We rode the Chunnel train, climbed
the Eiffel Tower, gazed at the windows of Notre Dame, and ate
croque monsieurs in the Latin Quarter. Paris is always
Paris, and that is always a joy. My most treasured memory is from
our second day there, when I turned over subway navigation to
the girls. Lora and I lagged behind and followed them through
the tunnels, and I was struck by the memory that these same girls,
now striding confidently through the Metro, were not long before
staying in a Vanuatu guesthouse with rats in the thatch and village
children peeking through the cracks in the walls. They are remarkable
young women, adaptable and resourceful. We were lucky to have
the chance to travel with them. They give us hope for the future.
We were stranded by the Italian train system, pick-pocketed in
both Rome and Madrid, scared spitless on an Iberia Airways flight,
and spent a night in the Denver airport. Then it was home to Billings,
family, and Christmas, as if we were scruffy, jet-lagged magi
laden with strange presents from around the world.
If we could bring you a gift this year, it might be a painted
papyrus from Egypt, a carved Celtic cross from Durham, or a postcard
from Pompeii, but I would prefer to leave you with hope. The United
States seems tired. Maybe it’s from the election, from war,
from our constant quest for entertainment. Why do we label Super
Bowls as if they were World Wars? Why do we pretend that a team
that wins three games should be called a dynasty? Let’s
turn off some of the noise in our lives, get some sleep, and wake
up to a kingdom of hope. Don’t settle for cheap imitations
of meaning. Do something important this year!
We arrived in Louisville on January 1, settled into an apartment
provided for missionaries on leave, and we were home again in
a new house, a new job, and a new year. We are still in culture
shock. We have hot showers and a refrigerator and an ATM card
and the use of an old car, and the girls have their own rooms
for the first time in their lives. The seminary campus where we
live is like a park, with big trees, squirrels, cardinals, and
a little stream running at the foot of the lawn. Not everything
is so enjoyable, though. The sky is never dark, the city is never
quiet, and the traffic is always amazing to Montanans from rural
Vanuatu! We commute by freeway and have already been stuck in
traffic for up to an hour at a time. I find it difficult to shop,
even for toothpaste; there are just too many choices to be made!
Lora, cooking dinner at the stove, finds herself wondering when
the gas will run out. Emily asked if it was safe to drink from
the faucets. And even Kinsey, who has always loved cities more
than the rest of us combined, finds the pace hectic.
The girls are both in the same public high school, which has
a very diverse population. We feel lucky that they are not the
only kids with “interesting” backgrounds. There are
refugees from Asia, Africa, and Europe, and you can hear eight
different languages spoken in the halls. That does not count Kentuckian,
where people say “ya’ll” a lot. It also does
not count Bislama, which Kinsey spoke to a concession stand worker
at a basketball game. She found a 200 vatu bill in her pocket
and tried to buy a snack. Nice try! Kinsey, 16, is in band. She
is working hard to get her lip back for playing the trumpet and
the French horn. Emily, almost 15, has started violin lessons,
something that she has always wanted to try. Both girls are in
choir. Correspondence school has made them self-disciplined students,
and they find most of their classes very easy, even though they
started half-way through the year.
Lora and I work at the Presbyterian Center downtown by the Ohio
River. We have been coordinating scholarship requests in the Global
Education Office, but I think that name refers more to what we
are getting rather than what we are giving. It has been fascinating
and inspiring to read the stories of so many people from around
the world who sacrifice for their education. There is a woman
from China, for example, who left her two children behind in order
to study in the United States for two years. And everywhere there
are students who rise above the circumstances around them: the
sluggish mail and inadequate funding, the local skirmish that
became a civil war, the death of a spouse. The students are recommended
by our partner churches; each national church decides its training
priorities. Pastors? Teachers or professors? Workers with health,
youth, women, development? You name it, we respond with all the
power of a connectional church. God provides, the people give,
and this office funnels the resources to where they can be used.
One bonus of our work is to read the thank you letters from students
who have completed their studies. We get to see the grainy photocopies
of diplomas and read the emails where students struggle to express
what this amazing opportunity has meant to them. For years I have
admired the slogan, “Mission: where our great joy meets
the world’s great need.” We are grateful for work
that is filled with joy, with meaning. That’s almost as
much fun as a hot shower!
Update on our last letter from Vanuatu: The shirt that Lora “helped”
Leiwia make did not turn out to be for Robea. It was a going away
gift for me, and Leiwia made a matching island dress for Lora
to go with it. If you see a couple dressed in flaming orange and
green outfits covered with hibiscus flowers, that’s us,
the ones with the frostbitten knees.
Love and peace, ya’ll,
Bruce
The 2005 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, 257
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