How to know where I'm going?

*note: I wrote this probably a month ago, but (as is pretty typical lately, for reasons I'll elaborate) I got distracted and forgot to publish it. Update soon to follow.

"where do I go from here?" I disliked Disney's Pocahontas 2, but that song has always stuck with me, and I've been singing it a lot lately. I applied for quite a few jobs for about two months, and didn't get a single interview. That frankly surprised me, as I figured "Ten years' experience" on a resume would be an ace in the hole. Now with the economic flux surrounding COVID-19, I'm not much expecting things will pick up for me. But, thankfully our tax refund this year is the biggest we've ever received and will keep us afloat for a few months. Discussing it with Kenneth, we decided that it is probably better that he pursue certifications.

I've doubted more than ever these last couple of months that I could handle another job right now anyway. Potty training is not going well, and so it feels like most of my days consist of taking the two-year-old to the bathroom, sitting down to do something, getting up to clean up the accident he had anyway, then consoling the baby who cried the whole time I attended to the accident, wondering, "now what was I doing again?" then turning around to see there's already another accident. I haven't even finished the DTP course which I promised Christie long ago. I picked it up again in February meaning to have it done by April 1. I have a first draft done, but still a lot of clean-up to do on it. I also have responsibilities with Stare of Owls, and we are being presented with opportunities (partially thanks to the lockdowns) that may make us money but ... will I have time? I really struggle to focus on anything more than ten minutes. I'd told myself I would be able to handle it by enrolling Nathanael in a Parents' Day Out when business picked up, but now who knows when those programs will open up again.

I also have to ponder a lot where the Lord is taking me spiritually in all this. I suppose what troubles me is that I've always (at least since I was a teenager) wanted to pour myself wholeheartedly into everything I did (hence the tagline of this blog), and lately I feel the need for reservation everywhere. Got to hold back on work to take care of the kids, got to put the kids aside to make progress in work. Want to fix up things around the house, but feel like I can't do that and get enough rest too. Even as we wait to go back church, whether mine or Kenneth's, the problems in the churches seem to stick out to me a lot more than any way I can help. It's a little amusing for me to hear people all around me talk about the Netflix shows they're watching to fill the time of social distancing, when I still feel overstretched. That in itself I wouldn't mind, but it's the lack of focus in the stretching that I have a hard time handling.

So, Lord, show me how to focus on You in this time, to grow as You desire, to be faithful but not foolhardy.

An unexpected end

I have sent the news to my prayer and financial supporters, so I think it's safe to make it public now, giving a few more details for those who may be interested.

Last spring as we were preparing for our trip to Zambia, I had to update some paperwork for SIM. As I did, I found there was one point that I could not affirm as I used to. Though I was hopeful that a promise not to make it an issue would be sufficient, and the personnel director took months to pray about the matter, it was finally concluded that I no longer meet the qualifications for an SIM missionary.

When the possibility that this could happen was brought up in the TEN3 meeting, Anthony told the others that "Satan's trying to get JennyBeth off the team." But I told him later, I don't see how this could be the devil's work, because no one was doing anything wrong. If I had given into a sin, or if I was being dismissed out of jealousy or some other such motivation, that would make sense. But it wasn't wrong for me to pursue the questions I did and conclude the matter was not as certain as I once thought. Nor was it wrong for the personnel director to uphold the standard that was prayed and deliberated over long before I joined SIM.

I wondered if I would be depressed leaving. I did cry. I can't leave something I've loved for ten years that easily. But the comfort that I did the right thing combined with another bit of encouragement, that maybe our leaders in Nigeria, Zambia, and Tanzania are ready to take the ministry forward without me. I'm not leaving behind the material-producing powerhouse we envisioned ten years ago, but maybe I am leaving enough seeds for the Africans to do what they must.

What next? We are looking and wondering. I had already dropped down to part-time status with SIM, and my support level made it barely above minimum wage--but it's still income we can't afford to lose, so we have to find something else. If I find part-time work that I can do from home, then I suppose we will continue much as we have been, with probably more income and I'll mostly be out of TEN3. If I find full-time work that would support the whole family, Kenneth is amenable to becoming the stay-at-home parent. Though that will still have its difficulties while Luke is nursing, Kenneth is already entertaining ideas of growing a garden and getting food animals again to teach/entertain the boys. But we are also looking for better-paying jobs for him. If he could find one, then I could continue on with TEN3 as a volunteer. Or perhaps I'll find a contract position, working full time from home for a few months and giving him time to get a CISCO certification. We've even wondered if this will somehow open up an opportunity for him to go to seminary like he's always wanted.

