You may or may not have seen my post from a couple of weeks ago about some of our family's adventures in cross-cultural existence, specifically regarding our application for Elliot's leave-of-absence from the last few weeks of the school year (for a three-month "home service leave" required by our employer).  Believe it or not, that first conversation with the local Compulsory Education Bureaucrat (leerplichtambtenaar) was just the beginning of the insanity.

Since that initial conversation, I estimate that we've spent over ten hours and over €200 (almost $300 U.S. dollars), bending backwards to meet the demands and requests of the Compulsory Education Bureaucrat.  Just today, I had another thirty-minute conversation with the gentleman, talking through the intricacies of our (what he has described as being a) "highly complex case."  I honestly don't see what's so complex about everything, but I know that the guy is just doing his best to do his job.

According to tentative indications from today's conversation,  unfortunately, it sounds like the Compulsory Education Bureaucrat is somewhat inclined to deny our application.  We talked about it at length, and I'm hoping that our conversation today may have helped to tip the scales back a bit more in our direction, but the whole thing is still very much up in the air.  Thus, I would like to ask if you would seriously pray with us for a favorable resolution to this situation.  It may seem like a silly, trivial, insignificant thing to pray for -- and it may seem like a process that's largely out of the hands of God (and firmly in the inescapable hands of the Dutch Bureaucracy) -- but a negative decision from the Compulsory Education Bureaucrat could have significant ramifications for our family's emotional and financial well-being.  Even if there is a negative decision, we could still appeal the matter to a higher-up "Board of Compulsory Education Bureaucrats" -- and then even if they rule against us we could appeal to the Dutch legal system (i.e. a real court case)... But we really hope it doesn't go that far.

So could you please pray for us in this matter?  We would really appreciate it. 

Before you decide to start worrying about me, suggesting counseling, or sending an S.O.S. down the old prayer chain -- just hear me out.  I realize that what I'm about to write may sound a bit disheartening -- and even alarming... But I actually mean it as quite the opposite.  As strange as it may sound, I've recently been reassured by (or at least in spite of) the darkness swallowing up our world.

I mean, think about it.  As you look around you, wouldn't you agree that discouragement abounds?  Darkness prevails... The world is winning... All around me, I see seeds of faith and hope and love getting choked out and swallowed up by figurative weeds, birds, dehydration, and so on...  My ministry often challenges me with its lack of momentum, its lack of results, its lack of that inexplicable spark of life.  I try to keep waiting, but I grow impatient and despairing.  I'm confronted with questions like:  "Can this be right?"  "Am I really on the winning team (the Church, the Body of Christ, the people of God)?"  "Aren't I promised an abundant life?  A life of fruitfulness?  The desires of my heart?"  "So what's going on here?"

Over the last several days, I've been thinking about this and praying about this a lot (and for whatever reason, it seems that other people around me have been wondering about this, too)... And oddly, unexpectedly, I've felt like God has been telling me:  "Actually, the current dismal and declining state of the world is exactly how I've told you it would be.  You're living after Eden.  You're waiting for the Restoration of all things.  You're in that awkward in-between period of history -- and as much as I'm pained by the brokenness of my Creation, the Time has not yet come.  You must wait patiently..."

And then, I'm reminded of the Scriptures.  Consider the following:

• The Curse (Genesis 3:14-24) - A few choice phrases pulled from the text say it all:  "painful toil... thorns and thistles... sweating in futility until we return to dust..." That's life after Eden.
• A Mantra of Meaninglessness (Ecclesiastes 1-2) - The whole book of Ecclesiastes is based around themes of labor... toiling... generation after generation... nothing new... We're confronted with the impossibility of leaving a real legacy... Chapter 2, verses 22 and 23 poignantly describe the dilemma:  "What does a man get for all the toil and anxious striving with which he labors under the sun?  All his days his work is pain and grief; even at night his mind does not rest..."  This is what we're dealing with in this world...
• Broad Path to Destruction / Narrow Path to Life (Matthew 7:13-14) - This description of a world filled with spiritual travelers is heart-breaking to realize... but it's an inescapable truth.
• The Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:1-23) - Three-quarters of the "seeds" of the gospel -- including some of those which have already sprouted -- are taken out before they have a chance to really grow and reach full maturity... Yikes!  It's also interesting to note that the Parable of the Sower is immediately followed by the Parable of the Weeds (vv. 24-30).  It's clear to see that our spiritual crops have been (and are continually being) sabotaged by a devious enemy.
• 90 Percent Ingratitude (Luke 17:11-19) - Jesus himself faced rather grim statistics in ministry!
• Following Christ = Carrying the Cross (Mark 8:34-38) - A life of discipleship involves losing our lives... denying ourselves... and coming out of this life with nothing but our souls.
• The Seven Churches (Revelation 2-3) - These letters to the Seven Churches are perhaps the most powerful reminder for me that the Christian life is one of challenge and difficulty.  Every single church is faced with hardships and offered encouragement only for perseverance... enduring hardships... suffering through afflictions and poverty... prison... persecution... being pushed to the point of death... living where Satan has his throne... perseverance (did I mention that one already?)... barely surviving, about to die... being left with little strength... These churches at the end of the world are universally challenged, languishing in very difficult circumstances.  Yet they're not challenged with some trite prosperity gospel.  They're told to persevere... hold on... overcome.  No change in circumstances is promised...

