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When I write blog posts and newsletters, I usually try and stay positive.\u00a0 Let\u2019s face it; I am a positive person, or at least 99% of the time!\u00a0 But I think its time for a break.\u00a0 We are getting weary.\u00a0 We love our life, we absolutely love Gemena, in fact it\u2019s been our favorite assignment thus far, but it\u2019s hard!\u00a0 Juba was hard in MANY other ways (and to be honest, we are glad we aren\u2019t there), but in Juba we could \u201cescape\u201d.\u00a0 We had a swimming pool at a near by mountain lodge, we had restaurants we could go to, we could \u201cescape\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0 Gemena is completely different.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a small town and there is a LOT to be said about my security and independence.\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t want to change the fact that I can walk anywhere I want and be completely safe.\u00a0 But then\u2026once we get into Gemena the only way to get out for a break is to fly.\u00a0 And that is just to Kinshasa.\u00a0 Of course Kinshasa is a break, but it\u2019s still Congo, Africa, and overseas.<\/p>\n
We are tired.\u00a0 Tired of\u00a0being called \u201cmondele\u201d –>a white person or foreigner.\u00a0 Tired of people waiting by our front door every morning asking for something.\u00a0 Tired of kids saying \u201cmister, give me money\u201d.\u00a0 Tired of rice and beans.\u00a0 Tired of collecting a trail of people when I run.\u00a0 Tired of people using our house as the \u201chub\u201d to charge all of their phones, computers, batteries and everything else they want to charge.\u00a0 We can feel ourselves losing patience with some of our greatest friends here, its time for a break!<\/p>\n
Thankfully the Lord has taught us when we are not being called to stretch ourselves any further.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t take good care of ourselves our first 2 years overseas and it took us a long time to heal.\u00a0 In fact I was still seeing the healing effects when I attended a missionary retreat in July.\u00a0 Since then the Lord has had to remind us \u201ctoday is not the day to leave your house\u201d\u2026and it\u2019s ok.\u00a0 Some days He tells us, \u201ctoday is a day between just you and I\u201d, and it\u2019s ok.<\/p>\n
The Lord has provided relief at just the right time.\u00a0 We are excited to go to America in 1 month!\u00a0 We are excited to eat good, different food.\u00a0 We are excited to see our family and friends.\u00a0 We are excited to celebrate Christmas.\u00a0 We are excited to rest.\u00a0 We have a busy few weeks before that rest comes, but oh the joy it\u2019s going to bring as soon as we step off the airplane onto American soil!\u00a0 Pray for our weary souls, as we find the patience and strength to continue strong, both physically and mentally for just 1 more month!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Monday, November 11, 2013 \u201cCome to me,\u00a0all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.\u201d Matthew 11:28 When I write blog posts and newsletters, I usually try and stay positive.\u00a0 Let\u2019s face it; I am a positive person, or at least 99% of the time!\u00a0 But I think its time for a break.\u00a0 We are getting…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3,5,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drc","category-gemena","category-missionary","category-wycliffe-associates"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":321,"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320\/revisions\/321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.berry1.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}