Grieve
/My heart continues to grieve the abrupt loss of our season of life in Turkey and as a family unit. Our community there and our time as a family was rich and plentiful.
Next Saturday marks our 11th wedding anniversary and we'd planned to take a hop to Italy and spend a week in Venice. It would have been simply divine. We'd discussed visiting and touring around a bit in Germany and taking a train to Paris and then possibly hitting up a German Christmas market at Christmas time. We hear they are a must.
The husbands of our beloved small group remain locked on base while us wives and our precious children are scattered around the countryside of Germany and the U.S., recovering from the loss of the life we grew to love.
I return time and time again to Ecclesiastes 7:8,10 - Better is the end of a thing than it's beginning. Say not, "Why were the former days better than these?" For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.
We've experienced our first 4 seasons climate spring in 6 years and I've drunk it in as balm to sooth my pained heart.
If it weren't for the evacuation we wouldn't have been able to enjoy the beauty of this spring in a place where everything but the pines sleeps hard in the winter and returns tiny, green and new.
If it weren't for the evacuation my boys would not be getting to know their grandparents the way they are. We've lived far from them for so long. Their entire lives.
If it weren't for the evacuation I would not have been able to get a Meneire's diagnosis and the help I need - I would have continued in desperation, trying to self diagnose as I have for 6 years - never knowing what I was doing wrong - what I was eating wrong.... It's a blessed relief to have the reminder that I just simply am not in control of this disease. The Lord has used this diagnoses as a beautiful reminder that what happens to my body is only by his design and permission. I don't have to fight it. I have only to rejoice in the suffering and trust His sovereignty; two things that I am slowly learning the details of.
If it weren't for the evacuation I would not be experiencing the ever so humbling process of swallowing my self sufficiency pride and asking those around me to help me through each week as I face attack after attack - my body is not as strong as I'd like it to be, and OH the hit to my pride that has been. Asking for help is just.not.easy.
If not for this evacuation I wouldn't have sat through a sermon series that brought me from wondering "why me?" to realizing that this disease is not about me. It's about what will bring the Lord glory - I will rejoice and be used through it. I will continue to remind myself that my ministry is my boys, and being laid up on the couch is actually a very effective way of getting quality time with them - on eye level.
Our season in this place is so so short - and then we will be on to the next location. Maybe Omaha with my in-laws, maybe (and we pray hard for this!) to a new base location if Josh can get reassigned this summer. We are soaking up life here. The boys are doing beautifully despite the challenges we are facing. I'm breathless when I look at the surrounding mountains and the striking contrast between the shadowed crevices and the sunlight faces of the cliffs. Even richer when a rainstorm comes pouring over the tops - tall, billowy gray clouds all huddled like a mop of hair that comes cascading down when it gets too heavy.
When I smell the Russian Olives and Lilacs and irrigation ditches that bring swiftly to mind treasured memories of my childhood I take great delight in the chance to experience this season.
We love it here. We will leave here soon and be on to our next place -
And we will say to the Lord, "My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips." Psalm 63:5
