Missions Textbook 10
Time to Leave Graz

We Never Saw It Coming: An Introduction to Christian Missions (textbook)

Wrapping Things Up                                                                    

Dearest Sue,                                                           January 1988

It’s getting so hard to patiently plan for returning to Portland. I could easily be packed and ready to go in a few days, but I wouldn’t have taken care of the apartment (which we’re giving up) or any of the hundreds of other details. We’re also trying to invite over all our friends and people in the Bible studies one more time.

On Floyd’s birthday next month, we’re having an “Open House Birthday Party!” Our apartment is much too small for everyone all at once, but it’s Floyd’s 40th, and I thought we should do it big. We’ll have a buffet with sandwiches, chips and cake – simple but fun.

The party was a huge success. Manfred, an excellent pianist, entertained us for hours on our baby grand piano. One of the men bought Floyd about fifty ultra-inexpensive German and Austrian classic literature books. They were wrapped individually and strung together as a garland around the whole apartment. I mostly remember the noise and that everyone was having fun and brought food. The neighbors had been warned (as per city regulations) that there was going to be a loud party, and a few of them popped in to see what was going on. They were stunned that we were having so much fun without being drunk.

Dear Friends,                                                                                  March 15, 1988

Before you stop reading because this is just a form letter, please read a bit further and you’ll understand why. I am sorry that I haven’t written for so long. If you haven’t already heard, we are moving back to Portland, Oregon for one year. The goals that we set seem to have been met – namely that there is an independent church here in Graz being run by the Austrians believers. In addition, there is a strong little group of believers in Mureck, and talk of a second group beginning in another part of Graz. The remaining Bible studies have been turned over to others.

Although we will not be leaving Graz until the beginning of April, most of our belongings are packed, sold, or given away, and we will be delivering them to a friend’s basement this weekend. [At that point, we moved in with my sister and brother-in-law, who had recently moved to an apartment in Graz.] We really do feel supported by your prayers, in that things do not seem the least bit hectic – yet!

We will be in England and Northern Ireland for about ten days, and then will fly to the East Coast and drive across the southern United States, arriving in Portland the end of June. We’ll be using much of this traveling to acquaint the boys with America, and we’ll be learning history and English along the way. We will be speaking in many churches, including five evangelism seminars. We will also visit Christine’s mother and Floyd’s stepdad and aunts and uncle. Of course, we scheduled in some fun, like visiting the beach, seeing Disney World and the Cape Canaveral Space Center.

Last Sunday, we spent the entire day in Mureck with the believers there. They are going through a lot of persecution, and they could really use your prayers. It is unbelievable how cruel and nasty their friends are, when confronted with the love of God and His offer of salvation and eternal life.

Here is our address in the States. We would love to hear from you, and we will write once we get settled. Unless the Lord opens some as-yet unseen door, we plan to return to Austria in early summer of 1989. And just because we are no longer in Graz, please don’t cease praying for the believers and for the Bible studies there. They still need and appreciate knowing that there are others praying for them.

We look forward to seeing you soon.

Floyd, for Christine, Erich and Michael

Many Hands Make Light Work

This book has been, so far, about the Schneiders’ work in Austria – to this point, about work in Graz. Lest we sound as if we were doing everything single-handedly, I need to remind you of some of the Christian workers (many of whom you have already met) who came to work with us and became a part of this incredible, miraculous work of the Holy Spirit.

First there were the two teams. The first arrived in May of 1983. Yes, we had clashes – but as things ironed out, the team leader and his wife ended up staying two more years past their initial two-year commitment. For a while, they did an excellent job discipling many of the students, and they led several of their own evangelistic Bible studies, using Floyd’s method of asking questions and letting God’s word speak for itself.

Another single girl, Rona, from that team also stayed a while longer, and she was a special blessing as a regular babysitter, cookie-baker, and wise observer and advisor of our family. During one of our cookie-baking sessions, we were talking about people having blind spots in their lives that make them unteachable in certain areas. I said to her, “If you ever see a blind spot in our lives, we would want to know.”

