Off to Chad, Africa!

N'Djamena is the capital city where we will be living.

So, we are off to Chad after 7 years of waiting and wondering and imagining.....we are still processing it all with excitement, nervousness, anticipation and wonder about what our lives will look like over in Chad. As a mom and wife, thoughts swirl in my head: doubts mixed with courage, happiness and sadness, confidence mixed with a fear of failure.....all these emotions will be worked out in time I'm sure but for now.....slightly overwhelming. Chatting with Phil, (someone who is walking this crazy road with me) has been comforting; asking our friends to pray for us and most importantly, giving this overwhelming situation to my Father in prayer has helped me in the processing stage of our journey to Chad.

One thing we know for sure and that we are most definitely confident about is the fact that this is God's plan for our lives, He chose this place for us and will carry us through, whatever trials should come our way....He always has and we know He always will.
It has been a 7 year journey......from the time we quit our jobs in London, ON and drove across Canada in our 1987 brown Toyota Corolla ("the pooper") and headed for Prairie's Mission Aviation Program........2 kids, a lot of friends, ups and downs in our marriage, a commercial, IFR and Instructor rating under our belts, no debt (PRAISE GOD....it was a $60,000 program.....obviously God got us though that one) and now here we sit.......82% of the way through raising our monthly support needed to go to Chad, about to leave in June to Quebec City for 6 months to learn francais, and preparing our hearts to serve the people of Chad.

Typical road condition during rainy season....impassable.

But you know what? Despite some unsettling aspects about this country, Chad is actually a great place for us in so many ways......it has a Christian elementary school right in the city run by Africa Inland Mission (AIM) should we choose not to homeschool. The other pilot family that we will be living/working with has 6 kids (lots of girls), the youngest being Kaitlyn's age. The flight program is small, only 2 planes which is super attractive to Phil who didn't want to be part of a large flight program and wanted to continue flying small planes and be 'down in the dirt' with people.

After doing some research on our own, we have discovered that Chad has some huge needs. There are only 600km of paved roads in the entire country! So when rainy season hits 4 months out of the year.....the roads outside of the capital city are impassible, making aviation vital to the continuation of the many ministries working in Chad. It has the largest number of unreached people groups in Africa, and the literacy rate is a mere 25%. Poverty, a history of political instability, unrest between the Muslim north and the Christian animistic south and corruption have plagued this country for years......there is much work to be done.
So, Phil and I move forward, trusting that God has all the details worked out, and as long as we continue to move ahead, He will direct our steps. Not gonna lie.....sometimes I feel very freaked out......just so you know I am normal...no super Christian here....just a mother and wife trying her best, failing often but relying more on the One who set out this path for her. Details to come....it's gonna be a crazy ride.

Am I actually hurting the very people I so desperately want to help?

On my list of books to read in 2012

Phil and I had the privilege of attending a one day seminar, with the main speaker being one of the co-author's of the book "Helping without Hurting". This topic is hugely relevant to our lives as we are on the cusp of entering into a 'foreign' culture for the purpose of ministry and are both slightly petrified of messing it all up.  
This was something I hadn't really thought too deep about....I love helping others but today I had my eyes opened to the possibility that my good intentions in helping could hurt an individual or even a whole community! Talk about frozen in fear....but I know that is not what the authors wanted to accomplish.