A Long Obedience…

Dear Friends, Family and Partners,

”A long obedience in the same direction” is the name of a book by one of my favourite author/pastor/theologians, Eugene Peterson. It comes originally from Friedrich Nietzsche, who wrote, “The essential thing ‘in heaven and earth’ is … that there should be long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living.” That our walk as Jesus followers is, at its roots, a long obedience in the same direction has been an encouragement and reminder (originally given to me by my dad… thanks dad!) for about as long as I can remember. Or at least as long as I have wrestled with faith and followed Jesus for myself.

Over the past weeks I’ve been pondering both this idea of a long obedience and the idea that we as human tend to overestimate what we can do in a year and underestimate what we can achieve in 10 years (an interesting article expanding on that). We live in a chaotic, complex, constantly changing world that in so many ways is bent on distracting and demoralising us. We’re bombarded with ‘do more’ and ‘be better’ and ‘hustle and hurry’ and the cursed trophy of ‘being busy’. While we strive to live good lives and do well in each of the many roles we fill, I’m challenged that as a Jesus follower my first example should be him.

The apostles returned to Jesus from their ministry tour and told him all they had done and taught. Then Jesus said, “Let’s go off by ourselves to a quiet place and rest awhile.” He said this because there were so many people coming and going that Jesus and his apostles didn’t even have time to eat. So they left by boat for a quiet place, where they could be alone
Mark 6:30–32

It was very early in the morning and still dark. Jesus got up and left the house. He went to a place where he could be alone. There he prayed.
Mark 1:35

Yet He often withdrew to deserted places and prayed.
Luke 5:16

We’ve just celebrated Jesus coming to pitch his tent among us. God coming into our space and living life like us so that we can have life with Him. My conviction for this coming year is that the Holy Spirit is leading me to lean, as wholeheartedly as I can, into not setting goals or aiming to achieve big dreams but instead developing habits that will result in a life shaped by and reflecting Him.

Will you join me?

Looking Back
One big milestone for Dané and I over the past few months has been completing the second half of our A2 Deutschkurs. This has been in preparation for the A2 level exam which we need to pass for our next residence permit renewal (we’ll be doing the exam on 26 Jan!). We are feeling more and more confident in our language learning and are finding ourselves speaking mostly German in the office, as well as having 1 to 2 hour conversations when taking Lily to play dates with friends.

Some work highlights. I (John) have continued to manage much of the administration processes for the Austrians we are sending abroad. We currently have 3 Austrians on Logos Hope (1 STEP participant and 2 in the 1-2 year program). I was also able to attend the annual Young Leaders Summit and presented a new mobilising tool at the OM stand.

A interactive table display, focused on least-reached people groups across the world.

Dané had the opportunity to attend and complete the Coachmentoring Essentials course presented in Mosbach, Germany. This adds to her already broad set of skills for caring for, and encouraging those working with OM in Austria. We also had our annual OM Team Retreat and were incredibly blessed to have Lawrence & Susan Tong (OM International Director) spend time in fellowship with us and challenging us to keep focused on Him and His guiding in our ministry, work and lives.

The girls have thoroughly enjoyed being back at school. They are both now eating lunch at school and staying later at Hort (Austrian equivalent of aftercare). This has been particularly wonderful for Cori who is the lone extrovert in the family and she soaks up all the extra social interaction each afternoon. Lily is officially a Schulanfängerin (kind of like Gr 0, but still integrated to the rest of her Kindergarten group) and her confidence has grown in leaps and bounds the past 3 months).

Cori attended an ice-skating course over the holidays, and Lily participated in her first ever swimming gala (See pictures below).

Looking forward
This year started with us all trying to recover from 2 weeks of COVID over Christmas. Thankfully we are now all well.

I (John) spend the first week of the year at a PraiseCamp, a big youth camp held in Vienna. OM had the privilege of running a missions interaction called ”GATHER+GO:TheGame” and we saw 130 young people ”sent out” on outreach to Laos and challenged by the realities of injustice, Christian persecution and the least-reached. This also lead to over 40 responses and over 20 people interested in short- or longer-term mission. Please pray that over the coming weeks I would have good conversations with each of these individuals and that God would lead them to the right place to serve at the right time. I am also excited that we already have 3 missions-focused workshops confirmed for events this year.

Dané has started the year with a People Care Day – focused on self-care, active listening and developing a personal care plan – for some of the office team members. She has also started the B1 level Deutschkurs. We are grateful that this specific course is hybrid (in-person and online), as she will be travelling to South Africa for 3 weeks in February to help her parents prepare for some challenging family changes expected in the coming months. This will also give her an opportunity to visit our sending church, Homeground, and the Logos Hope (where she will be able to meet up and spend some quality people care time with the Austrians currently onboard).

Photo Dump
A few snap shots from life here in Austria.