China and other news

As most of you know we recently returned from a week long trip to China. Gabe was invited, along with some other businessmen, to give ethics lectures at several universities in China. He spoke on medical ethics. When Gabe was first asked to go, he agreed only to do so if he could bring the whole family. We really didn't think they would want children along but to our surprise they welcomed us all.

I spent weeks preparing and packing us up. However, nothing can really prepare you for a 13 hour flight with a 2 year old and a 5 month old. Praise God and thanks to all those who were praying for us, the flights were not bad at all. Their ears bothered them but not too bad. Gabe and I managed to get a few hours of sleep and the girls a few hours more. And we had a few meltdowns from the girls but they didn't last long.

It's hard to sum up all that we experienced in that week but I think we both walked away feeling blessed and encouraged. God opened some doors for us for future work in China as well as allowed us to get a glimpse of what He is doing among his people there. Evelyn had a blast. We spent part of the time staying with friends which was encouraging for us and hopefully for them. : ) Our friends had 2 kids the same ages as Evelyn and Maeve and Evelyn loved having someone to play with.

The flight back was again long (no way getting around that) but we made it through and were very happy to be home. Below are a few photos. I may post more later.

Family photo outside of a very Western mall.
(Much better than any malls we have around here.)

Maeve enjoying some lunch of dumplings and sweet potato

Countryside view on the train ride

Evelyn checking out the other apartments

On a more difficult note, while we were in China we got news that my dad has been diagnosed with acute myloid (sp) leukemia and has growing melanoma. He as had several cancers in the past so this was not a surprise but it was shocking when they told us he had about 2 weeks to live. If the treatment he is taking works then he could have several more months. He is to go home from the hospital today, Monday. He will continue treatments but as an out-patient. We are enjoying as much time with him as we can. Processing all of this has been hard but praise God that our hope lies with him. My father will either be healed here on earth or have a new body in heaven.