Hard Questions

Anyone who is or has been a parent to young ones know they can ask a lot of questions.

Those questions can run the gamut from 'what are we doing today?' to 'what does heaven look like?' Some questions are easier to answer than others.

Saturday's question that nearly put me over the edge was: "When will the electricity come on?"

last Wednesday's women's Bible study during a 'regular' power outage that lasted about 30 minutes

It's been a stormy week in Albania.  We've had a lot of rain and a lot of wind. (I never thought I'd feel such winds anywhere but the prairie!)

Of course when there is a lot of wind, there are lots of opportunities for power outages and we experienced a doozy last week. Four mornings out of 5 we woke up with no power (and thus no way to take showers), the shortest lasting about 4 hours, the longest stint lasting more than 30 hours without power.

Thankfully we have been blessed with a generator so the power outage didn't affect our ability to have church and other regularly scheduled programs, but we were limited in what we could plug in simultaneously so the deep freezer and fridge got priority.

Nevertheless, as I dreamed about getting a hot shower, I couldn't get too upset when I was asked one more time about when we'd get power again, after all, I was asking myself the same question...

Today's tough question will be "When will Gigi and Gjysh get here?"

Yes!  While my mom was just here in December, this will be my dad's first visit in more than a year.  His health has prevented him from any international travel, but he recently got the 'all clear' from his doctor, so we've been counting down the days.

Last night as we were putting the kids to bed we got a Voxer message from mom that a mechanical problem with their plane in Chicago has caused a domino effect of missed flights. So in the mean time we wait to hear word of their arrival... like we did for the power to come on, Will it be later today or tomorrow?

We have a LOT of business to cover and important ministry decisions to make that really require their presence here.  While we look forward to our time together, would you pray for making the most of these few days and for discernment?

As for other activities in our lives the past few days...

Monday I shared our testimony in a chapel service at the international Christian high school in Tirana. It was a privilege to be invited, of course, but stretching for me as I'm much more comfortable with University-aged students!  I survived in once piece with no major awkward pauses (always my greatest fear in public speaking)!

The other unusual event last week was submitting an article which will be published as the cover story of a mother's day edition of a Christian women's magazine here in Albania.  I was really honored to be asked to write for this publication.  It is a fantastic evangelistic piece in a country that has limited resources in the Christian publishing world specifically for women. As you read this, would you pray for those who might read it? It was one of my more difficult challenges as I weighed how much of our story to share in this kind of format.  I pray that it is received in the right spirit and that it might be used to touch hearts to understand God's great, pursuing love for them!  We are also planning to buy several copies to share with Albanian friends and individuals who played a role in helping us with both children's adoptions.

I'm especially grateful to our friend and colleague, Genti Proseku, for so carefully translating it for me!  I'll be sure to take some screen shots of the story once it's published.

I'll conclude with a photo of a very happy Reni.  Friday night after church the G brothers stayed for a sleepover. Youngest boy "C" had just had his 5th birthday and his birthday request was to come to Ellie and Reni's house, so we were happy to oblige.  It was the first time we've seen them since Christmas as they spent January up in Kosovo... I think the blackout only added to the fun!