The search in the midst of trying to finish things with the mission, and going through the "what-ifs," is sometimes exciting but also getting tiring. My prayer is simply for enough money to do all that God wants us to do, and enough time to devote to our kids, house, and whatever else we should be doing.

It's not the crossroads, it's the steps you took to get there

When I was in Zambia in 2013, the leader of the youth ministry that hosted us asked each of us to share a word with his students. I wasn't exactly prepared--even years into missions, I wasn't used to being asked to preach/minister/advise on the spot, even though it's common on my trips. So I don't think I communicated it very well, as I got pretty blank expressions, but the point I tried to share was that the big decisions, the pivotal moments of your life to do great things for God, really matter a lot less than you think.

The last time that I felt like I had a big decision I was torn about and needed to hear from God was where to go to college. The more I've matured in my walk with Him, the less the big things have felt like decisions at all. More and more at each each crossroad, there would be only one way that made sense to who I was. Every chance I had to date someone in those early years, either the chance would close desipe my efforts, or the man just didn't fit what I knew would be best for me as one who would bring me closer to God. When I graduated, with career and grad school options galore, the only thing I could picture myself doing (besides having a family, which as I just said wasn't working out) was missions. When I found TEN3, I had very little deliberation about joining because it so well fit everything I had developed a passion for and everything I was good at. Even though Kenneth in so many ways did not fit what I was sure I wanted in a husband, I still think back convinced I couldn't NOT have married him, because I saw that, to become the person God wants me to be, I need him.

That's not to say I didn't agonize many times over whether I was right, and pray for God to show me if I wasn't. I certainly didn't always like the implications I knew would come out of the decisions I was making. But the way always was an inevitability coming from the desires I had inculcated.

Which brings me back to the point I was trying to make to the Zambian kids years ago. The big crossroads don't matter so much because they are determined by the little decisions you make when it doesn't seem to matter. The things you fill your mind with, the people you spend your time with, the mercy you give or withhold, and especially the time you spend praying, will always determine the big choices you will make later. I remember John Randles once explained that our spiritual lives are like a bank account, and in the dialog when Peter said he would die with Jesus and Jesus replied that he was about to deny him three times, Jesus was telling him, "You haven't made the deposits for that kind of withdrawal."

Another way to put it may be that how you perform in your time of testing will be determined by how dedicated you were to self-sacrifice when you were comfortable. I am humbled and reminded all the more how I must fill my mind and my time, for surely every regret I will ever have will come from lack of prayer.

Thanking God for a defect

I'm thanking God this week that I have one leg shorter than the other.

It all started with a nocturnal hip ache after I had Nathanael. Sleeping with a pillow between my legs fixed it, but immediately after giving birth to Luke, it came back, worse. It wasn't bad pain; more annoying. I supposed birth had pushed my hips a bit out of alignment, and so it crossed my mind that was probably something a chiropractor could fix. It took several weeks for me to talk myself into going; I halfway thought the mild ache wasn't enough to justify the expense, but the fact that I personally know a chiropractor (one of my husband's former Bible students) and the thought that it may become less fixable with time pushed me to make an appointment. I came just complaining of the hip ache, but he of course also asked me about various other areas. He asked if I have tension in my back, and I said, "Sure, I get stress-related knots." He asked if I ever get pain in my mid-back, and I happened to think then that yes, it does hurt when I wear the baby in a sling. I remembered that it got to where it hurt when Nathanael was 10 months old or so, and was surprised it started hurting when Luke was just 6 weeks old, though I just assumed it must be that I wasn't doing the sling quite correctly.

With the exam and X-rays, he found that the hip ache is due to my left leg being 11mm shorter than my right. It puts my hips out of alignment, and so has actually been wearing on them most of my life. Giving birth was just the first thing to aggravate it enough for me to notice. "Most people who have this and don't get it corrected eventually need a hip replacement," he told me.

But then he showed me the X rays of my back, and I was stunned. The tension and ache that I had thought was totally normal was a sign of vertebral subluxation complex all through my spine--my lower and mid back have lateral curvature, and my neck has lost its normal curve. This was almost certainly caused by years of heavy laptop use, and especially the setup I'd improvised to nurse and work at the same time, sitting in a recliner and reaching over to my laptop at an angle. He showed me on the charts how this complex leads to premature arthritis, bulging disks, vertebrae fusing together, and all kinds of nasty stuff. My mid-back has already developed two small bone spurs, but the doctor assured me that the rest of the problem is still completely correctable. So the next few months will be marked by new ergonomic furniture and many trips to Lubbock. He also warned me that as we began treatment, I would feel worse before I feel better, and that had certainly been the case. It's still not too bad, but the added discomfort reinforces the shock realizing just how much trouble I was headed for.

