The Ways of the Lord

My heart breaks for our missionary friends, Jon and Adie Leedahl and their three young boys. We have so many wonderful memories with this family from our training days in Missouri. They have such a heart for God, for their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, and for the lost.

In mid-October, almost a month ago, Jon, who is a highly skilled missionary pilot working in Papua New Guinea, had a terrible motorcycle accident. Both his legs were severely injured, and he lost almost all his own blood. Blood donations from other missionaries kept him alive until they were able to fly him to Australia for treatment.

Jon lost his right leg. His left is battered and scarred.

When we heard the news, we sobbed. Hard. Why, God?

"Well, I guess this must be God's will." Some might say.

Yeah, but just because He allows it to happen doesn't make it easy. Doesn't make it fun.

Sometimes God's ways are definitely not my ways. I wish I could be like Jesus, crying "Not my will, but Yours be done," even in the midst of terrible tragedy. But my humanity gets in the way so often. I hurt. I question. I don't like the results. I don't understand.

Through it all, I have to remember that God is good. So, so, so good. God is loving. He is kind. He hates evil and suffering as much as I do, yet He uses each bad situation for the good of those who love Him.

If He is the most loving Being that exists...that will ever exist, I know I can trust His ways, even when I don't understand. Even when I don't see the beauty in them.

And there will be beauty in Jon and Adie's lives. There already is. There has been an overwhelming unity of believers around the world who are coming together for one purpose: to lift the Leedahls before the throne of God. Such beauty in the midst of brokenness!

Perhaps Jon's accident will call others to go. Will challenge others to lay down their lives in the service of a King who is so worthy. Who is so, so good and loving.

Perhaps it will cause others to pause. Take inventory of their lives. Ask "What am I really living for? Am I really willing to count the cost of following Christ?"

All I know is, God will bring beauty. That is His way. Even though all I see is the broken, He sees the beautiful.

The ways of the Lord are good.

You can follow Jon and Adie's story at http://theleedahls.com/.

PNG Fact of the Day (3)

A lot of people ask us about the weather in Papua New Guinea. Let's just say, it's hot there. Like really hot. It wouldn't really be so hot if there wasn't like 98% humidity all the time (ok, well, I might be exaggerating a bit. It's probably only 95%).

So basically, it's hot and humid, at least most of the time. There are definitely times when it cools off, and certain locations at higher elevations (like over 4,000 feet or more) have slightly cooler temperatures. But usually, it's pretty hot and pretty wet (if it's not wet outside from rain, you're wet from sweat). Yay for being close to the equator.

The Joys of Motherhood

I think it's starting to really hit me that I'm going to be a mom really soon (um, wasn't I just a kid like a few years ago???). I had a prenatal checkup yesterday, and we got to hear the baby's heartbeat for the first time! What an amazing, breathtaking experience! I can't wait to meet this little one!

I also gave in yesterday and bought my first pair of maternity jeans. So much more comfortable than regular jeans for my ever-growing belly! I'm showing quite a bit now, at least to those who know me well. Other people probably just think I'm getting fat, which is probably also true, but I guess I have an excuse. :)

Even though I know that raising children is a difficult task, one that requires a lot of patience, hard work, and sacrificial love, I am excited out of my mind and so incredibly joyful to get to be a mom! I'm so grateful for the godly example my mom showed me. I hope I will be half as good a mom as she is!

Oh Canada

We had a wonderful (and very busy) first weekend in Canada! We spent most of Friday and Saturday at Peace River Bible Institute where Clint attended several years back. We got to sit in on the school's missions conference, and we also attended a class reunion on Saturday afternoon, which was a wonderful time of fellowship with some of Clint's friends and former classmates.

Yesterday, we had the privilege of sharing about our future ministry with Gospel Light Alliance Church. It was such a blessing and encouragement to interact with fellow believers who have such a heart for God, His Word, and spreading the Gospel to the ends of the earth!

We've also been blessed to spend quite a bit of time with several of Clint's siblings who are living in the area. It's been good to connect with them and get to see some more nieces and nephews (well, really just one nephew).

Thanks for all of you who are praying for us during this trip! We appreciate it! Pictures to come soon! :)

Fall is Finally Here!

It's finally starting to feel like fall here on the Oregon coast. The temperatures are starting to drop and so are the leaves (I really miss the gorgeous fall colors that we have back East!). Time to start breaking out my tea cup and warm blankets! :-)

I also love fall because, if you're lucky enough to live near an apple orchard, you can pick apples and make apple pie, apple cider, and all those other delicious fall-ish apple things. We picked a bunch of apples (for free!) last Thursday. The result? 28 quarts of canned homemade applesauce and 14 quarts of homemade apple pie filling plus a few large boxes of leftover apples that are going in the basement. Yum! All set for the winter months!

We're headed up to Canada early tomorrow morning. Looking forward to seeing a bunch of our Canadian friends and several of Clint's siblings who live up there, and we'll also be speaking in at least one church. And I'm also looking forward to taking Baby Teele to Canada for the first time, although I guess it's not really very fun for him because he can't see it. Oh well. :-)

PNG Fact of the Day (2)

Ok, it's time for another fact about Papua New Guinea.

