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January 29, 2008
Friends,
Hello from Louisville! We finally had enough snow last week that the campus kids managed to make a snowman. It was covered with dirt and oak leaves frozen into the snow and it only lasted two days, but it was fun!
We had a wonderful Christmas with Bridget, Bruce’s eldest daughter, who visited for about ten days. We had lots of time for talking, for laughter at wild card games, and for walking in the park on sunny days. On Christmas Eve, when we came home from church, Lora made soup while the rest of us walked the labyrinth here on campus by moonlight. Well, Bridget and I walked it. Kinsey and Emily ran through it like kindergarteners playing tag and then scrambled up “the best climbing tree on campus” beside the labyrinth. They sang Christmas carols, making up the alto line or the descant as they went, and sometimes interrupted themselves with laughter over an awkward harmony. Bridget and I walked to the center and then back out again, to the music of carols and laughter. Then our carolers swung down and we all came home to eat.
We took Bridget on a couple of short hikes in Bernheim Forest, a logged off, worn-out farm that has been turned into a nature preserve. We’re grateful that it’s only a half-hour drive away, and we go there as often as we can to walk on real trails and breathe some forest air. It’s as close as we come here to real wilderness, this rejuvenated woodland. It’s a hopeful place, dealing in rebirth and restoration as it does, and it was Bridget’s introduction to an Eastern hardwood forest.
We also took Bridget to the Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill, which is always an enchanting place. This time we arrived just in time for a talk by a retired schoolteacher. She was dressed in clothing from the 1830s, and sang and danced and explained a lot about how the Shakers worshipped. We also got to watch demonstrations by the broom-maker and a woman spinning wool on a wheel just like Lora’s old one. We were struck by a couple of things. First, they called the place where they met “the meeting house,” reserving the word “church” for the people themselves. They would say, for instance, that the church met at the meeting house. That’s a beautiful tradition! Second, I was interested that they really did no art at all; there was nothing that was just for decoration, since everything they made was useful. Their work was their art, and that, too, is a beautiful tradition! Those two things had somehow escaped our notice on our first couple of visits. I wonder what else we’ve missed. We were reminded of how steep our learning curve will be when we arrive in Ethiopia, how difficult (and thrilling!) it will be to find our way in a completely unfamiliar culture.
We had two invitations for mission interpretation this month. At Mt. Tabor Church, just across the river in Indiana, the girls sang “Prayer of the Children” for the service, and we were all aware that this was probably the last time that all four of us will lead a service together. At Silver Spring Church, in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, Lora and I led a worship service in a sanctuary built in 1734. The congregation calls the original building “the meeting house” (just like the Shakers did!) because at the time when it was built, the word “church” was reserved for Church of England buildings. The “meeting house” had pews with doors on them, a balcony around three sides so that parishioners could look out the windows in all directions in case of Indian attacks, and a pulpit up a stairway half-way to heaven! Both congregations are very supportive of mission, and vibrant in the way they feel the call to reach out to others. We enjoyed their welcoming spirit.
We’ve been plenty busy with fund-raising this month, spending a lot of time licking envelopes, writing emails, and talking on the phone. Churches have been very generous. We are more than half-way toward our goal, which is to be fully funded by May 1 so that we can go to Ethiopia in August as planned. We still need more than $30,000 in annual pledges, though, so if you would like to join in, that help would be appreciated a lot. It’s a strange thing, this asking for pledges. “Hi! We’re Lora and Bruce, and we’ve been invited to teach girls in Ethiopia. Would you care to help?” This does not fit any economic model that we know of! It’s more like we’re in one long Christmas season, hoping for presents under the tree, trusting that the gifts we need will be there to be opened, appearing as unpredictably and unreasonably as grace.
What are your New Year’s resolutions? Well, let’s not call them resolutions; let’s call them recommitments, OK? That’s a little firmer, a little more substantial.
We recommit to:
- Sharing greetings and farewells, and talking a lot in between.
- Leaving time for unexpected carols in the moonlight.
- Remembering to hope, and that our lives can move from worn-out to reborn.
- Paying attention, so we don’t miss beauty.
- Moving ahead without fear, one learning at a time.
- Trusting the gifts that God will give.
Love and peace,
Bruce and Lora Whearty
The 2007 Mission Yearbook for Prayer &
Study, p. 261 |
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