It's struck me that, if it were not for my legs being different lengths, leading to the hip pain, I would have ignored the back tension until it progressed to real pain, and by then I would have had permanent damage.

If you compare my first couple of years writing this blog with this past year, you probably notice a change in attitude. The enthusiasm and big dreams have been almost jaded as I think back at how many failures we've had. I don't write much about the disappointments, because I'd rather share the things we rejoice and hope for, but, with news that the app we hoped would fund the ministry has been out-competed before we got our first customer and that schools are too worried about getting computers to stay in business to hear about new curriculum and certification, I really began to wonder, "Is this it? Are we never going to get the results we've prayed for? Did we make too many mistakes, so many that the enemy won this battle? Is it time to look for something else?" Then this issue at the chiropractor's told me that God knew the mistakes that I would make in how I would position my body, and gave me that leg discrepancy to give me a warning to correct it before it was too late. If He did that, then how can I not believe that He knew all the mistakes TEN3 and our partners would make, and made provision for those too?

Anthony's latest conversation with me about the future of TEN3 curriculum was likewise encouraging. Since Kenneth and I plan to homeschool using the classical model, pulling in other elements we have come to see as important, Anthony asked, "Can I just adapt what you do and get schools started with it?" Well, I think that may be more difficult than he is bargaining for, but it probably can be done. We are still running our programs in Nigeria, Zambia, and Tanzania, but I couldn't see what more steps we could take to get educators discipled strongly enough to take it "to the third generation" as we've always envisioned.

So maybe all the trial and error along the way was God geting us to this point, where I am advancing the most important sector of transformational education--children's level--by doing just a little more than I would be doing anyway in educating my own children. Keep praying for us.

Baby! Is a baby!

That's what Nathanael was exclaiming when he saw his little brother for the first time:

His name is Luke Athanasius. I love the name "Luke" because it means "giver of light," and I want my child to behold and reflect brightly the Light of the World. I also like the character Luke in the Bible--I like his skill and thoroughness in writing the gospel and Acts, and how dedicated he was in helping Paul--he traveled with him as a prisoner, enduring a shipwreck and so much more for the love of our King. It's very clear from his writing and his actions that he had a passion for God's glory among the nations. Those are qualities I pray for my son. Kenneth chose Athanasius for the saint whose life you can read here.

I have a lot to thank God for. I'm thankful that the birth went well. I'm actually thankful the doctor accidentally broke my water at my 38-week prenatal appointment, because the little guy was already 7 lb, 12 oz. I'm thankful that I didn't need Pitocin this time, so I could actually relax between contractions. I'm thankful to be on Samaritan Ministries now, which allowed me to have a hospital birth much more affordably than insurance did. I'm thankful for my parents and sister who kept Nathanael for us, for the couple from my church who came by to take care of our dogs while I was in labor, and for those who have helped us with diapers and other little items we can still use this time around. I'm thankful that, despite us all getting colds right after we left the hospital, little Luke hasn't suffered more than a stuffy nose. I'm thankful for how Nathanael has taken to Luke, and in general that he has such a wonderful family to be born into.

I am thankful for the time Kenneth was able to take off work, though now that it's almost time for him to go back, it sure doesn't seem long enough! Please pray for us as I begin adjusting to a "normal schedule" now with a baby added to toddler care, two jobs, and house management. I'm not sure if I'll need extra self-discipline or extra laxity to manage all these demands. Pray for the right grace I'll need to do what God has for me each day.

Ten years for what?

Ten years. This month marks ten years that I have worked with TEN3. It's difficult to believe I've now dedicated about a third of my life so far to it.

I was more than prepared to. All I wanted to do with my early adulthood was missions, and/or raise a family. Any other option, whether grad school or a career, just seemed a waste – why spend time pouring into myself when I had a great education, great health, no debt, nothing to hold me back from investing full time in the Kingdom? And I loved TEN3's vision from the moment I discovered it. There was nothing better I could imagine doing with my skills than helping Africans grow in knowledge that meets their needs and leads them to build their whole lives on Christ.

I still love that vision and all its potential. It's a bittersweet feeling looking back, though, at all the work we've done over the last ten years. Many of the opportunities we were most excited about fizzled to nothing. We were praying ten years ago for 350 schools running the CTO, and I think today we only have two currently running the full program. A couple more do portions of it. My main job those first few years was working toward a full university degree using the principles that God had revealed work so well for disciple making and excellent education in Africa to build on the CTO, and that has completely fizzled out.

