Time and experience have proven that the setbacks, disappointments, suffering, and betrayals of my life have turned out for good. Truly they have become a door of hope that has opened to wonderful opportunities in heart and situation to love the Lord or Body of Messiah more purely, more fully. Although never comfortable to endure, affliction of the soul or body has led me right to the arms of Jesus, who has showered me with comfort, love, and a pathway of escape.

Job 36:15: “He delivers the afflicted by way of their affliction.”

I love this verse! When you are in the middle of pain and there seems no recourse but to endure, you seek immediate solution or escape of the suffering or problem. But it is written here that God makes a way of relief by way of the affliction. It means you must hold steady, look to God to comfort and guide in the midst of the pain. In time, He will faithfully bring you to resolve and a peaceful place of respite. In fact, during the conflict, there is a place of shelter in prayer and covering as you seek His face and not just the answer to the conflict.

Undoubtedly the hardest years of my life were in Ukraine when we first moved there. After the fall of Communism, some cities and villages remained about 100 years behind the USA which made it hard for spoiled, pampered Americans to survive. Everything in my life had turned upside down, and there seemed no comfort or recourse but to endure. I hated it. I gripped for one solid year, until I broke and surrendered in joy to God’s will for my life. It came through many tears and anger and fighting against it. There was nothing to take pleasure in but God. It sounds terrible, but true. God brought me there to show me how fulfilling He alone is.
After I broke, blessings and change overwhelmed everyone; but God was seeking my steady affection and trust through the storm.

Here is the story:

The first MJBI began in a small, fishing village about 50 kilometers outside of Odessa, Ukraine, in an old, Communist indoctrination camp for Russian youth. It was located at the end of an unpaved road that was lined with homes made with mud bricks and thatched roofs. The village resembled something out of “Fiddler on the Roof.” It was about 100 years behind the United States.

Sometimes the wind blew so hard through the windows that it would blow the candles out on the table. Our first winter in Ukraine was one of the coldest they had had in 25 years. We went often without heat, electricity, and water. For these pampered Americans, it was a rough beginning.  I wanted to return to my warm home in Texas, nearly every day for the first year.

One particular morning is imprinted on my memory. The heat and electricity were out, so Julia and I were in the kitchen all bundled up in our winter coats, hats, scarves, and mittens. The room was frigid. Julia worked on her homeschooling for the day, while I endeavored to cook an egg on the stove for her breakfast. Suddenly, the stove went out too. I just looked at that raw egg, staring me in the face.

I told Julia that the gas was gone as well, and she could not have an egg for breakfast. She stood up suddenly and burst into tears. Julia was only eight-years-old at the time and had been very courageous through all the rough transitions that life in Ukraine demanded of her. But I wasn’t surprised to see such an emotional outburst.

She finally caught her breath and between sobs she said, “Mama, Mama, I feel like I am losing my life.”

I ran to her and threw my arms around her neck. I sobbed too. After a couple of minutes, I said, “Julia, I feel like I am losing my life too. In fact, we both are losing our lives. Jesus has granted us the privilege of losing our lives. Something dies in us, so that something can live in others.”

That was a hard moment, but one I would not trade for all the memories of Julia’s childhood. It was a lesson lived in living color about embracing the irony of God’s kingdom–about how you really find your life when you lose it.

We stayed in Myaki for almost a full year, completing the MJBI school year. And I recall it now as the sweetest year of my life. God’s grace lifted us through those times and carried our family over the rough times. I remember it as a year full of contradictions–the stark difference between the warm fuzzies you feel at the church altar when you respond to an emotional call to the mission field, and the cold reality of living it out in a foreign place. I remember feeling extreme highs and lows. And trying to stay true to what God had called us to do through a torrent of emotions.

I would have given up and gone home, but somehow God allowed me to stay. I would have turned back and said, “Forget it. It is too hard.” But God just wouldn’t let me do that, because He wanted all the credit for the humble beginning of the MJBI in Myaki, Ukraine.

And I know He deserves the credit, because I quit every day for one year.

Many mornings I wouldn’t want to get out of bed, but I would hear the first MJBI students praying and singing out to God, asking Him to reveal Himself to the Jewish people of Ukraine. Accustomed to such rough situations, those students knew we were suffering and I know they prayed for us too. Those prayers sustained us.

It is hard to believe now that over 17 years have passed. Look at what God did in these past years. And I believe the best is yet to be.

When I count my blessings, I consider myself favored by God that He allowed such suffering in my life to bring me up in faith to serve Him more purely. and to trust Him more fully. In the end, the blessings in my life have overtaken the little that I suffered!