I'm sure all of you are familiar with the story of the tower of Babel. Right? (if you don't remember, check out Genesis 11) But what you may not be familiar with is that God did a REALLY good job of confusing the languages. Don't believe me? Ok, take a guess at how many languages there are in the world today (and don't look it up on Google first).

If you said anything short of about 6,900, you're wrong. Yup, that's right. There are almost 6,900 known languages spoken in the world today!!! Pretty mind-boggling if you ask me!

According to the Linguistic Society of America, "one area of particularly high linguistic diversity is Papua New Guinea, where there are an estimated 832 languages" (click here for article)

So, your fact of the day for Papua New Guinea: there are over 800 different (and distinct) languages spoken in PNG! There is a trade language called Melanesian Pidgin English, but it is a very basic language with only about 2,500 words.

One of our jobs when we move to Papua New Guinea as missionaries will be to learn one of these languages so that we can share the Gospel with the people in their own language. It will be tough, but we're excited!

Learning a new language is hard work!

Teele Daily Life

Wow, where in the world has September gone? I just realized sometime in the middle of the night last night that I haven't posted much this month... and now the month is almost over! Yikes!

Anyways... the last few weeks have been very good. We celebrated Clint's 28th birthday last Sunday. I made him lasagna and a blueberry pie... he was in heaven. :) And then last Monday, all of Clint's hunting excursions (pretty much every morning for the past month) paid off when he shot a cow elk! It's a huge blessing to have all that meat for the winter! 

Pregnancy has been going well for me. I think the doctors would say I am at about 12 weeks right now! I haven't been that sick, which has been a HUGE blessing! I definitely have bad days, but overall, it's been a fairly easy pregnancy. I'm so grateful! And it's super exciting to start to see a little baby bump! :) Can't wait to finally meet this little one!

As the weather gets cooler, Clint is starting some part time work thinning fir trees on the property where we are living. We are very grateful for the work as well as a wonderful place to live!

Yup, so that's a glimpse into our daily life right now. A bit ordinary, but it's definitely wonderful and full all the same. I hope that this month has been just as wonderful and full for you as well!

PNG Fact of the Day (1)

Since we aren't going in January to Papua New Guinea anymore, I thought I'd start a new kind of blog post where every so often, I post a fact about PNG or our future ministry there, just to keep the excitement up! :)

Soooo... the PNG fact for today is: it's PNG Independence Day! Well, actually, it was yesterday for them since it's already September 17 there. But anyways, September 16 is the day when PNG gained their independence from Australia back in 1975. And apparently, just like here in the States, Independence Day is a big deal over there. They celebrate with traditional dances, celebrations, and costumes. It's pretty cool!

Here's a photo of the festivities from a missionary friend of ours who is in PNG right now

I Believe in Miracles

Our society says you have to have hard facts and solid evidence to prove something to be true (but people also say "truth is relative"... not sure how those two go together???). It's definitely the case in a court of law. But when it comes to the existence of God, most people wouldn't say there is any solid evidence that He exists.

I disagree. There is. Most definitely, there is. One piece of evidence is called "miracles". 

In the past few years, I have seen miracles. Real miracles. When I was a kid, I used to think, "Oh yeah, miracles happened back in the Bible when Jesus was alive and could heal people and stuff." 

But He still does! Not always. Sometimes His plan is for someone to endure a terrible sickness, the loss of a loved one, or some other type of emotional pain. And there is a certain beauty about those who have endured such pain but have trusted God through it all. And yet God still does work miracles. 

One miracle that is precious and dear to my heart recently is the miraculous healing of my mom. (Sorry, Mom, I may be overstepping my bounds here, since I haven't seen you post anything about this...) :-). The doctors found a tumor... and they diagnosed the worst. 

I could hardly believe it. I still can't. My mom? My world tilted, spun, shook. And so did hers. And my whole family's. 

We prayed. So, so hard. Every day. Multiple times a day. And God worked a miracle.

After a few weeks of not knowing, the test results came back completely clear. The doctors were stunned. From their original diagnosis, things didn't look good at all. But the tumor was totally benign. 

Our God is a mighty, awesome God! He still does work miracles!!! And I'm so glad He did for my mom!

My Hunting Husband

I'm a temporary hunting widow this evening while my handsome hubby is hunting elk. Sooo... I thought I'd post since I haven't in a while.

We just got internet set up at our house, which is nice so we don't have to run to the library constantly or steal it at Mom and Dad Teele's place. :-)

I also have to brag on my husband a bit. We just got back on Thursday from a week long camping/hunting trip in eastern Oregon with a bunch of Clint's family. Super fun! Anyways, Clint hunted pretty hard while we were there... and when I mean hard, I mean HARD. Like LOTS of walking and hiking. It's pretty rugged out where we were. Like really rugged. Like there are canyons that are 2 miles across. Beautiful, but not very fun to track deer or elk.

But anyways, my hubby still managed to shoot a buck deer, and while it isn't very big, the fact that he got one and packed the whole thing out by himself (at least 70 lbs) is pretty incredible!

 

I'm crazy about that man! :-)