However, God is mighty and all things are possible with His strength. We are excited to watch and see how it all plays out.

Praises:

The Hochenburger Family moved here to join us 2 weeks ago. They are getting settled and we are SO happy to have them here!

The airplane is scheduled to arrive in country sometime next week!

Prayer Requests:

We would really appreciate your prayers to move the container and airplane paperwork along so we can begin to utilize them.

That Christ would go before us and His name would be glorified.

Protection, physically and spiritually.