The fact of the matter is that the world is wasting away!  Stories of redemption and renewal -- those things that we celebrate in prayer letters and public testimonies -- are the exception (occurring 1% to 10% of the time, according to the wisdom of the Bible), not the rule!  We're not outside of God's will if we're experiencing hardships and discouraging circumstances!

And yet, hardship is not the end of the story.  Our ultimate hope is in the Resurrection and the Life that will be revealed at the end of the world!  Scripture offers us an unconventional hope:

• 2 Corinthians 4:16-18 says, "We do not lose heart.  Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen.  For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."
• And John 16:33 quotes Jesus, saying "In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world!"

And in the meantime, we can enjoy small, short seasons of renewal.  The annual cycle of summer, fall, winter, spring is a reminder of this (Ecclesiastes 3).  The daily cycles of darkness and light, too, are a reminder of this (Psalm 30:5).  And as long as we're part of a community of fellow strugglers, fellow sufferers, fellow believers -- we can encourage each other to persevere (Hebrews 10:23-25), even in the midst of our mindfulness of the futility of this world...

Is this a message of foolishness?  Yes (1 Corinthians 1:18).  Can it be sad and scary and sobering?  Yes.  But am I sad?  Not most of the time.  Am I scared?  Yeah, a little bit -- but not to the point of paralysis.  Am I sobered?  Definitely -- but I wouldn't say that's such a bad thing.  Would you?

I love my kids...

And I love God...

But the truth is that I don't always know how to combine these two elements of my life.  Oh, of course I do my best -- reading stories from the Bible, praying together, asking and answering questions about the nature of our world throughout the regular course of daily life, and even going through the occasional family devotional series together (usually around holiday seasons).  Even so, it can be tough with very small children.  I'm not always sure if spiritual truth is being communicated in a way that is truly meaningful for them.

Case in point:  bedtime prayer.  This has been a ritual with my children at the end of every day since the day on which each individual child was born.  And yet, as my kids have gotten older, it has seemed that the practice has become little more than a brief diversion to the final good-night kiss -- and its significance has been lost in the process.  Every night -- for the past six months -- when I'd ask Elliot if he wanted to pray for anything, he always respond with the formulaic:  "God-please-help-Olivia-Amen."  And that was it.  Even during the times when I would be praying with Elliot (or for Elliot, I should say), he would make monkey sounds... or climb up the wall with his bare feet... or play with my eyebrows... or hum "The Star Spangled Banner" under his breath (and no, I'm not making up any of these examples).

You'd think I would have gotten the point sooner, but it finally dawned on me within the last couple of weeks -- as Elliot's bedtime prayer attention span has seemed to be getting exponentially shorter -- that I really needed to figure out something to help my five-year-old son connect with the idea of prayer.  I had already tried explaining to him that prayer was simply talking to Jesus and that Jesus wanted to hear whatever Elliot might have to say... I had already tried variations on themes, times, places, and positioning... But really, we needed to come up with something drastically different.

And that's how we started singing telegrams to Jesus.

For the last week, Elliot and I have been discovering an amazing form of prayer together.  I really should have thought of it sooner -- as Elliot has been a musical child since his earliest days of verbal communication.  But basically, we just started praying to God in musical form.  Not that it's really anything all that revolutionary or innovative (people have been writing songs to God for millenia).  But it's become something beautiful that I've found myself looking forward to every night since we first discovered it.

At the end of the day, after putting on pajamas and brushing teeth and reading a chapter from a book, Elliot and I climb up into his loft bed together, and we lay down side-by-side on our backs, looking up at the ceiling.  And then we start singing to Jesus.  I'll start with singing a line like, "Thank you God for the beautiful weather..." and Elliot will jump in with the second line, "Thank you God for my friend Dennis and the marbles he let me play with at school..."  And we'll go on and on like this for three or four minutes.  The tune is not familiar -- we invent it as we go -- and the words do not always fit a clever rhythmic scheme or rhyming pattern.  But the thoughts expressed in these songs are genuine heart-felt reflection on the day behind us and the day ahead of us.  And I'm really surprised to hear my boy's spiritual insight and heart of worship for God.

I realize, of course, that I'll have to actively seek to keep things fresh and not allow us to get into any ruts -- even if it might be a creative rut -- but I've been encouraged to have this intermingling of two of my great loves in life over the last week or so.  I thought I'd pass along my recent experiences to anyone else who might have kids (now or someday).  And if anyone else has discovered any other unique ways of helping connect kids and God, I'd love to hear about it as well...

