One of our own, E, serves in Central Asia. We support his work as a community developer, English teacher, cycling advocate, and Jesus follower as he lives and shares the gospel to his friends.

Hello from the capital city. Hope you’re well.

I’ve been here about a week and it’s been nice and busy—helping with Dari-English translation for our Safari books project, distributing books to bookstores all over the city, coming up with new promotional materials for the books, and also accompanying our trainers to some of our community health trainings, one of which was in a village of internally displaced people (i.e. refugees from other parts of this country) and the other was at the main Police Education Center for the country, which is more like an army base than a police station.

It has been really encouraging to see some of how what we prepare for in the office translates into reality. For instance, our books are all over town and are often displayed very prominently in the bookstores, holding their own place even in large and popular bookstores where the booksellers have chosen to showcase them on the wall or on special shelves. As far as the community health trainings, it was interesting to see grown men, some of whom have taken the Hajj, learn new things about the relationship between waste matter and sickness; and it was also interesting and encouraging to see rough-and-tumble all-male policemen paying respect to our trainers and voicing their gratitude about learning pregnancy health lessons that will help their wives and children.

I’d like to ask for your prayer for a couple things:

• With the recent successful conclusion of the Pregnancy Health Books project back in my main town (23,200 Dari-language illustrated books have been printed and are being distributed to students of our Pregnancy Health Trainings now), it’s a little unclear as to what work I will be able to do when I leave the capital. There’s always work to do here in the capital, but because our NGO branch is much smaller and my main town is more rural, it can be hard to find ways to help out especially as I am still an “intern” (sometimes I forget that!). I am not yet at a point where I can be raising the thousands of dollars necessary to start huge projects so I am praying about finding a new avenue to professionally contribute to my NGO and community. There have been a few good project ideas from colleagues that have come across my path and in which I could play a role, but those people would need to actually raise the funds and start the projects, and I can’t make that happen. So I am praying a lot right now to try to discern God’s wisdom for me in this situation and would really appreciate your prayer as well.
• Speaking of health, I am feeling pretty weak at the moment — currently have a bad flu, annoying allergies and a weight-lifting injury (bet you didn’t know I’ve been lifting weights, haha).

As you might be able to tell, there are a lot of moving pieces in my life these days … in some ways not as much as there used to be, but the ones that are here now are really important and really unknowable. Sometimes it’s hard to see how God will do the beautiful things I know are in his plan. But there have been other mysteries he’s revealed in the past, mysteries much larger and more significant than the one regarding my personal future.

It’s kind of crazy and kind of awesome to just sit and trust.

Be blessed.
E

[Photo by evanistan @ Flickr]