Dear Praying Friends,
Thank you for your prayers that have sustained and strengthened us these past weeks!! I am sorry that it has been over a week since my last update, as I am sure many of you are wondering what has happened here…. I will try and be brief, as I could write pages on what is going on but I don’t want to bore you with all the details!!!
Well, it is week 3 since our teammate was asked to leave the country in a week’s time and we learned that Paul’s name is on the letter from the ministry of interior with the names of 3 men who are to be asked to leave Jordan!! Doug was advised by a lawyer that since it was a verbal command and nothing was officially written, he could ignore the deadline and wait for another warning! So he waits and we wait for a phone call asking Paul to go into the police…but nothing has happened!!! Some may say Praise the Lord!! nothing has happened, but the uncertainity of each day has been exhausting as we try to live “normal” lives in the midst of not knowing if we will really be able to stay long-term in Jordan. It has been very upseting to us all to think of moving countries again, and making Ruthie change schools again and start all over with making friends. It has been a sobering few weeks as we realize that while we chose Jordan to live in because we thought it was an easy place to live (workers have lived and worked in this country for years and there have been very few people kicked out), now we find that Jordan has become like other countries in the region, that are very worried about anyone who might be doing evang work.
Our Jordanian boss, Sameer, has been really helpful in working through various connections that he has with government officials . But so far all of his connections have not been successful in learning any more information except that it’s religious in nature and that they should stay away from this case!! Paul and Doug have met with someone from the American Embassy but he also hasn’t been very helpful. We are still considering different options of getting outsiders involved, but the whole situation is very sensitive as we do not want to embarrass the Jordanian government and make them angry. At the same time we would like to apply enough pressure from outside to make them reconsider this decision. Please pray for us that we would have wisdom to make the right choices of how to proceed. We leave for the summer, to make preparations for our daughters wedding in July, so it would be so helpful to know the state of our residency before we leave in June.
** Before sending this out, we got word that our last resort (a highly placed offical in government) here in Jordan is going today to talk with the minister of Interior to see if he can check on Doug’s status! It will either mean that he is allowed to stay in or told a definite NO!! We feel that our fate is closely tied to Doug’s since both of their names were on this list of people to kick out! We know that God is in control of this and are trusting in His will for us. Thanks for praying.
TLOing -
We have had to postpone or cancel all trips that we usually make in the spring time to our various teams that we oversee. This will possibly be costly as one trip is non-refundable and another one is possibly too. It is disappointing to cancel trips as we usually enjoy these visits with teams and it has usually been a whole year since we have seen them. But God knows these things. We are concerned that if Paul leaves Jordan on a trip, he might be denied entry into Jordan when he returns and I am not eager to pack up and move countries by myself!! Nor do we both want to be stopped at the airport and have Ruthanne here in Jordan alone. We really want to let her finish out her school year here.
CRL
All this has caused our company to come under scrutiny as well. Another teammate who was hoping to get a residency visa through our company might not be able to since there are many questions now associated with CRL by the government. Please pray for Dan and Karen who are working with Sameer on a project where Jordanian students travel to the US and American students come here for a cross cultural experience and to gain better understanding of each other. D&Ks residency as university students expired a few weeks ago and since Dan was called in a few weeks ago for questioning they wonder just how their future looks here as well. Please be praying that we can find another Jordanian who will be willing to get Dan a visa to work here. As you can see there are a lot of people affected by these recent events.
In the meantime I am still going ahead with helping to do training at the girls home and the home for battered women. These training times are going well. We are seeing many receptive to our relational training and that has been encouraging in the midst of all the other uncertainties!! I have been recently asked to help organize a sponsorship program for the new little girls that the orphanage recently took into their home. There are 15 of them and we hope to raise enough sponsors to put them in a better private school to help ensure that they grow up better prepared to fit back into society. I am attaching an introduction letter and the profiles of the girls so you can read about their situations. If anyone is interested in sponsoring one of our girls, please get right back to me and I will you more details as to which ones still need sponsors and how to transfer money. Pray with us that God will bring in the full amount of money that is needed. I still go once a week to teach the girls English and it is rewarding spending time with them and having the chance to give them a little love that they are so lacking!
So, hope this hasn’t gotten too long! You do not know how much we appreciate your prayers for our situation here. At times we feel encouraged and able to face the uncertainties with faith that God will intervene in our situation here and then at other times we feel very tired at the thought of moving countries again! We want to rest in Him at all times and keep our eyes focused on Him whatever the outcome is. Thanks for praying.
For His Sake,
Paul, Susan and Ruthanne