God's Providence

As we were traveling on the long flight from Istanbul on Wednesday, all I could think about was wanting to be home. I had scheduled my flight back to Atlanta to spend another day with Mom and Dad.  But, after being gone for so long, I just wanted to hug my wife and sleep in my own bed. 

Scott and I got to my parents house a little past 12 in the morning completely exosted from the trip. We found our places to bed down and we were out.  With the time change we had been up for almost 20 hours and I was feeling all of it.  I just knew I would sleep until noon the next day; not so with jet lag.  At 5:30 my eyes opened and I was wide awake.  I heard a soft rap on the door and it was Scott.  "Are you awake? I can't sleep."  I got up and started washing some clothes.

Mom and Dad had left for the hospital before I got up. Dad was having a procedure done on his leg to get the proper blood flow down to his foot.  It should have only taken the morning, but little did I know, we were going to be all day at the hospital.

After a wonderful breakfast at Shoney's with my brother Chris and Scott we headed over to the hospital to sit with my mom.  Dad was just about out of surgery when we got there.  After a bit the nurse came and got us and told us that the procedure went well and we could go and see him. As we were visiting with him, he told mom that he thought he was bleeding.  With further examination we found out he was.  The stint had torn the artery and Dad was in trouble.  They rushed him back to the emergency room for a second 4 hour surgery.  Mom was worried about him being under for so long but he pulled out of it just fine.  With Dad now in recovery we decided to take a break and head for the house for a few hours.  Little did we know that Dad was awake and asking for Mom.  You would think in the world of technology that we live in, that they could have called Mom on the phone, but that didn't happen.  So Dad was left with no one there for a few hours.  All that to say, he was happy to see us when we got back to the hospital.

I'm amazed at the provision and timing of God.  He knew that I would need to be with the family and made a way for that to happen. This is so impressive to me because I live 1100 miles away and don't have the opportunity to be there at the drop of a hat.  But God worked it out so I could be with my family in our time of need.  It is good to be a child of God.

The Long Road Home

After a great night of food and fellowship, we got up ready for the long trek to Istanbul. As we were eating breakfast we were discussing the guys that live in danger for the gospels sake. When you are in this kind of situation you must have already determined that you would give your life if necessary as Christ did for us. That is not really the concern when you have this level of commitment there are two things that become the most important in life. We must finish the task that God has given to us. And while we finish this task we want to complete it with honor. It is hard to think in these terms when you are faced with this level of danger on a regular basis. I believe this is one of the major problems with American Christianity today. We are at play, and therefore are simply doing what we have to do to get by. Those days for the committed Christian are long gone.

So, we all piled back into the taxis that we came in originally and headed back for Irbil to catch our flight. There was a brown out on Sunday night as the storm blew in. I felt right at home when I noticed that it had rained dirt on everything the next morning. So off we go. The van is quiet as people are sleeping or zoning off into the great nothingness of the land that surrounds us. The trip is not long, just two hours. As we arrive at the airport the security checks begin. Before I get on the plane I have been checked at least three times. I had a great time on the flight getting to know one of my brothers from Mexico as he shared pictures of his family and what God was doing in his ministry, while my brother from home provided comic relief to my right. As we were coming in for a landing I hear, “he’s coming in hot!” and we bounced off the tarmac and landed safely (PTL).

Now it’s time for Passport control and we are out the door headed back to the hotel. I must say the hotel here in Istanbul was a well-received sight. We were able to do a bit of souvenir shopping before we took off for dinner at the mall. It turns out that Istanbul has some malls that make American malls look like strip centers. It is amazing to see how the rest of the world desires to imitate the very thing that I am trying to get away from. My choices to eat were Moe’s, Arby’s, Pizza, and the like. Everyone was dressed just like I was. If I had awoke in this mall I would have thought I was in America somewhere. The food still wasn’t as good but they tried. We then sat down in a place like Starbucks and had some great discussion on world strategies for finishing the task. I was honored to be a part of the conversation.

A Village Run

Sunday has been an interesting day. Because of the place that we are this is the first day of the week. There are no churches to speak of; therefore there is no time for Church. We got up this morning and ate breakfast at the hotel. Breakfast consisted of veggies, boiled eggs, bread with honey, and Nescafé that they were passing off as coffee. The BKA guys came and met us for a short business meeting that was very enlightening for me. It was invaluable for me to hear both the positives and the negatives of the meeting.

We then all loaded up in a van and took off toward the villages were the guys spend time with people. We met a man that had recently come to faith. He exposed to the gospel in Chicago and after he came to faith he had a heart for his people and moved back into one of the villages to share what he had learned. He runs a bee hive for a living and makes a pretty good gar of honey. We are hoping to duplicate this business in the villages to generate income. We ended up in one of the villages looking at Syria, and Turkey for our van in Iraq. (If I lived here that would be a tourist spot and I would sell souvenirs. There is so much opportunity for this beautiful country. Most of the people in the villages live under the poverty level. Any help that we can give them is much appreciated by the government here in Duhok.

I had a wonderful opportunity to sit in the office of the Vice Governor of Duhok; He is the one that is in charge of organization like ours that come to help the people of Duhok. He seemed very encouraged by what we are doing in the villages and encouraged us to do more. It was a very warm and friendly visit. We all left with the feeling that a good partnership had been established.

After the meet the people that were in the meeting found a pizza place for lunch. The pizza was just like you would get in the states. The only difference was they served it with French fries and hot ketchup. We ordered and waited for a bit only to be surprised when they brought out a medium size pizza for each one of us. We almost didn’t have enough room on the table for all the food. Somehow we managed to get it all down (there’s much P90X work to do)