a long overdue update....

Friends,

You have seen us through a tumultuous, sorrowful year.  Thank you.

One year ago we were shocked and angry with the injustices that surrounded us as the people we loved were oppressed and abused by the government over them.  Many times friends remarked of frogs never quite realizing how close they are to being boiled until....

In April, the pot foamed up and boiled over in an instant and we were pulled out at just the last minute; we fled with more grief and survivor guilt and questions and painful sorrow than we will ever find words for. And believe me, I've poured out some words.  But it all falls short.

The next few months the Father provided with lavish generosity for our family:  beginning with "Yes, the six of you can stay with us... we'll be ready for your arrival in a few hours" and then "The Lord laid it on my heart to ask if there are any international workers that need housing, cause we're going to be gone for five weeks and we'd like people to stay in our home," and "Yea, they can use our minivan too," and then "Our basement is available to you for as long as you need" and "We'll be gone for the rest of summer, would you please stay in our home?"  There were care packages, tearful talks with friends- one who flew across the country to comfort Matt and many who we were all the sudden face to face with unexpectedly.  There were invitations to share with groups and we were really too shaky for it, but you put up with the shaky version of us.  Thank you.

We were counseled that we shouldn't make any big decisions for a while, give ourselves time to rest and reflect and move forward slowly.  But we didn't feel like extended waiting would be helpful.  Nor does too much open time seem like the best path to healing for Matt or me.  So we prayed hard and moved forward as quickly as we could....

And the Father brought together about a thousand more pieces for us to move to Northern Virginia in August.   We came for jobs with a new ministry called For The Nations, DC which provides ESL (and will soon have more sports and job training as well) for refugees, asylum seekers and newcomers to America. This is also the location in America where there are several thousand of the people we love, whom we eagerly desire to continue advocating for....

So we landed to a home intentionally made available to those in ministry and stay for a few days til our rental was ready and we visited one church 14 hours after pulling into town and never visited another: grateful and fed and delighted to worship and serve together with The Falls Church Anglican.  Just thought we'd try it, since they are the church hosting For The Nations in their facility.  The townhome we ended up in isn't as beautiful a fit but we couldn't never beat the location, the schools, the neighbors here and we look forward to a future season of having a home better suited to hospitality.  This has been the one difficult piece and I've wrestled with it too much.... but may my heart desire for a home that's bright and clean, with capacity to serve and welcome guests, be submitted to the Lord.

Processing all the transition has felt like something we've wanted to do, known we need to do well... but really, how do you?  How does a family process all this?  Especially a family like ours that has only one verbal, emotional expressive type and a bunch of internal processors who don't naturally communicate about emotion.

Leaving nearly twelve years of ministry without a single goodbye to the friends we came to serve. Leaving them living under horrible fear and facing unjust prison as their very real future- maybe in part because they knew those tall foreigners.  Leaving our home- the first home in our marriage that I really loved- a home our family loved and we ministered out of joyfully. Leaving the mortgage still to pay and being allowed to pause payments while we pray earnestly for buyers.  (Would you join us to pray for the Father to provide buyers- even in that war zone?)  Leaving the only real job on Matt's resume and needing to find someway forward, some new job, with very very slim experience to note that anyone was impressed by.

We hoped that there would be a dog in our future, but with our little rental and a budget built for living in China, there's been no adding anything.  Our budget has been tighter than it ever has in our lives- showing both how blessed and grateful we've been for such faithful provision for so long and how good it is to have to tighten down and find that we still have all that we need, even when we have less than we've had before and far less than most everyone around us. Easing our kids into their first brick and mortar schools in a country where they felt unfamiliar; three kids came in at math levels that felt ridiculously easy for them, but they hadn't covered everything in the year ahead and it's better not to leave holes... so they probably lost a year or two of math progress.  And when they thought they were probably headed for the MLB, our boys have realized that their baseball skills fall far closer to the center of average.

I desperately pray that we are each experiencing jaw-dropping wonder at the grace of God to provide for us through all of this....  The Lord who opened up the Red Sea for His people, also brought us out of China and into this good land and is planting us here too, tending to us with all His heart and soul and enabling us to be fruitful in this place- bearing fruit for His glory, fruit that we pray will abound with praise for all eternity.



And now for this blog....

My eyes tear up quick to think of the deep joy it has been to me to record the Father's graces to us here for about a decade.  To record family photos, stories, and memories.  To post book reflections when there was no book club for me to chat with, or homeschool craziness when there was no community to share those burdens or joys.  I feel like this blog has been my main link to my dearest friends.

And now I'm saying goodbye.

Another sad good-bye!

But I'm not leaving posts completely.  I've been sharing pics over at Instagram for two years now and Id love to connect with you friends there.  (username @mattsjill ).   I'm also looking for another place to post more advocacy writing.  In my crumbs of time between kids and teaching ESL and hosting and visiting Muslims and student friends, I'm trying to actively pursue congressional and senatorial for a Human Rights Bill affecting the people we love.  If I can get more writing together of our experiences living through the wretched, corrupt, deplorable oppression there, I will share a link here for wherever that is.  I'd love your prayers with me that this would come together so that ultimately Christ could be displayed in this advocacy as Bonhoeffer noted Him to be:  "a man for others".  May it be seen that we are laying down our lives in a tiny way, following after Christ who laid down His life in the greatest way, for this beloved people.

Lastly, I had posted here for a time a long narrative poem- of sorts- with too many collected photos of the place and the people we love and with a heap of our family experiences there and with all my passion poured into words to exhort others to see the goodness of going, of laying down our lives at the ends of the earth for the sake of the King and the Kingdom.  My hope is to get this into a page format before too long.  If you'd be interested to receive that, I'd love to send you a copy once it's done.  Please let me know!