L'Abri Newsletter, March 2010

Dear Praying Family,

We wish you another happy new year as we just celebrated Lunar New Year a couple of weeks ago. Thanks to your earnest prayer, we finished the winter semester in gladness, and students have returned back home safe and sound in heavy snow. Over the holiday season, Eun Chol and Eun Ha visited their families and spent quality time with them in Busan for a week. Chun Sung went to his hometown in Jeonjoo to pick up his children with his wife. He stopped by L’Abri last weekend to make a close the contract for the housing. He will be moving into Yangyang this week. Chun Sung’s wife, who is a teacher, was assigned to HaeNam elementary school near border 38 stop.

In the meantime, In Kyung, Kyung Ok and I were buried in snow in L’Abri. The parking lot in the front was filled with snow as deep as 70 centimeters; we had an honor to appreciate snow that sparkled so gloriously in sun light that tons of diamond field would not do. We wanted to keep the snow as pristine as we can so cars had to be parked outside the lot. We were practically mesmerized by the scenery night and day. Where there is beauty, one should be aware of the danger; we had deadly icicles hanging on edges of the rooftop. In the middle of the day, you can hear huge icicles crashing on the floor that makes you shudder. To be on the safer side, I opted not to take a trip outside. When it was absolutely necessary to go out, I took caution to walk around the building with my back on the wall. Snow laden traffic condition and short holiday season prevented visitors from coming to L’Abri. But they were not able to stop gifts, and we are so thankful for those kind givers who remembered us.

Although my story may mislead you to believe we were having a quiet holiday, it is not so; we have been preparing for spring semester that will begin on March 5th and slowly recovering from exhaustion. Häfele family is coming back to us this spring semester in 3 years; about 44 of them will come during 8 week of spring semester. Teams of 5-6 will be staying with us from Tuesday until Saturday every week. I have never met Häfele family before but heard a lot about them from other workers that staying with them required extra strength mentally, spiritually, and physically. Their stories make me nervous already. Most of Häfele family is not Christian so I am not sure how to make an appropriate approach to them as a fairly new worker of L’Abri. While Häfele family is staying with us for 5 days each week, we will be doing usual L’Abri routine including 2 lectures, bible reading session, prayer meeting, movies and tutoring. In order to serve them without getting burned out, we shall be fully equipped in body and mind. We ask you to pray for us that we would be able to show the true Christian living and function as the channel of blessing to Häfele family in meeting Jesus.

We have few registrations besides Häfele as of now. But we hope that students and Häfele family would not inconvenience each other and stay in good terms taking care of each other. Another prayer request is that we as workers will serve and meet individual needs of students, listen to God who sent them to us in humility, and obey Him. One great news is that Elder Kim BukKyong, and his wife Cynthia will be visiting us all the way from the U.K. to participate in the ordination ceremony of IPC in Korea. Kim gladly volunteered to give lectures in the first week. Personally, I am looking forward to seeing Cynthia for she has a reputation to be skilled in dog training so I hope to learn a trick or two of the trade from her; a dog named Jireh has been under my care since last November. However, she tends to have a selective listening skill to my command and acts whatever she feels like. Her behavior certainly frustrates my patience and makes me wonder why I am still feeding this disobedient dog.

With the lunar new year season come and gone, a new semester is ahead of us. There are a lot of work yet to be done including preparation for lectures, cleaning inside and outside of the house, washing bedding and furniture covers, and etc. We have new addition to our family; Chun Sung’s wife, Soo Yeon and their children, Ji Ho and Ji Min. Ga Hee, the elder daughter of Eun Chol and Eun Ha will be moving up to 4th grade in school , and their youngest, Han Hee, will become the oldest in the kindergarten.

Each of us faces different sort of changes and challenges. But we are able to face them with courage betraying our throbbing hearts because of God’s leading hand and your prayers. I desperately yearn that all of us, despite our weakness and deficiency, would stand in the place where God called us to be, serve one another in love as the body of Christ, and accomplish what God has purposed according to His pleasing will. I also pray that you have a continuing flow of God’s word and grace this year. Recently, I received a mail from a dear friend of mine in Thailand that ended with the bible verses that perfectly frame our current status. Closing this letter, I would like to share them with you so that you would also receive nourishment from them:

“Have you not known? Have you not heard? The lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” (Isaiah 40:28-31)

In Christ,

Mokyung