Team Five Morris

My life has changed drastically in the last month. A month ago a friend of mine encouraged me to check out another international school for Aiden. He is a teacher there and said the school was really generous with missionaries in regards to school fees. I made an appointment and a week later Aiden was enrolled and I had a job! 

In that same week my younger kids' school, Acacia Classical Academy, asked if I would fill in for a teacher who was going back to Germany. Teaching music. I mean I love music and have spent my fair share of time hunched over a piano or plucking the stings of my guitar but I'm not a trained music teacher by any means. Yet this school, like the other one that Aiden goes to, was so generous to my family and my kids are happily being educated. So I agreed. 

I went from homeschooling and lolling around all day to working TWO jobs five days a week. 

My schedule used to look like this: Workout, homeschool, REST OF THE DAY TO DO WHATEVER I WANT. Now it looks like this: Up at 5:30 to work out, out the door by 7:15, drop various children off at school and work most of the day. Pick up various children at various schools, grocery shop, make dinner, force kids to do homework, get them off to bed. HUGE adjustment for me. 

I'm not really complaining. In fact, everytime I consider how unexpected the provision was from God for all three kids to be at great international schools I am humbled. Truly. Life as a working mom is harder than I thought it would be but my kids are excelling in school, playing sports, making friends and I am content. 

I may just be the office assistant who makes photocopies and records attendance but I am enjoying a whole new world of friends and activities. Homeschool moms: I still respect you for the challenges you face being at home all day, educating your children and keeping life running smoothly in your four walls. Working moms: I respect you equally as much. 

Aside from the school change and jobs there is another huge change for us. Rosalie is leaving on Wednesday. She has worked here with us for two years laboring, investing, living, sharing and participating in everything that God is doing in our neighborhood. She is one of my best friends and running partner, bible study friend, and cohort. I am devestated to lose her. Living overseas is very different in regards to friendships. People are constantly coming and going and it is really hard to get close to people. I have been blessed by Rosalie's friendship for two years so I am sending her back to the USA with a heavy yet hopeful heart. She is on a new path, a different mission field and I expect we'll have many more years of friendship even if it is from afar. 

Life is really changing. Kostya (our other long term co-worker) is getting married next month. The church is growing and maturing. Scovia is headed back to school on Monday to begin her last year of high school. Aiden is playing soccer (I am a soccer mom for the first time), Hannah and Ben are learning rugby (WHO acutally understands that sport?) and Dan and I are still happily married! (A daily praise for sure!) We are planning a trip home in June to see my sister tie the knot and to meet my new baby cousin. While changes make me uncomfortable at first, I can see that they aren't always bad. And God is always good.

Merry Christmas from Uganda! We are headed into three days of preparing and serving the people of our neighborhood a huge feast and the Good News. 

Each year we try to feed as many people as we can on Christmas Eve. This year is no exception. We are hoping for record numbers. Last Easter we served over 600 people!

Christmas is very different here. No piles of gifts, no trees in every home and Christmas lights in windows. No kids going to bed expecting a fat jolly man to deliver their heart's desires. Most people want to have some tasty meat on Christmas day and won't eat the usual fare of posho and beans. Some people are lucky enough to get a new outfit to wear to church on Christmas. 

We offer this meal not because it helps anyone long term. Not because we want to be known as the church who has awesome Christmas parties. Not because we want to pat ourselves on the back for serving the poor twice a year. We offer it because Christ was generous and welcoming and now it's our turn. The prep time for cooking is a warm happy time filled with laughing, singing, and sometimes dancing. The group of ladies spend all night cooking the day before and are bleary eyed come morning but ready to serve. The line is long, the people are hungry and the church is a mess before the day is done. I can't adequately describe the joyful chaos that this meal brings. 

To those of you who contributed to make this meal possible, thank you so much! There will be a lot of joy on Christmas eve, a lot of sharing about Jesus and many full stomachs. However you celebrate thank Jesus for the opportunity to serve Him another day and to look expectantly to the future. 

I really want to write something that sounds brave and up-beat in the face of crappy circumstances. But the truth is I am pretty devestated that we are battling another lung illness with Benjamin. He is staying the night in the ER of a British run clinic in Kampala. It is expensive and there are only two beds. So Ben is lying awake in the ER amidst chaos and noise tonight barely able to breathe. 

Hannah went through this a several years ago. Four bouts of pneumonia in two years shook us pretty badly. And now Ben. I am frustrated beyond belief and scared. The doctor here doesn't even know what is wrong with Ben. His x-ray shows one lobe of his left lung as being pretty sick. But the labs indicate this isn't a bacterial infection. Dr. Stockley is a very completent doc who has been here for 25 years and I trust his opinion which makes it all the more scary when he doesn't know what to do. 