“Really?” she asked.

“Yeesss,” I responded slowly.

“Would you really want to know?”

I knew there was something, and I did want to be open to what God wanted to tell me through her, so I said, “What is it you are seeing?”

She told me that she had observed that Floyd and I seemed to be favoring one of our boys over the other. Interestingly enough, we had been over-compensating in trying not to show favoritism. I thanked her, and assured her we were not upset. We needed to do something about it now.

I have already told you quite a bit about Bernd and Karin Flock who arrived in October of 1983, just after the first team had come. They were in every way a tremendous blessing to us, to the believers, and to the city of Graz. They led their share of evangelistic Bible studies, and for a while Bernd was one of the elders in the Brandhof Street Church. Karin was committed to mentoring women, and she encouraged me to learn to do the same. They were every bit as busy as we were, and they would be busier, once we left.

The second team had come in May of 1984, and they also made a major impact as they met students, lived with them, and talked them into reading the Bible. Whenever Floyd had to be out of town, some of the team members were able to continue the Bible studies in his absence. Many of the people they worked with are still following the Lord today.

We had had a couple young men – one from California and one from Colorado – who had come to work with us short term. Both were friendly and outgoing and helpful, and we were very thankful for them and their willingness to listen to advice and jump into the ministry. Jim loved Austria so much that he eventually married an Austrian, and he still lives there. Jeff wanted to be a missionary to Albania – which was very, very closed to the Gospel – and he wanted to use Graz as his “home base.” Years later, Albania opened up – a little – and Jeff, now married, was able to minister there for a while. It was a difficult country to live in permanently, however, so eventually they had to leave.

My youngest sister, Karolyn, had come to Austria in May of 1984, initially to smuggle Bibles into Eastern Communist Europe with the team in Vienna. While there, she met Roger, who would become her husband. Six months before we left Austria for our year-long home assignment, they moved to Graz. Because they already knew German – at least somewhat – and because they had no other responsibilities, they ended up leading two of the Bible studies that were in towns outside Graz.

Dr. John Lennox and his lovely wife, Sally, also contributed irreplaceable teaching and discipleship in the country of Austria. He was a regular speaker at the Austria Student Mission conferences, and he also came to visit Graz and Mureck, where he taught and encouraged the new believers. He was a good friend to Floyd, and they often talked long into the night on theology and practical evangelism. John was the one who encouraged Floyd to write a book on evangelism, and he also introduced Floyd to many believers in Great Britain, who were connected with the ministry and teaching of Dr. David Gooding. John is a dynamic teacher and a brilliant apologist with a winsome ability to communicate to university professors and local postmen. We are so thankful for the friendship of John and Sally.

Several letters I wrote right before we left Graz were filled with lists of Bible studies and who would be taking them over. Usually it was Austrians who had gotten saved in those studies and had invited their friends to join them. Occasionally it was one of the missionaries who had come to work with us. Either way, it was such a joy to know that the work would continue. As Floyd often said, “The ‘Guru’ needs to leave. If the work can’t survive without him, then there was something wrong with the ‘Guru’s’ training.”

Cultural Observations from Third Culture Kids

[The following portions are quoted from Erich’s (age 14) and Michael’s (age 10) Travel Journals.]

We left Graz on Easter Sunday 1988. Nobody asked me if I wanted to go. We simply gave up our beautiful apartment in Berliner Ring, packed everything we owned into other people’s houses, moved in with Uncle Roger and Aunt Karolyn, and then drove away from Graz. I know we’ll come back to visit, but it won’t be the same . . .. I really don’t want to leave.

Roger and Dad drove us all in a big rental van. We stayed overnight in a nice Gasthaus, and the next day we arrived in Belgium to take the ferry across to England . . .. Michael went to the restroom and read the sign on the door: ‘Occupee.’ “That means,” he said, “that the bathroom is possessed.”

We got on the ferry, after waving good-buy to a tearful Karolyn, and found seats to sleep on in the “No Smoking” section. It was very noisy, though, with children crying and students laughing, and drunk people being loud.

