OUR SPONSORING CHURCH - GLOBAL MISSION CHURCH 
“They have refreshed my spirit and yours.”  I Corinthians 16:18       

We worship weekly with Global Mission Church at their Bundang campus. The worship service we attend is a several thousand person gathering in a high-rise building. The worship service is televised to their Suji campus at the same time with about the same number of people attending. We are the only English speakers in this sea of worshiping Koreans so several families from our co-op alternate translating the service for us.

On the opening day for our first co-op, Global Mission rented a restaurant and had a welcoming party for our family. They had a bountiful “sit down” buffet for around 100 people. There was a beautiful cake with a “cake cutting” time. They hung an impressive welcoming banner for our family and gave gifts to Boni and me.

On Sunday, November 5, the senior pastor of this 20,000 member church, Pastor Dongwon Lee, and the pastor over our project in home education, Pastor Shim, initiated a ribbon cutting ceremony and dedication for the new Home School Network Office at Global Mission Church. It was an honor for our family to be a part of it. They call it a “resource center” because they hope it will be a means of helping the home school movement nationwide. They are motivated about this new ministry in their church and have welcomed us royally.

EXPERIENCING KOREA
“When I consider the work of Your hands…what is man that you are mindful of him?” Psalm 8:3-4
        
One of the JIA families donated tickets for all of us to visit the Korean National Museum and then watch a live performance of traditional Korean dance and music called “The Han.”

 We also enjoyed attending a traditional Korean wedding of one of the staff from JIA, Eun Kyung. (Eun Kyung helped us get our immigration cards the first week we were here. That was the time we experienced our first wild taxi ride in Korea.)

We took a three hour road trip to the east coast near Donghae to visit an organic farm system that helps support a group of country churches in that area. Ik Sang and his teenage son, Tae Hyung, were our tour guides.  (This family volunteers with JIA helping to start the much needed development of curriculum for high school level students.) I have never seen such a combination - terraced vegetable production among snow covered mountains, all overlooking the East Sea. We order produce from this organic farm, and a day later, it is delivered to our door in the city and is less expensive than buying it at the store.

             In the short three months we have been here, we have experienced the balmy mountain greenery of summer, the vivid colors of fall with Japanese maple lining the streets, and now the beginning of winter with snow starting to blow in.

THANKSGIVING         
“It is He that has made us and not we ourselves.”  Psalm 100:3

The Korean Thanksgiving holiday, Choosuk is celebrated the beginning of October. Several kind families from our co-op asked to come to our apartment and show us how to make traditional food and play traditional games. One of the favored treats here is called “dok.”  Dok is a rice flour treat that has a flexible, life-like consistency and is stuffed with either bean paste, sesame seeds, or other unnamed mysteries. At first it was a little scary, but it’s beginning to grow on me.  It was quite interesting to watch the process of making dok. After the mixture is made, everyone, including the children,  participates in stuffing and shaping each piece of dok. Then the dok is steamed with a layer of pine needles covering them. One reason these different things are easy for us to adapt to is because of the warm welcome and love these people have showered on us.

We also enjoyed celebrating our American Thanksgiving with our fellow FMI family, the Sumralls.  We were able to buy a turkey at Costco. It was from Great Britain so we had directions in English and oven temperatures in the metric system which was very helpful. We were able to prepare most of the traditional foods we usually enjoy in the United States. The day before Thanksgiving, a gold inlay in my tooth fell out and left a gaping hole in my mouth. My heart sank as I felt so helpless to know where to even begin to look for help in repairing my tooth.  No one knows my native tongue and how much less my tooth!  It may not seem like much to you, but I never felt so lost. Yet through a phone call to our translator and friend at Global, Joo Yun, a dentist (who told me he had seen me at church the Sunday before) was able to see me Thanksgiving morning. By dinner time, I was patched up and comfortable and able to eat all the traditional Thanksgiving foods that had been prepared. It was a beautiful fall day so after we ate, we all enjoyed a mountain hike. We then came back for a Thanksgiving worship time at our apartment. 

WORKSHOPS, BIBLE STUDIES, AND MEN’S MEETINGS
“I will rebuild…so that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord…”  Acts 15:16-17

With all that has gone on here since our arrival three short months ago, it was timely to be asked to speak on the topic, “What To Do When You Feel Burned Out,” at our monthly JIA workshop.  

Judah has had a very positive response to his mid-week Bible study with all the youth from co-op. Judah chose John Piper’s “Don’t Waste Your Life” theme.

I have been enjoying the personal interaction I have had with the men during the men’s meetings, the co-op times, and the weekly soccer games.

          Pastor Hyung Yun, pastor of the international services here at Global Mission Church, and his wife Ahn Na are part of our co-op and have become key to helping us understand cultural matters. Ahn Na translates for our afternoon co-op with such enthusiasm and ability. They are doing all of this while just starting to home school their family as well. 
         
Choon Woo (a deacon at Global) and his wife, Ji Wan, were part of the phone chain that found a dentist for us when we needed one. They have taken on themselves so many services to help us get moved in. Choon Woo also translates for me at one of the weekly men’s meetings and translates the Global church service for our family every other week.  One of his two middle school sons told Judah his parents wanted to home school his brother and him because they want their sons to be men of God.

Cheol Hi also translates for our family at the Global church service every other week. His family feels called to a tentmaker’s mission with Korean university students in  Uzbekistan. On a recent ministry trip to Uzbekistan, the door opened for Cheol Hi to start developing IT work projects. Seeing our family working together, this family has changed their plans from just the father going to their whole family going as well. While he was there, he also found out that Uzbekistan had just ordered all English businesses out of their country. This leaves Korean missionaries who are there with no school for their children. (They were all attending the English school that was just closed.) The Korean families have asked him to bring the training he is receiving here in home education and family discipleship to Uzbekistan in January when he goes there to start his first business project. Is it possible that this family reformation is going to spread through Koreans beyond Korea? The timing of this story and the details of so many other things regarding their family’s calling sounds like the Lord’s providence. Cheol Hi would like us to go and teach a weekend seminar in January for these families. Pray for this opportunity in the middle of the Muslim world, and pray that God would open the way if he wants our family to help these Korean missionaries in Uzbekistan.

Recently, I asked the men to answer several questions for me so that, when translated, I could get some personal information as to whether or not we were bringing any special help to their families. As I looked at their questions later, I realized how seriously these families are taking what we are saying. Each one has started family worship. They could tell me where they were reading in the Bible, what they were memorizing, and what the last discussion was that they had with their children about life and godliness (Deuteronomy 6:6,7). We are amazed these men are stepping up to our challenge to make their homes houses of light through seeking Christ and worshiping Him together as a family.   
 

PRAYER REQUESTS:
“We have seen His star in the East and have come to worship Him.”  Matthew 2:2
 
Continue to pray that the non-Christian spouses of home schooling parents would come to know the Lord.

Pray that we would have a blessed family time and holiday with Christa, Jared, and our friend, Matt DeVincenzo, as they are visiting over the Christmas holiday.

Pray for Cheol Hi and his family as they begin their new ministry in Uzbekistan.

Pray that God would provide help for the Korean missionaries in Uzbekistan who want to begin home schooling their children. Pray that God would open the way for our family to go to Uzbekistan if He desires for us to be a part.

Pray for the Korean families as they are seeking to diligently apply the Word of God that it would be “a work of faith and labor of love, and that they would have patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.” I Thessalonians 1:3