For Prayer

I think its not without irony that wherever we have worked with refugees, we have shared with them (to some small extent) the similar feelings of being a foreigner without permanent residence.

Of course we always reserve the trump card of being able to return to a safe home country - ah - analogies, they always fall flat somewhere along the way!

Today we met with our immigration adviser.
It was not the news we were expecting.

As you may know, we are missionaries working with an organization that doesn't pay us. It means that we spent 4 years prior to working full time with refugees raising our own support mostly through churches in Australia.

Since relocating to the US - some of that support has evaporated, and some of it has just plain lost value due to inflation, exchange rates, and Jonathan our third child.

Our plan had been to transfer our visa status here in the US so that Sue could work a few shifts per month in her career as a nurse as a second source of income. We had originally planned that this would happen early in the new year.

Our advice today puts that back another 6 months due to processing times. So now we face the daunting task of not being able to travel internationally, of wringing another 6 months out of our support as well as some hefty processing fees.

It's another shock along the rocky path we call life.
Thank goodness I don't think much of prosperity doctrine - our experience wouldn't even register us on their meter!

The good news is that the Jordanian couple we are trying to secure safety for has just been given a substantial green light by the US state department report. Pray with us that we can safely relocate them from the nasty persecution context they currently find themselves in.