Wings As Eagles - May Newsletter
The first week in May we travelled to Nanning in Guanxi Province and helped with an EMA camp for a group of thirty underpriveleged school girls. The camp was a great success in spite of a day or so of rain which (literally) put a dampener on things. One of the highlights of these camps for us is the last night around the campfire on the beach where the girls and staff put on a concert. It is a good time to watch the girls’ faces in the firelight and reflect on where they are at the end of the camp compared to when they arrived.
Ray has been tutoring a young woman (a molecular biologist) who has been selected to go to Sweden for two years in September. During the course of conversation in their sessions together she asked about our motives for adopting Deborah, and other questions which quite naturally lead to our faith. She now attends our church Bible study on Saturday afternoons, our English class on Sunday afternoons (where our reference book is the Bible) and has begun reading Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven Life.
Likewise our travel agent who arranged our trip to Harbin back in January and who more recently organised a trip to Beijing for us asked about us tutoring her in English. While her English is reasonable she is keen to improve it and jumped at our invitation to come along to our Sunday afternoon classes. The reference book we use did not seem to bother her in the least and she has shown more than a passing interest in our faith.
In late May we travelled to Beijing to formally submit our application to adopt Deborah. Rather than travel to Beijing and return in a day or two we decided to pull Deborah out of school and take her on a five day tour of her national capital. This took in the Imperial Palace, the Forbidden City, the infamous Tiananmen Square and many other Beijing highlights. Disappointingly the day we had an appointment at the Australian Embassy clashed with the day our tour group visited the Great Wall so Deborah did not get to see this great wonder of the world.
We were not as prepared with our submission as we thought we were and there are a number of documents (birth certificates, marriage certificate etc.) which we now need to have authenticated back in Australia and endorsed by a Chinese consulate back there. While this will be time-consuming for us, particularly as we will be on holiday, in the end it should only be a formality and the end result will be worth it all. We will need to make another trip to Beijing later in the year and maybe then Deborah will get to see the Great Wall.
In mid-June we leave for ten weeks in Australia, including son Damian’s wedding to Catharine in Townsville on 23 June. We will be visiting with family and friends all up the east coast of Australia as well as spending three weeks in Tasmania including a 9 day 4WD trek in the west coast wilderness area.. Sadly Deborah will have to return to Changsha during our time away. We pray that this will be the last time she may have to do this.
Due to our being constantly on the move for the next couple of months this will be our last newsletter until August.
Praise Points:
Praise Him for His continued faithfulness to us in so many ways.
Praise that another two students from Suzanne’s classes have asked to come to our Sunday class.
Praise that Maggie is looking for ways to serve Him during her summer break here in Shantou.
Prayer Points:
Pray that Deborah be kept safe while she returns to Changsha in our absence.
Pray for Deborah who loves The Son and that she will fully understand the concept of being saved.
Pray that we be kept safe during our travels to and from, and within Australia.
