The Wee Ones

Scots are so kind to kids.  We noticed as soon as we got there that instead of receiving annoyed glares, the kids were smiled at and enjoyed.  A friend here told me that they have a custom of putting money into the prams of strangers as they stroll their babies around.  I think Judah is a little too manly with his broad vocabulary, massive volume, and tendency to announce that he is in charge (literally—“I in charge!”) to attract any funds this way, but I try to use the stroller just in case.  

We have had personal experience of the pro-child climate, though.  For instance, we stopped at a gas station, and I ran a sleepy Ariel in for a potty stop.  I could tell from the moment I asked the question that there was no public bathroom at this station, but the ladies just looked at each other and said, “Is it for the wee one?  Oh, well, let me get the key…” and then led me back through a bunch of doors and storage.  And of course, we exited with several sweet comments and verbal caresses for my little redhead, most of which I couldn’t quite catch. You can drive ten miles down the road and suddenly find the accents totally incomprehensible.  I don’t know why the differences arise so suddenly.

Another time, Judah was losing it after a “day off” in the city of Ayr.  We were trying to take a fun day with the team, but it turns out the Ayr is for shoppers and café goers, which Judah and Ariel are not, and so Judah was in a high chair causing a ruckus at a coffee shop.  A lovely lady just walked right over to him from her nearby seat, and began to talk to him her sweet Scottish talk, mixing some general pleasantries with nonsense with gentle scolding, and utterly holding his attention.  “Tha’s right,” she said.  “Sometimes et just takes a defferent voice, and ma funny accent, and so you must be good, wee lad…” She smiled at us once he was calm and went back to her seat.  I sometimes think that even if for no other reason, God’s got a special blessing for Scotland.

Shortly after arriving in England, we took a couple days to visit my dear roommate from college and meet her dashing new husband, David. We toured a bit around Nottingham, laughed a lot, totally took to the new hubby, and remembered why we love Eb. Oh, and, of course, we prayed. The kids got to see a real, old castle (from the outside), and we ate at a pub that claims to be the oldest inn in England. It was a fabulous visit. Here’s pic of the kiddos, with the real Robin Hood, whom they recognize thanks to classic Disney. “I thought Robin Hood was a fox, not a man!”

The Kids in Nottingham

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It has taken us a while to get this site up and running.  You may have noticed the mismatching of the dates with the events.  Sorry about that, but we’re hoping to catch up to current news pretty quick here before we send out the link.  So, unfortunately, we’ll probably move quickly through a lot to get to now.

We arrived at the missions base at Harpenden, England, in a happy haze of jetlag and excitement.  OJ began his secondary mission of scouring the streets for Starbucks as soon as we hit the road from the airport to Harpenden.  Unfortunately, this mission is not going as well as the primary one; I think he’s only found one so far.  The wonderful folks at Harpenden treated us like royalty, giving our family a whole flat to spread out in.  Good thing, as we brought enough luggage to clothe the base.  I realized as soon as I opened the first bag that during the flight my mind had mysteriously been healed from the trauma called ‘moving,’ and I was awakened to a new reality of ‘packing.’  If the healing had happened a day earlier, we would probably have 100 lbs. less of luggage.

So we spent a few days connecting with the team already on the ground, meeting new friends, and recognizing faces from our trip to Harpenden 2 years ago.  We saw so many people whom we had met only when praying for them an hour during those ten hour days of intensive prayer on our previous trip.  It’s fun to get to know people you only know from prophetic prayer the normal way.  I was thrilled to find a bunch of them with new babies in their arms!  One of them was an amazing lady who had two older children and was for all intents and purposes “done.”  I clearly remember praying for her and her husband, and was blown away to see her a couple years later filled with joy and showing off her beautiful daughter.  “This was my surprise fortieth birthday present!” she said.  So it’s not just Tacoma where prayer and babies go together!  Praise God!

Initially we tried to let nature take its course in helping the kids with their jet lag, but when on our third night there Ariel didn’t fall asleep until sunup, we put them on a creative schedule to slowly move them by means of exhaustion closer to a normal schedule.  It involved many painful wakings of sleeping children (forgive me, Dr. Weissbluth), but it worked.  After a few days, they were much more on track, much more themselves.

We got a few chances to pray for the folks we came across over the next few days.  We experienced the kindest hospitality and warmth from so many there at Harpenden, and were so glad to be there as we got our feet underneath us.  We prayed mainly to encourage the teams that are trying to birth prayer team ministry there on the base, and lift them up in the battle to do so.  It is so easy to forget how opposed this ministry is, and so unveiling stuff coming against these mighty men and women was a huge treat.  Just to remind them how great they’re doing and why their job can be hard!  Since then, where we are in Scotland, we’ve come across folks who have been profoundly impacted by these new prayer teams born right here in the UK.  It’s the most exciting thing to come across–multiplication of initial investment made by our pastor and many other teams than us.  People being released in who they are being trained to do the prayer ministry, not merely receive it.

During our time at Harpenden the details for the first leg of the trip (destination Seamill, Scotland) were finalized, as well as the makeup of the team.  We sent off some amazing, beloved members who had travelled around England lighting people up before we arrived to their next adventures or some rest, and picked up Erin at Heathrow.  We jumped in a rental minivan to drive the seven hours up to Seamill.  The van crew was Pete, Erin, Ariel, Judah, OJ & me.  In a miraculous stuffing of our much downsized luggage (we stored a bunch at Harpenden), we all fit, most of us lodged in with various items around our feet and heads.  OJ drove, still searching the fields of sheep and sleepy towns we passed in vain for a Starbucks.  At the end of a long day, we made it to Seamill, Scotland, a missions base on the west coast of Scotland, home for the next little bit.