November 21, 2008

Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year, Lunar New Year

Dear Friends and Colleagues in mission,

It is that time of year again when we give thanks for the blessings of the past year and look forward to the challenges and opportunities of the New Year. One more annual cycle is about to become history. Yet in the midst of this regularity of the passage of time is Christmas—when God gave time a new meaning through the Incarnation.

The blessings of the past year have been many—the opportunity to engage our students in the learning of theology and Christian education; the sharing of ideas through publications and participation in international conferences; the gift of good health which has enabled us to maintain a schedule of activities that one reader of our letters said “made her tired just to read it”; and the joy of receiving the prayers, cards, letters, and financial support from churches throughout the United States.

Cover of the book edited by Daniel Adams and published in 2008.

Among the highlights of the year were the East Asian Mission Co-Workers’ Retreat held in Daejon, Korea, in February; a brief trip to the Diamond Mountains in North Korea in April; the Hanil University faculty-staff summer retreat in Zhangjiajie, China, in June; participation in an international conference on religion and democracy held in Assisi, Italy; in August; participation in an international conference on church social work and diakonia at Hanil University in October; and giving a lecture at Presbyterian related Soongsil University in Seoul in November on the tenth anniversary of their Graduate School of Christian Studies. We also welcomed five students from Myanmar into the Asia Pacific Graduate School of Theological Studies for the 2008-09 academic year. Unlike some years, this year has been largely focused on academic activities and included the publication of Christian Education in the Bamboo Grove: The Collected Essays of Chou Fang-Lan edited by Daniel J. Adams. This 443-page book celebrates Carol’s 50-year teaching career in the field of Christian education.

As 2008 draws to a close we will be making our third journey to Myanmar to lecture in theological schools and to encourage our alumni who are serving as pastors, missionaries, church administrators, seminary professors, and seminary deans and presidents. We plan to spend Christmas with the Christians of Myanmar and three weeks in January lecturing at Yangon Graduate School of Theology, Lorraine Theological College, and Tahan Theological College as well as at several other theological colleges. We will also make a brief visit to Cambodia to see the work of another alumnus who works with a Korean NGO in Phnom Penh. This will be our final visit to Myanmar prior to our retirement.

2009 will be our last year in Korea teaching at Hanil University and Presbyterian Theological Seminary. We will leave Korea in December of 2009 and return to the United States for three months of mission interpretation prior to our final retirement on March 31, 2010. As we look ahead to the coming year, we are filled with a certain degree of apprehension related to packing up our house and shipping our belongings, finishing up our teaching and turning our work over to others, and saying “goodbye” to dear friends and colleagues. Asia has truly become our home, and retirement will be opening an entirely new chapter in our lives. The time has come, however, to make this change while we are still in good health and able to plan for the future.

We still have one more year here at Hanil University. It will be an opportunity to continue in the education of leadership for the Korean church and other churches of Asia. It will be an opportunity to perhaps write one more book, give several more special lectures, and participate in one or two more international conferences. And it will be an opportunity to influence—and learn from—several hundred new students. We are looking forward to 2009 in gratitude for the blessings of the past and in anticipation of the challenges that lie ahead.

As they say, “time marches on” but for us it is time that has been hallowed and given meaning by the Incarnation of God in Jesus Christ, and for this we are most grateful. We wish all of you a blessed Thanksgiving, a joyous Christmas, and a grace-filled New Year!

Faithfully in mission,

Carol Chou Adams / Daniel J. Adams

The 2008 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 101