Journey to the Colder Side of the Earth: Thanksgiving

Hello,

We hope that you all had a good Thanksgiving this week! We managed to eat the same excessive amounts of food as we would in the States thanks to a gathering of all of the teachers and their families at the apartment of one of IA's families on Friday. We had the day off from school and got to enjoy some turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, and green bean casserole. Even though we are from America it still felt like Thanksgiving.

With Thanksgiving this past week it seemed like the perfect time to look back on some of the many things that we are thankful for this year. This semester has been busy and all of this year has been filled with so much activity, travel, and change but through it all we have been blessed and are thankful to God for His faithfulness and abundant provision in the midst of it all.

So with that in mind and in no particular order, here are some of the things that we are giving thanks for this year:

1. Being in Russia. It is a privilege to be able to live in another country, and we are especially grateful that Russia has relaxed some of its visa laws. We were able to get a full year visa that can be extended for two more years without requiring a trip outside of the country. While most of our visa details are handled by the school, this is still a blessing and means that the situation for all of us as invited teachers is more stable.

2. Our school. IA is a special place and we are thankful to be a part of it. The more time we spend with our students, their families, and our fellow teachers the more we realize just how unique our school is and just how different the kind of lives that our students have are. Everyday we get to teach about things we care about for some of the most respectful, well behaved and fun students in the world. It almost seems to wrong to call it "work" somedays:-)

3. Our friends and families. This past year we had visits from friends from college in February and my parents and brother at the end of May. We also got to spend time with more of our families and friends during the four weeks we spent in the U.S. in July. We love you all and you are in our prayers!

4. Our supporters. We have been so blessed by the amazing people who have been so faithful in giving of their finances and in offering their prayers. Your encouraging words, faithful giving, and many prayers have sustained us in ways that none of us may ever fully know in this life! Thank you for all that you have done for us!

5. Financial blessings. On a related note, we've written before about our need for more financial support for this. While we are still not where we need to be, we have been blessed in many ways and are much closer to our goal. God has been so faithful in providing what we need when we need it.

I keep hoping that in an instant everything will fall into place and we won't have to spend any more of our time thinking about money and asking for new donations (believe me, we hate writing about it as much as you probably hate hearing about it), but it seems that God has other plans. By committing to come to Russia we have been on a faith journey that has required us time and again to step out into the unknown and trust in God to provide. We weren't sure how we would raise the money to get here when we committed to come, but we made the commitment and God provided.

This year has been no different. While everything is not yet in place, at every moment when we have had a need God has been there to provide. Studying Russian is an important goal of mine, but our budget was very tight so we left it off and prayed that something would work out. I made arrangements to study Russian at the beginning of the year without knowing how I would pay for it, but God has provided an opportunity for Amanda to tutor after school. This has provided everything needed to allow me to study Russian. Month after month we have been blessed to find that new one time gifts have been made, and these have gone a long way towards helping us as we wait for the new year to begin when some new pledged support is scheduled to come in. The after school test prep classes that we are teaching are also paid work, and we have been able to save that money to use towards next year's needs.

In all of these ways and others God has met all of our material needs, and it has been a constant reminder that He is prepared to sustain us when we are willing to obey and follow His leading even when everything is not clear.

It is very easy to only focus on the needs that we have and on things that we wish were different, which is one reason that having a holiday like Thanksgiving is so good. Setting aside time to give thanks reminds us about all of the many things that we have that we do not deserve, and is a reminder about how God has been at work in so many things.

With thanks,

Matt