When we got to the hospital today Ben's oxygen sats were at 72%. For those of you who don't know what that means...a healthy person is usually at 100%. At 85% the body is hurting to get oxygen to all the tissues. At 72% it is bad. On oxygen he is back in the range of 88-92%. But as soon as he goes off he plummets again.

By tomorrow we should have a second opinion (at Dr. Stockley's request) on Ben's labs. Dan graciously relieved me from staying the night at the hospital. Probably because when he showed up around 9 p.m. I was pretty frantic. 

Would you seriously pray for our family tonight? I have always struggled asking for complete healing but I am asking God for just that. And in addition pray that we'll get some insight into why this is happening. 

Thanks for your love and encouragement. 

If you know me or have been reading this blog for the past few years you know that I say what is on my mind. Not very eloquently either. This blog will be no exception.

My marriage is hard. Really challenging. The past 15 years of knowing and loving Dan have changed me. Sometimes for the better and other times it has brought out the worst in me. We just hit 13 years of marriage and I marvel that we still like eachother. 

I think that is what is so hard about it. I really do genuinely LIKE Dan. I HAVE to love him...its a rule of course. But to LIKE him, ENJOY spending time with him...that is a blessing. So when we have times where I don't like him, nor he me, well it is frustrating. I feel like the past year has been fraught with many times like that. 

Practically speaking, you move a healthy marriage to a third world country, plant a church and live in a fish bowl and you are guaranteed to have trials. But this last year has been pretty defeating at times. I have been very vocal about asking for prayers from many of you for this very thing. 

Since July Dan and I have been really fighting to keep our marriage healthy. We've added date nights, we've talked about our issues, we've talked to others about our issues, we've prayed and cried and read marriage books. And some days things are great. Two weeks ago things were NOT great though. 

We had a period of a week where we couldn't even talk without fighting. We went on two different dates that week and ended up fighting on the first one and simply NOT talking to eachother at all on the second one. We were both exhausted and empty and just kind of ignored each other and the issues for a day or two. During that time I was miserable. I prayed fervently for change of heart, change of emotions, change of habits and yes...even for God to simply change my husband. 

On a thursday night I left to go to our discipleship group that we do with our teen girls. Dan usually stays home with the kids and they make a mess of the kitchen and watch MMA (mixed martial arts) videos and take their shirts off and wrestle. When I get home I have an hour of damage control to do, dishes to wash and kids to put to bed. (who are totally wound up from all the wrestling) It is a great time for the kids to spend with their dad for sure and I'm grateful but I don't look forward to the mess each week. 

So I came home expecting the same chaos and instead I find my husband quietly washing dishes, the kids ready for bed with teeth brushed and the house clean. Since we still weren't actually talking to eachother I raised my eyebrows but said nothing. I went into our room to put my stuff down and was taken aback by our bed with clean sheets on it, clothes put away and four or five candles lit. 

Now most people would know exactly what that meant. However I was still annoyed with Dan and tired and simply blew the candles out, while being mildly appreciative of the freshly made bed. (The power had been out all day so I was thinking he had lit the candles while he was changing the sheets and forgot to blow them out when the power came back on) I proceeded to get ready for bed and went to sleep saying not a word of thanks to him.

The next morning as I was lying awake early it dawned on me that Dan had done something amazing. He had chosen to serve me. He was also annoyed with me and tired from all the ridiculous and pointless aruging but he had put that aside to serve me. Because it would glorify God. In that moment I also realized that the candles had meant so much more. It was a peace offering, a show of love and intimacy that we had been lacking for a long time. And I missed it. I laid in bed silently as Dan got up and made coffee (which he then brought me in bed). I was feeling pretty ashamed. 

In that moment I thanked God for always being faithful to us. For always pursuing us and lavishing undeserved love and mercy on us. I thanked him for using my husband to teach me that. I repented of all the times I had "blown the candles out" callously and selfishly in my marriage, for all the times I decided to put myself first and ignore the needs of my husband and kids. 

I came into the kitchen and quietly thanked Dan for his love and for making the house a nice place to come home to the night before. I meekly appologized for mis-reading the symbolism of the candles he has so thoughtfully lit, recognizing how hurt I'd be if the tables were turned and he had stormed into the house, blown out he candles and gone to bed. 

We smiled at eachother and drank our coffee. There wasn't much to say that hasn't already been said a million times in the last year after a fight. But we both ,in that moment, decided to keep trying. I know we'll argue again, that we'll be annoyed with each other and be selfish. But for today, there is peace. Today we recognize that the weary, imperfect, sinner across the kitchen table from ourselves is also being sanctified. 

Pray for us. Pray for protection for our marriage in this stressful environment. Pray for grace and joy to abound.