Click here to view this newsletter as a PDF.
What a blessing to share New Year’s Eve with one of the few families that I get to enjoy on both sides of the ocean! (The Norens also serve at RFIS.)
RFIS Prayer Chapel and garden circa 2011(?).
It is with both joy and sadness that I share with you my upcoming separation from the North American Baptist International Missions Department. Though it has been clear for quite some time that my chapter at Rain Forest International School had come to a close, there were still many questions regarding the great “What’s Next?” and what role the NAB may hold in that. Though I will remain on staff (and on support) through the end of my home assignment in June 2025, it has become increasingly clear that my next chapter will be elsewhere. I greatly appreciate and covet your continued prayers as this page turns and God reveals the details of his next chapter for me.
I have never been one for New Year’s resolutions, but I do appreciate the sort of ‘built-in’ opportunity each new calendar year presents to pause and reflect on what God has been doing. Plus, with such a big change looming on the horizon, you can probably imagine that I have done a lot of reflecting and dreaming. What DO I really want in this next chapter? I’m not talking about specific jobs or possessions or accomplishments, but more in terms of who I want to be and what I desire regardless of those things. I sat down at one point in January to make a list and thought I would share that journey with you. Please recognize that I am still working through these, and God still has work to do in me! These are just a raw reflection of that question at this moment in time. (Hopefully the coming year will provide the opportunity to refine these as I filter them more clearly through the lens of Scripture.)
- I long to contribute meaningfully to and experience true community.
- I desire to share deep thoughts and profound wondering while learning continually.
- I want to recognize, appreciate, and create beauty – to bask in the glory of creation, recognizing God’s hand in its order and chaos.
- I aspire to live in constant recognition and awareness of the many ways God is working that “no mind can conceive” (1 Corinthians 2:9) and that go beyond “all we ask or imagine” (Ephesians 3:20).
- I long to wake up with purpose and lay down each night knowing that someone or something has benefitted from my actions that day and that I have truly sought to glorify God.
- I want to be able to truly listen with humility, to act with wisdom, and to speak with authority.
- I yearn to honor God, to seek justice, and to somehow reflect even the tiniest glimpse of his light and warmth into this dark world.
I have a long way to go, as I think we all do, but what encouragement there is in realizing that it isn’t a journey to be accomplished through my own strength. Blessings, my friends!
Meet Precious . . . my new furry friend. 😊