On patience and planning (or lack thereof)

If you're reading this you know by now that our family is prayerfully considering whether God has a plan for us to move to the wilds of east-central Africa to join a team of medical missionaries. I (Hank) would primarily be involved with teaching dentistry (and of course still doing dentistry) and living and sharing the Gospel. I'm sure that over the coming weeks and months you'll read a lot more about how we got this crazy idea, all the logistics that we're considering, and all the plans. But for this, my first blog post EVER, I would like to share what happened this afternoon and the little life lessons that God taught me.

First, let me set the stage. I don't work at the office on Mondays; it's often an errand and busywork day for me, or I may help with school, or take care of the little ones while Hannah does schoolwork with Henry and Eika. As it happened, Hannah had an appointment with the optometrist and then a massage this afternoon. I suggested that she also take time to go to the gym, and, while she was gone, I would take the kids swimming. Yes, all four kids. I don't know what I was thinking. Just across the border in Canada (about a 35 minute dive) is a great indoor aquatics center that we like to visit especially in the winter months.

So, Hannah left the house and the kids and I got all the swim stuff (goggles, towels, swim diaper for Jude, change of clothes for everyone) ready. We all donned our swimsuits ahead of time and some of us threw pants on over our swimsuits (It was only about 45 today and we had SNOW this morning). They put all the other dry clothes and the swim diaper in a backpack and we hastily made our way to the van.

As I was pulling out of the garage I decided to run back in and get a hat and coat for Jude just in case there was a break from open swim time when we arrived. That way we could go to the playground while we waited. Ok, we're finally on the road.

When we arrived at the pool we realized there were several problems. Someone had neglected to put the backpack of dry after-swim clothes in the vehicle. This meant that Henry and Jude had nothing dry to wear afterward and Eva had no shirt (she was wearing her suit with pants). I also came to the realization that Jude had no shoes (yep, 45 degrees today), no swim diaper, and no clean diapers excepting the one he was wearing (clean for the moment...). Ok, I thought, we can work around this. Kids can bundle up, wrap a towel around themselves, wear their coat with no shirt underneath... I was wearing jeans over my swimsuit, I'd just have to be a little cautious zipping up after swimming...

We walked into the facility and found out that open swim didn't start for another 70 minutes. After getting over the initial shock and wiping Eva's tears I told the kids that we could just go to the playground for a bit and then swim when they opened. Oh, but Jude is wearing his swimsuit and has no shoes. Ok, let's run to a thrift store and see what we can find. Alas, no shoes (my kids are Idaho tough though!), but I did come away with two (two would come in handy later...) pairs of toddler sweatpants for the price of one and a sweatshirt for Henry (in typical fashion he was wearing everything he brought which included only his swim shorts and a t-shirt).

We got to the playground and the kids piled out and headed for the jungle gym. I started to put the sweatpants on Jude only to discover that his diaper was no longer clean. No problem, he can go commando for now. Within 30 seconds of putting the thrift store sweatpants on he peed. On the slide. Ok, no problem, that's why I got that second pair.

We had a blast at the playground, went swimming (bought a swim diaper at the counter), bundled up afterward, and made it home without a hitch. The kids did great and their attitudes were positive all along the way. As I was driving home I thought about what life might be like on the African mission field. Certainly, we won't have the amenities we have at home. No doubt there will be many times when we aren't prepared for whatever might happen. Yes, there will be frustrations along the way. But in the midst of all that turmoil we'll pray for patience, we'll try to remain flexible, and we'll work to model that attitude for the kids.

This afternoon gave me several opportunities to exercise some of the fruits of the Spirit. I could have lashed out at someone for forgetting the backpack, I could have been angry that there were no clean diapers in the van, I could have been frustrated that we had to wait an hour to swim. Thanks be to God that He gave me the patience, peace, kindness, and self control that was necessary.

I pray that as we seek God's direction for our life and all along the way He would grant us the grace that we will need to get through our lack of planning and foresight.