Happy Spring!!
We hope you are all enjoying the many wonderful things about this time of year — milder weather, trees and flowers blooming, the promise and hope that comes from knowing that Jesus died and rose again!
We are getting to enjoy the outdoors and celebrate the Easter season in some new and exciting ways this year. In the past two months we have made magnificent strides with the transformation of the lot beside our house. Not only have we had a great place for our family to enjoy spending warm Spring days, but we also have a place to invite our neighbors into for some special Easter events. This Friday night we will be showing an animated Life of Jesus movie in the lot, and Sunday we will have an Easter egg hunt for the kids. When we look back a few years ago to the frustration and trash-pit that the lot was, it's amazing to have a space that we can enjoy and share.
Another area of "new life" that I (Elizabeth) am getting to enjoy and participate in is my first two births as a doula. It has been hard but satisfying work. I left one birth feeling physically exhausted but emotionally exhilarated, and another where my muscles were just fine, but my heart ached horribly. Both times though, it just felt like such an honor and privilege to get to serve these women and be a part this meaningful event in their lives. It's felt like such a fit for my gifts and passions that I kind of wonder how I got this far in life without finding this path. It's just another example of how God has shaped us and our ministry by the experience of becoming parents. He's shaped and changed us as people and missionaries by brining children into our family, and for that we thank Him!
Speaking of which, there is another "new life" development … much to our surprise, we found out we are expecting Varaso baby #3 in October! This has suspended or side-tracked some of the plans that we had (I will have to take some months off from serving as a doula, and I won't be running the Broad Street Run this Spring as planned!) but since the initial shock has worn off, the excitement has taken over. We are trusting that this new child will be a delight to our family, a builder of the Kingdom, and that God will meet our needs and limitations with his abundant provision.
We had also planned and expected for Frank to be able to start a course of treatment for Hepatitis C this Spring, however the treatment is not safe with my being pregnant. It has been about a 5 year process of being passed around and waiting for treatment to be covered, so as you can imagine, having to delay is difficult to accept. The treatment can be really hard on your body, so we have even wondered and prayed about trusting for healing or seeking alternative treatments. Would you please pray with us for this — that during this delay, God would maintain or even heal Frank's body, and that He would give us wisdom and peace about a treatment course in due time?
While we have had to adjust some plans and expectations in light of this new baby, we are also experience the delight of plans that have worked out sooner and better than we had expected. We figured that preparing the lot for use would be a summer-long endeavor, but instead we can already sink our toes into green grass. We hoped that eventually we would have an opportunity and resources to send Selah to preschool for a couple of half-days a week, but because we couldn't find a good option, we gave up looking and figured we would re-visit it in the fall. Instead, two good friends have just started a preschool at a local church, and Selah attended her first day there yesterday. She loves it! God has just been caring for us and giving us contentment and peace. It's a good place to be!
With so much groundwork being laid in this areas of new ministry — the literal groundwork that Frank has been doing in the lot, and my doula training – we are looking forward to all that God is going to build upon this foundation. We are praying that there will be more people coming to join us in this ministry, and that with a lot of the foundational busy-work behind us, there will be more and more chances for more and more personal ministry.
Please continue to pray for us, that God would energize and encourage us as we face challenges so much bigger than ourselves. We want to be filled with hope and faith, focusing on what He is able to do, not limiting Him by what we are capable of. Pray for our neighbors, that their hearts would be soft and open to who Jesus is and what He wants to give them. Pray for our kids to thrive here, to have greater faith and do greater things that we have and have done.
And please enjoy these great pictures of our family and our neighbors enjoying our plot of green grass!
Thank you for you prayers, encouragement, love and financial support that keeps us here!
Love and blessings,
Frank, Elizabeth, Selah, Callum and baby-on-the-way!
