As I’m writing this, it’s Saturday at 9:30pm (just after noon Saturday back home), and Gina and the kids are down for the night I think. I can’t get connected to the internet, so this post will not be “live” when it goes up. We have finally arrived in Arkhangelsk and are very near now to Andrew and Kathlena—nearness measured by geography, time and emotion. I can hardly believe my new son and daughter are only a few miles away from me right now. We will see them Monday.
It’s still light outside, and probably will be all night long. It will be “dusk” from around 11pm until 3 or 4 am, and then it will get brighter. Definitely not what we’re used to, but even the brightness is not familiar. How ironic that a place where the sun doesn’t set can be so dark; in fact I had forgotten that the darkness here has little to do with the cold, gray skies. It is a darkness felt more than seen.
It’s been a wearisome couple of days, but our Lord has been very kind to us. Many of you have been praying for us, specifically for “traveling mercy”. I reminded my troops this morning that we have experienced precisely that. We had a wonderful apartment in Moscow last night, and although we had been up for almost 35 hours (excepting unproductive airplane naps), four + hours sleep last night was able to refresh us all tremendously, and we were delighted over a simple breakfast this morning and by the excitement of traveling still closer to the moment of liberation. I’m reminded of Psalm 3:5 and 4:7-8. It’s worth looking up these verses. Amen.
Then today our flight was delayed due to heavy snow storms in Arkhangelsk, leaving us at the Moscow airport for almost five hours waiting on our aircraft. But even then, we had a serendipitous meeting with three late-twenties travelers (two young men and a young woman) on their way to Ark for the weekend. We met them in line checking in for our flight. One of them asked us a question in Russian that we clearly could not answer. Rather than the usual indignation this type of thing causes, one of them asked where we are from, and they all laughed at the one who thought we might be British. We began to talk, and they explained all the Russian airport announcements to us and helped us navigate our way through the multiple delays. We had the opportunity to speak with them about our adoption story, about Russia, about America, and a little about the Lord. They were all very friendly, and very helpful. Thank you Ivan, Yari (hope I’m spelling correctly) and Olga. The Lord used three strangers to make our path smooth and learn more about Andrew and Kathlena’s country at the same time.
Tomorrow is the Lord’s Day, and we hope to rest. We need his refreshment not only for our bodies, but also for our minds and our souls as we prepare to face a socialist judge and negotiate the ransom terms. Thank you for your prayers—we have been embraced by the hand of our Father and by His people.
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