Really Quick...

This is going to be really quick...probably. I would have written sooner, but the internet has been turned off all week, because the kids have to study for their finals. Anyway, I just wanted to let you guys know that I'm doing sooo much better for having gotten that last email off my chest. Sometimes venting in one's native language can be remarkably therapeutic. ^^

So, yeah, it’s hard to live across the world from my family. It’s difficult not being able to speak the language fluently. I miss American food, and being able to find shoes that fit, and being able to cross the road when the light turns green, without looking both ways first. If I had known what it would be like, I think that I would not have chosen to be a missionary after all. But I know that someday this life, with all of its struggles and perplexities, will be over. Someday I will stand face to face with my beloved Jesus, and then...

Actually, my story is simply that God loves me. I wonder at His love. It’s almost as though He can’t bear to see me in trouble. It’s like He knows that I must experience difficulty to shape me, and because this is a fallen world. But it breaks His heart to watch my pain, so He cannot help but set aside the laws of nature, and pull me into His arms, and give me rest. There is such gentleness in His dealings with me. It absolutely blows me away. Sometimes I feel so deeply loved by Him and so extraordinarily well cared for, that I can’t help wondering if He loves me more than everyone else put together!

God has given me courage and joy. And, while I still feel inhibited, of course, by my un-fluency, I no longer feel the pressure that I did, and have been able to give that particular struggle to God. Thank you so much for your prayers!

Elisabeth