So compared to what we wanted to do, our ministry has floundered horribly. Yet, when you look at how mission projects to go, the degree of results some mission teams may get from ten years of work, we do have quite a lot to show. Thousands of families have been impacted by our Families and Media ministry, with tears of repentance and opened eyes to the spiritual warfare going on in their midst. Hundreds of students have taken our Bible curriculum and gained a fuller understanding of God's work in the world throughout history and what it means to their lives. Students have been blessed with various adaptations of our CTO material to different situations, and those who have taken the program said they've never had anything so helpful. Pastors have given positive feedback that our seminars have helped them learn to use technology wisely in their ministry and engage more effectively with their youth as they guide them to use discernment. And our national directors still see much more potential for what TEN3 can do in their communities.

The difference between those results and what we are about, though, is in our tagline, "Discipling to the third generation," that is, having people understand the discipleship material and process well enough to teach others and expand the ministry and make it their own. It is in making the ministry outlive us. That is really going to come down to training. Please join me in praying especially for Ray as he begins walking four young people, Aloyce, Joeley, Christpin, and Samuel through our online training. Pray that they, and those Collins is working on training, will really understand the material, catch the vision, and be the second generation that will disciple the third. Maybe we won't get the 350 CTO schools we envisioned. Maybe we won't get the tertiary degree with the curriculum we planned. But if we get people who know God's story of redemption and what their place is in it, who practice spiritual discipline out of love for the Lord and not a checklist, who can comprehend what they read and discern good information from the less-helpful, and who have a passion to bring that to others, then I will be at peace that we have done what the Lord asked of us.

What did we talk about in Zambia?

So what actually happened in TEN3 during our conference in Zambia? First, of course, we prayed and worshiped together each day. There also was just the joy of being together, and the affirmation of our love for one another and our work together. Our four countries each reported the state of our ministry. The US side of TEN3 is going to have to be mostly on auto-pilot for the coming year, with Ken retiring, Jim and Karen slowing down to focus on health problems, and me having a baby.

Nigeria is advancing on many fronts, with the Families and Media ministry still reaching thousands of women and, as we had hoped, creating interest in the CTO. They are also continuing workshops for secondary school students on break, technology training for underprivileged groups, and now an outreach in the prisons. Our Nigeria director has also been invited to a curriculum conference for an association of Christian schools throughout Nigeria, which yields rather exciting possibilities for shaping the education across the country.

Tanzania is in something of a reset mode. There was a center running in Bunda last year, but Tukiko admitted that he had other priorities in his church that kept him from supervising it as closely as it needed. Then the location was no longer available and the teacher wanted to move on. However, his church was impressed enough with the program that they decided to construct a new center, with more resources and attention devoted to it. They are finishing that up. Ray went on to visit Bunda after our conference and got to meet the new young man who will be the teacher, and so we have him set up on our training site. Ken likewise got to visit Miriam, who is working toward opening a new CTO center in another city in Tanzania, encouraging her and her staff and leaving then with eight computers to get started.

Collins is still just getting started with the ministry. Thanks to partnership with another gracious ministry, we were able to ship him eighty-four laptops earlier this year, and he is starting in five locations with those, some doing the CTO for adults and some doing "Learning with Computers for Primary Students." I got to meet Charis and Zangi, the two girls helping edit the reading books.

We also discussed the next needed steps and perceived obstacles. The biggest obstacle is our standards/certification process. Christie told us that they cannot get people or institutions to pursue the certifications we offer because the requirements are seen as rigorous for little immediate benefit. On our side, I pointed out that we have not done a good job of recognizing and keeping track of those steps that are taken toward certification (mainly because we don't really have anyone assigned to do it). Her idea is to use equipment as an incentive for certification. Our three national directors together also discussed that they would like to begin evolving the programs somewhat on their own, starting with an upgrade of our "Pastors and Technology" seminar that could be used in seminaries. What Anthony picked up from those things is that the standards and certification process needs to grow organically as our national directors respond to the needs and desires in their contexts.

In a way, we are seeing exactly what this ministry was geared to do--the US side diminish while the Africans advance. We will still be their secretaries, writing down what they find and accomplish to share and formalize. And we will still look to raise equipment for them to use. Please pray for us as we continue to navigate these changes and seek to follow the Lord's direction. May the gospel go forward greatly as our ministry takes advantage of each of these opportunities to make disciples.