Christmas 2007

Christmas greetings from the Friesens.

Wishing you a merry Christmas are Jessica, Hannah, Josh, Carol, and Paul Friesen.

We are still in Austin, Texas, but have moved once again (note our change in address). Our new home offers a bit more space, a backyard with a view of Texas hill country and, most importantly, a guest room for you to come visit!  (After all, Austin is a lot closer than Penang.) Jessica is home for such a visit, having just arrived from Malawi where she completed a six-month internship with World Relief as part of her senior year at Wheaton College. She will return to school in January with plans to graduate in May.

Hannah has been living at home and working as an occupational therapist at HealthSouth. While the transition from school to work has not been easy (what happened to all that discretionary time!), she has managed to make a few trips to see friends in Colorado, Boston, and Florida and is steadily paying off her school debt. She enjoys running on Town Lake’s hike and bike trail, local volunteer opportunities, and hanging out with friends.

Josh is now a Junior at Lake Travis High School, still playing alto saxophone in the marching band, helping out with the 4 year-olds on Sunday mornings at church and sampling the working world (at Subway last summer and in a few days he’ll be starting at The Great American Cookie franchise nearby). His school football team has made it all the way to the State finals for their division, so on December 21 we’ll drive up to Baylor in Waco to give Jessica a chance to see some Texas football and, more importantly, her brother in the marching band.

Carol continues to serve as associate pastor of missions and caring ministries at WHPC. The church has experienced a complete turnover in pastoral staff in the past three years, leaving Carol briefly last March as the only pastor. (The mission field clearly isn’t the only place demanding lots of flexibility and fostering a sometimes-painful dependence on God!) Since then, the church has called a new associate, Peter Haas, and an interim senior pastor, Joe Rightmyer. While Carol didn’t get to Central Asia in 2007 as planned, she was able to visit ministry partners in Nicaragua last March and in Zambia last September and spend a week with Jessica in Malawi. In June, she received her Doctor of Ministry degree from Fuller Seminary. We celebrated by flying everyone to New England to see family, and then Paul and Carol flew to California for Fuller’s commencement, followed by a trip up the Pacific Coast Highway, a day at Sequoia National Park, and a brief visit with Paul’s sister and family.

Paul has also experienced a fair bit of staff turnover in his position as regional liaison for Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). (He will soon be on his fourth boss!) He has made numerous trips to Southeast Asia linking churches and presbyteries here in the United States with ministry partners in Asia.

Asian highlights

And then there are trips to Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, and occasionally Malaysia or Singapore. Working through the tensions of cross-cultural, short-term mission is ripe with opportunity for God to show up. Some say God is there already. That would mean we are the ones who showed up. Just in the nick of time. That thought doesn’t go very far though, as it suggests that we saved the day. Unusual things do happen, and I am amazed at how things work out in the midst of great confusion and the best laid plans morphing into chaos. A big highlight was a mission and evangelism consultation sponsored for Southeast Asian Presbyterians by the Council on World Mission. leaders from Singapore and Malaysia played a major facilitating role in organizing an event that brought delegates from their own countries as well as Myanmar, Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. As a Westerner, I was privileged to participate with them as they listened to each other, developed friendships, engaged in mission discussion, and are now seeking for ways to help each other do evangelism.

Opportunities to teach at various churches in the Austin area, to participate in the annual men’s backpacking trip, and play golf year round are slowly making a Texan out of Paul!

Together for Christmas, we rejoice in the good news, Immanuel, God with us! May you experience God’s empowering presence this season … and think of coming to Austin for a visit!

Paul, Carol, Hannah, Jessica and Josh Friesen

The 2008 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 213