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Dear Ted & Phyllis,
The lack of correspondence between us is no indication of
the high place of honor and esteem you hold in my heart. Knowing that you're
circumstances sometimes are over taxing, I don’t expect much of a response to
my infrequent letters but I do want to keep in touch with you.
I got back from another trip to Southeast Asia a little over
a week ago and have been so pushed trying to get caught up this is my first
opportunity to write to you. I have written a very lengthy report of that trip
which I will send you in a separate envelope, so zi will try to refrain from
being too redundant in this letter other than to say that it was easily the
most difficult trip I have ever been on. It started off when I arrived at the
guest house in Chiang Mai where I always stay to discover that I had lost
my waist pouch with ALL
my money and passport. That is almost the ultimate catastrophe that can happen
when traveling abroad, but things continued to go from there down hill. That was
the most unrelenting serial of saiyaku (disatsters) that I have ever faced in
my life. I believe it can be accurately said that it is a miracle I came out of
there alive; but a month later – in retrospect – I was able to accomplish
everything that was on the original agenda and the over all rating of the trip
certainly was in the plus column. You can read the details when you get the
report I will be sending separately.
All together, including the money I lost in the waist pouch
and everything else that fell in on me, that trip cost me close to $2,500 which
is going to take quit a while to get even with the board again. That means I am
going to have to stay pretty close to home here at NLL and try to work off a
lot of the indebtedness I incurred on this trip. In one sense the brethren say
I don’t owe them anything, but in reality I am a long ways behind to different
people who had to cover for me and I feel I should pay them back.
Millie Dennis and two of her children were just here for a
couple of weeks and I just got back from taking her out to the airport an hour
ago. One son, Mark, works for Delta so she can do quite a bit of flying for
free and this was her second trip out here this summer. Did you know Dick and
Millie Dennis from Karuizawa? They were with TEAM
form ’64 to ’82. Dick was one of my best friends and perhaps the finest
missionary we ever had in Karuizawa. He wasn’t real fancy but just kept hanging
in there and years later there was a very impressive crowd of young people he
had brought to Christ. Poor Millie was so much in the background she never knew
what was going on. In talking to her about the Golden Era in Karuizawa, I was
amazed at the prople she didn’t know or the events she didn’t remember. Finally
we decided she was so busy in the kitchen cooking meals, washing dishes, and
changing diapers on six kids she never knew who was in the living room. She had
a guest book she asked everyone to sign and one month she counted one hundred
guest who had been there. Poor Millie, when she went to bed at night she never
knew how many would be there for breakfast as Japanese came in at all hours of
the night and slept on the floor. In the words Of Allen Fadel “The Japanese
were just like the frogs in Egypt.”; but Millie was a good soldier and the
combinations of her keeping up with the dishes and Dick’s steady ministry of
the Word brought a harvest that few people have ever matched. Dick was so far
out in front of the rest of us and had his basket slam full to overflowing by
3:00 in the afternoon, that the Lord gave him a pass and excused him from the
field early. He went home a year and a half ago. When Jay was four years old we
got a call from Rosemary’s mother saying that it looked like dad was going to
be with Jesus soon. We told Jay that Grandpa was going to heaven soon and Jay
responded, “The lucky duck!” Well, Dick was a “lucky duck”, but he was a worthy
one too.
I doubt that you would have known Sigrid Ridle. She was a
very different German missionary that was here for 40 years. Rosemary knew her
very well. She fianally staggered up on the opposite Shore a couple weeks ago,
but she had a terrible time getting across the River! She near about drowned
most of the way. Over two years ago she broke her hip – that shouldn’t have
been that serious – but somehow she just didn’t have any ganbaru and never got
out of the hospital bed. I don’t know how in the world she did it but she
languished in that bed for two years. It would have killed me if I had to die
that way. For the past year or so Roald and I were praying that the Lord would
take her soon – which He never did. Just before I went to SEA
last month the hospital called NLL saying Sigrid had gone into a coma and they
didn’t expect her to come out. Roald went over to see her and just before he
got there somebody had laid hands on her and prayed; while they were praying
Sigrid opened her eyes and came out of the coma. Roald was really disgusted.
But she finally made safely across a couple weks ago. I’ll bet she was one
happy soul when she finally woke up in heaven, and we are all grateful that she
isn’t here anymore.
You mentioned in your last letter how blessed you were by
the letter I had sent reporting on a prayer meeting. I couldn’t remember what I
had written so I got it out and reread.
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