A lot of catching up to do

Well, it has been ages since I sat down to write a blog.  And, I could make lots of excuses for why I haven't done that.  But instead I will try to just bring you up to date on all the things around here.

UNEXPECTED FRIENDS

  Several weeks ago we received a phone call from one of our friends and colleagues who serves in the Far East of Russia...the area that almost connects Russia with Alaska.  It seems that due to a SNAFU with the airlines there was a team of volunteers headed for the Far East and they were stranded in Moscow.  Of course, I suited-up and headed for the airport to pick them up and helped arrange for a place for them to stay while they were in Moscow.  Now, as it turns out, some of those folks are regular readers of the Hooks family blogs, so it was great to get to meet and spend time with people who pray for and support our ministry.  After several days of negotiating with the airlines we were able to finally get them to their final destination so they could help with a youth camp.  (By the way, there were a large handful of youth who accepted Jesus as their savior during that week.)  I cannot tell you how wonderful it was and how encouraging it was to spend some time with these new friends of ours.  It was a very special time for our family and we enjoyed getting to know them.  Sometimes it is easy to forget that there are faithful friends back home who pray for us regularly, so this was really a time for encouragement.

STONES OF REMEMBRANCE

  It is good to have times and places where we stop and evaluate our lives.  For Kellye and I this usually takes place every summer as we celebrate our anniversary.  I can honestly say that I never really expected to celebrate an anniversary in Moscow, Russia.  And I really never expected to call that place my home.  However, God has done some great and mighty things in the 18 years that we have been married.  I think if I were to recount them all I would probably overwhelm the servers of the blogging network and cause a world-wide shutdown, so I won't do that.  However, let me say how blessed a man I am that God gave Kellye Hodges Hooks to me.  She is a tower of strength and the premiere example of what it means to be a godly woman of faith.  She is not only my wife and best friend, but a wonderful and loving mother to my children and I am a blessed man.  If you want to read more about the kind of woman she is, turn to the last chapter of the book of Proverbs and start reading in verse 10...you will see her described there.

SOME BITTER WITH THE SWEET

  Unfortunately, our anniversary will also remind us of the passing of our dear friend Teri Tarleton.  It was on this day that she went to be with her Jesus and left the rest of us to carry on the work here without her.  She was not only a dear friend, but a godly wife and mother and example to us all of how to live on the mission field with hearts filled with joy regardless of circumstances.  She will be missed by our family very much.  We will miss her smile, her playful attitude, her cooking, her patience, her love for us and our children, and a myriad of other things.  And, while we are saddened at her passing we celebrate a life lead for her Lord.

MOVING INTO MID-LIFE

  We also celebrated Kellye's 41st birthday recently.  It is amazing that a woman that looks so young and beautiful could be "into" her 40s.  Wow!  How blessed am I?

THE QUEST: MISSION UKRAINE

  Most of the folks with our company who work in the Moscow offices are in the process of obtaining new work visas and work permits that will allow us to stay in the country long-term.  Now this is a rather difficult process and the Russian government does not like to make life easy for foreigners.  ("The Russian government does not like to make life easy for Russians either," said Dema, one of our Russian friends.)  So several weeks ago we packed our bags and headed for Ukraine to obtain our new documents.  In the recent past our folks had been able to get their new documents in Kiev.  However, two weeks prior to our trip the Kiev office decided they were not going to process those kinds of documents anymore, so we had to go to Odessa.  So after an overnight train ride to Kiev, we got Kellye and the kids settled into a company-owned apartment in Kiev and I jumped on a "bus" (it was really an 18-passenger van) headed for Odessa.  Maybe one day this week I will write the full account of my very interesting trip, but for this blog's purposes I will summarize.  Six hours later I arrived in Odessa... aptly named because the dictionary definition for odyssey reads "a long and eventful or adventurous journey."  I arrived on Thursday night and was told at the consulate on Friday morning that my new documents would be ready that afternoon.  After sitting in the waiting room for the entire day on Friday I was informed at 4:30 that getting the documents that day would be "impossible" and that I should return after 10am on Monday.  So I spent the weekend exploring Odessa and then spent the entire day on Monday sitting in the waiting room waiting for my paperwork.  Finally, around 4:30 on monday the consulate handed me our passports with the new visa stickers.  Woo-hoo!  Then it was back on the "bus" to Kiev.  We spent a fun day at the zoo with friends of ours who live in Ukraine and that night we were back on the train to Moscow.  OK, as I write this overview I now know that this week I need to tell the whole story, so stay tuned for that one.  Needless to say, we arrived home safely and realized that we are starting to think of Moscow as "home."

THE RUSSIA FAMILY

  Immediately upon our return to Moscow we started final preparations for our Annual General Meeting (AGM) which was being held at a retreat center about 2 hours south of Moscow.  Kellye's description of this event in her blog does as good a job as any of describing the week-long meeting with our colleagues from around Russia, so I will refer you to her blog for more information.  But let me add that there is something refreshing about sharing time together and swapping stories to be reminded that we are not alone here.  In many places where we have personnel, their nearest contact with anyone from our company can be as much as several thousand miles away.  So it is nice to be reminded that we are not alone here...that we all hate language school...and that we all face similar struggles and though we may not be seeing them in our own back yard, there are success stories from across Russia.  God is at work in this place and this was a good reminder of that.

So, as we spend the weekend sharing a few more precious moments with dear friends who serve on the opposite end of the country, let me say to you that the one thing that we all have in common is that we are grateful for the people around the world who read our blogs, who pray for us, who give to missions offerings, and who remember that God has called all of us to missions whether we are living in the States or in a city or village where the language is not our own.

Blessings,

Marc