It's not about me

by Kristine

As Candidacy with MAF draws near things are becoming more real to me. The fact that in two years or less I'll be saying,"See ya later" to many family and friends. It's natural to think,"Whoa... what am I doing? Is this what I wanted? Do I really fully understand what this path I feel called to means? What about Jenna getting to know family and friends we adore?" Questions like these flow through my mind most daily. Typically I know many people don't talk about this stuff, but I like to be about as real as possible with all of you because I feel it's important. I am a normal person with thoughts and feelings and yes, I do think about all the things I know you probably wonder if I think about. :)

As I was sitting in church this past Sunday these thoughts were still in my head. I decided to give them to God and pray about them. It was then that I realized something, it's not about me. I know it seems silly because yes we are taught to give it all to God but me being a typical human being likes to think about how things affect ME. How selfish is that? I realized that yes, it's going to be super hard saying,"See you later" to everyone but God's called my family to go overseas as missionary aviators. I don't have to worry about my close family and friends because I know that God has them in His hands and most of them know Him.

What about those in the other country we are going to? The ones that don't know Him? The ones that think they have no hope in life? What about the children who've been abandoned and the battered women and the youth that think that they've done too many wrong things to ever be worthy of God? Who will talk to those people? Who will show the orphans that there's love for them? Who'll show the battered women that they can have healing in Christ? Who will help the youth know that no matter what they've done in the past, God has a future planned out for them and can give them hope beyond compare? What about the kids who need a good education too? Couldn't I provide that with the skills and talents that God's given me?

Specifically to mission aviation: How will those injured get to a hospital when the nearest one is a few days walk away? How will the diseased in remote villages get the life saving medical supplies they need to live? How will people with the know-how to administer those medicines get there in time when it takes days to reach them? What about those who want to contact loved ones or even get a message out in remote villages? Who will show these people serving them in this way that Christ loves them? These are things mission aviators do! There are a lot of people who can drive cars, but not a lot of people who can fly a plane let alone feel called to serve God using that plane!

Those questions flowed through my mind throughout the church service and I was filled with such a calling to serve the Lord through missions. We feel called to serve and go. Yes that means leaving the comfort of home and the safety of a good job and the security of family and friends. But it also means that God's leading us on a journey to help those that don't know Him overseas. How amazing is that? It's time to get excited about the journey and to trust that God has everything planned out in advance to use us in ministry.

We need your addresses!

Lately we've been pretty busy. So busy in fact we've forgotten to update this blog. Right now we are working on getting our house fixed up so it can be sold. After we get back from MAF this summer we plan on selling most everything we don't want to take with us and hopefully selling this house quickly. We are hopeful it will sell fast.

In the meantime other than home renovations we've been busy completing bible studies and other things MAF would like us to finish before we go in July 11th. One of those tasks is getting names and addresses of people who would like to receive our newsletters and keep in touch with us. We've contacted many of you, but there are some that we've not yet contacted. Some of you actually just follow our blog and aren't on facebook with us yet.

If you'd like to receive our newsletters, please e-mail us your name and address to: ericandkristinereed@gmail.com and we'll send them to you!

We passed our MAF technical evaluation!

Huge news! The past couple of weeks we've been at MAF headquarters in Nampa, Idaho doing our technical evaluation. We are pleased to report that we've passed! Praise God! We've been invited to come to the Candidacy for two weeks in July. During that time we'll find out which country we've been assigned to. Then for three weeks or so after that we'll be doing some different trainings. It's a very exciting time for us! It's totally a God thing and He opened lots of doors for us on this trip. I don't have much time to write and will write more later, but we passed!!

Blessings,

The Reeds

It's Tech Eval time!

Yes indeed, we are in Nampa, Idaho for our Mission Aviation Technical Evaluation. We'll be here approximately a week and a half. During this time Eric will be evaluated on his flight knowledge and skills (written and practical), we'll be evaluated by a psychologist, meet with the board, get to know several MAF staff and talk about our IT (Informational Technology) and Teaching skills. At this end of this evaluation we'll know if we have passed this step in the process and can proceed further. It's a huge deal!