To say the least, I was a bit anxious going into this morning's fire safety inspection at the H88.  We've invested a lot of time and enery and (let's not forget) money into this project... So to have everything come together in a one-hour inspection (albeit just one hour among many that came before and many that may have to come after) is understandably significant.

But now that it's done (since a half-hour ago), I have to say that I'm feeling pretty good about things.

Of course, we still don't have any definitive answers -- and probably won't for at least a week... But things went about as well as we could have expected.  There were no major glitches discovered -- though let me assure you, citizens of Amsterdam and members of Zolder50, that your safety is of the highest priority for the Gemeente.  No stone was left unturned, no doorframe or passageway was left unmeasured.  Permits to renovate for fire safety were cross-checked with permits to alter a historical landmark which were cross-checked with certificates for building materials which were cross-checked with officially-licensed architectural drawings... City bureaucrats take their jobs very seriously.  Even so, it seems that everything -- or at least all of the most important things -- checked out.  The under-administrator now has to take his findings back to the over-administrator in his office, and then they will render their decision.  It was comforting to learn that they will grant their permission for whatever number of people can safely use the facility simultaneously (i.e. it's not a simple "yes / no" decision on our application).  If the space is suited for 120 people (which it should be, based on all of the standards that were used for our renovations), then we will be granted permission for 120 people.  If the space is suited for 150 people (which it probably won't be -- though we can always hope!), we will be granted permission for 150 people.  And if the space is suited for 100 people, then we will be granted permission for 100 people... in which case we'll have to figure out how we want to go about bringing the facility up to the contractually-guaranteed level of 120 and conducting the regular work of the church in the meantime.

Your continued prayer support would be greatly appreciated and highly useful during this period of collectively holding our breath to wait and see what happens next.

In any event, I've been encouraged to remember that God is taking care of our church.  Early this morning, before heading out to the H88 for the big inspection, I believe I was providentially led to read Proverbs chapter 21 -- which is chock-full of reassuring promises in the face of our present circumstances.  Verse 1 says, "The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord; he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases."  Verse 5 offers hope and patience, even in the midst of a long drawn-out process:  "The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty."  And the chapter ends with two great verses of reassurance and reminder for who holds the keys to any door:  "There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord.  The horse is made ready for the day of battle, but victory rests with the Lord."

It's been a whole month since my last progress report on the H88... And well, there are actually some pretty important developments taking place with our new ministry facilities this week -- so I thought this could be a good time to slap up a few new pictures and then invite you into join us in prayer...

As you can see from the photographs, a large part of the physical labor is done (at least in the main two rooms).  In the Lounge (left), we still need to hang some artwork and do some cleaning (mostly dusting) -- but otherwise, this space is fully functional.  As you can see in the Main Room (below), the furniture has been loosely arranged, but we've still got quite a bit of unpacking todo, and we also need to do quite a bit of technical installation (audio, video, lighting, etc.) -- as well as a general cleaning (you can even see the fine layer of dust on the chairs in the picture!).  The contractors have nearly finished with their work; thus, we'll soon be able to move full-speed ahead in finishing off the other two rooms of the H88... It really is finally coming together...

It's nice now that we don't have to use our imagination quite as much to envision what this place will look like and feel like when we're finished.

As things have become more and more completed, we've started using the space for more and more of our week-to-week operations (one-on-one appointments, staff meetings, Soul Gatherings, etc.).  We have not, however, started using the space for our Sunday worship gatherings -- because we have not yet secured final permission from the fire marshal to use the space for more than 50 people.

However, the fire marshal is coming tomorrow (Wednesday, 21 February).  So we're anxious to see what will come of everything.  In a lot of ways, we've been anticipating this meeting for months.

It's specified as a part of our rental agreement that we must be able to get permission for at least 120 people to use the space (or else the agreement will be dissolved).  And although this certainly seems possible and even probable (provided that the right safety measures are taken), this is not an easy proposition.  Dutch fire codes are extremely rigorous; and if past experience is any indication, tomorrow's inspection is likely to be far from a simple "rubber-stamping" of our immediate and unconditional use of the space.  Yet every adaptation suggested by the fire marshal means extra time and extra costs to be worked out in the already-stressed business relationship between us and the owner (which has become stressed because of the already-significant unexpected overages in renovation costs and construction timelines).  So this is why tomorrow's inspection is a kind of big deal.  Any number of things could happen in tomorrow's meeting -- and, to be honest -- I don't expect a final conclusion to our renovation process...

But at the same time, we're praying that God will act on our behalf and provide green lights for moving ahead with the completion of our relocation process.  We're praying for allowance of (at least) 120 people.  We're praying for a minimum of further expenses.  We're praying for cooperative attitudes between the fire marshal and the owner and us... And we're praying that all of this will come to a conclusion as soon as possible.

In short, we're praying for a miracle.

Fortunately, we pray to a miraculous God.  And we believe the words of James 5:16 -- "The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results."  So if you would pray with us, we would greatly appreciate the spiritual support.  I'll try to let you know as soon as we have more definitive information on how everything goes...