We are praying for God's will in this. As many of you know this has been on our hearts for a long time. With Kristine she's felt called to be a missionary for years. Eric's also wanted to use the skills God gave him in flying, programming and technology to serve for years as well. We're going to work hard and try our best to pass. If we don't pass, then God has other plans. It could mean we should try again or it could mean that we need to look into a different organization to serve with. God is the only one who knows. And we are actually content with that. If we do pass we'll be invited back to Nampa, Idaho to do a longer training.

So that's the basic information. Here's where our story begins... several hours ago in Salem, Oregon.

We both stayed up super late the night before packing and making sure that we had everything we needed. Kristine worked on a few last minute sewing projects and Eric worked on compiling all his required flight materials for the evaluation. We got to bed really late that night and woke up a few hours later to leave for Nampa, Idaho where MAF headquarters is located.

Taking the I-84 route seemed the fastest and easiest. Plus Kristine had already figured out places to stop for food along the way that seemed safe. It was a long trip but Jenna did pretty well. We stopped in Hood River to eat at Bette's Place. The food was good, reasonably priced and Jenna did great there. We put her in a high chair for the first time at a restaurant and she decided to make it her own and lounge in it. (Pictures will come later) It was pretty funny. She dumped a glass of ice water all over the table. That was not so funny. After we ate and had a good break we were on our way.

We stopped at a rest stop after a few hours and had some fun. We can't remember which one it was but Jenna got a good break. (Photos to come later) Also we swear she has red hair.... sometimes it's hard to see but I got it perfectly in the sunlight during this rest stop.

After this rest stop it was time for me (Kristine) to drive. I think we were getting near Pendleton at this point. The Sun was shining and we were doing great. Then...out of no where it seems...the rain started. It poured and poured on the road. Which is not quite nice when you have semi-trucks all around you! A few times I couldn't see the road! To make matters worse, since we are getting close to having to replace the tires, the car was hydroplaning on the road! I was feeling tired before, but not anymore! The fact that I REALLY had to pay attention to what I was doing or else we'd go off a cliff or crash with another car or just get into an accident myself woke me up. I was so afraid! Going around curves and not knowing if the car was going to hold it or not. Believe me a lot of prayers were said. It was by the grace of God that we're here. :)

After a while Jenna woke up again and we decided to stop in Baker's City. We stopped at Sumpter Junction restaurant. I really don't think we would have stopped here had I not researched it. It sounded like a fun place. They have a little model train running on a track around the restaurant. It was fun. Jenna liked it there and liked watching the train. The waitress wanted to hold Jenna and she didn't look scary, so I said okay. :) (Pictures of this part of the trip to come later)

We got back in the car and made it to Nampa! We got into our MAF apartment and it's really nice. They have apartments at their headquarters for missionary families who have to do training or are back home on furlough. They let us use one apartment during our technical evaluation time. We are very thankful they let us because it makes the costs a lot less than what they would have been had we stayed in a hotel. Plus living here for a week or so lets us meet other people who are here during our stay too. We've met a few other couples, one who's due with a little one any day now! It's been fun.

Tomorrow we have an introductory meeting with the committee and Eric starts his flight eval process. Please join with us in praying for 1. Sleep (Jenna has to adjust to being in a new place and we have to adjust to her adjustments!) 2. Clarity of Speech and the most important 3. God's will.

Blessings,

The Reed's

Being Crafty

In an effort to help bring the every day life into this blog, I (Kristine) wanted to show you what I've been working on the past few months. It's definitely been a learning curve, but fun. I wanted to make Jenna some dresses, but couldn't figure out how to read the pattern, so I made my own pattern. :)

I took some women's dress socks and made some cute tights for Jenna to wear. It's super easy to do.

I took some old headbands and cut them in half, then sewed flowers on them. Jenna seems to like the headbands...until she pulls them in front of her eyes!

My parents bought me a food dehydrator for Christmas; so I decided to try it out!

This is just a sample of what I've been up to in my "free" time the past few months. I like it because I am learning new practical skills that I can use forever. I hope to make myself a dress if I get good enough. Luckily, I have Jenna to practice on! :)

-Kristine