Mom and Dad dragged us out of our sleep at 2:45am. We have SOOOOO much luggage – eight large bags plus carry-ons, and when I’m tired, I don’t like to carry it. We slept in the bus station for a few hours, while Mom and Dad took turns watching our stuff. We boarded a bus, then a train and had to change trains because we got on the wrong one. Finally, we arrived in London.

Mom and Dad’s friend was waiting for us. He gave Dad the keys to his American van, and Dad had to drive us to their house on the wrong side of the road.  It was wild, and we even saw two trucks drive past each other and crunch their mirrors together. There was a switch for a grenade launcher on the dashboard. We tried it, but nothing happened. I’d like to have one.

We were all grubby, so we did some laundry, took baths, and then napped. We played games until 9:30pm and then took a train to Scotland. We were so tired and there were no places to lie down. I drifted in and out of sleep, but I was so uncomfortable. Finally a nice man moved, and each of us had two seats, and we could sleep better.

In Scotland,, we had to wait for another ferry to Northern Ireland. It was getting to be a real drag – no sleep, traveling in the dark, carrying luggage (although not as much because we left most of our stuff in England with our friends).

We ate a good English breakfast on the ferry – eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, and tea or milk. It’s amazing what a good meal will do for you. We felt better.

We spent a week with a family Floyd had met on his many travels – friends of John Lennox and David Gooding. They had two teenage girls and a boy slightly older that Michael. The plan had been to provide our boys with some Christian friends and fun in the English language. Our friends took us to the beach, to the Giant’s Causeway, to an outdoor folk museum, and horseback riding. Northern Ireland is notoriously rainy and soggy, but the weather was unusually sunny and warm the entire week. It was like heaven not to struggle with the language, to be able to speak openly about our ministry, and to rest. The boys tromped around farms in borrowed “wellies” (English for rubber boots), chasing sheep and holding lambs.

Floyd had several speaking engagements, where he told people about how he evangelized in Austria and then challenged them to try the same “method” with their friends and family members. Our friends took Floyd and me to a Bible study near Letterkenny. In the afternoon, we had tea with the local bishop, who did not think it was such a good idea for the common person to read the Bible. The conversation never ceased to be cordial, but it was not friendly. The Bible study – to which the bishop did not come – was very encouraging, as we met a former IRA operative who was converted by reading a tract and by learning that Jesus commanded to “love your enemies.”

From Erich and Michael, again:

That evening, we packed. It would have been fun to stay in Northern Ireland. Nobody asks us.

We took the ferry and train back to London. [After a few days of sight-seeing]: Living with people is fun, but you also get tired of it. We were glad to finally pack and know that we’d soon be at CMML [Christian Missions in Many Lands, Inc. headquarters in New Jersey]. Security at the airport in London was strict because they have to worry about the IRA, a terrorist group. On the plane, we tried to sleep, but they showed the movie, “Three Men and a Baby.” It was super. I’m glad it was on the airplane; Mom and Dad would probably have never let us see it otherwise.

CMML always feels a little like home. We had the apartment upstairs. Everyday we did a little school, and Michael had to practice piano. But we got to watch TV – real American TV, with commercials. We didn’t want to turn the commercials off. We watched ‘MacGyver’; his voice is really different in English! Dad had lots of meetings – almost every night. Sometimes we went with him, sometimes not. We decided that before our trip across the U.S. is over, we’ll know his slide show really well. At least he’s funny. People seem to enjoy what he says. If the people don’t laugh at his funnies, then we know that they’re really boring.

The people at CMML provided us with a car – a dark red Toyota station wagon. It looks great on one side, but the other side is all smashed. It’ll get us to Oregon, though.

We wanted to swim in the Atlantic Ocean, but it’s really polluted in New Jersey. We ate out lots – at Dunkin’ Donuts, Roy Rogers, Burger King. We discovered Wendy’s salad, taco, and pasta bars. I can eat all I want, and it doesn’t cost any more than Mom eating all she wants! [I don’t know how many years Wendy’s did this all-you-can-eat offer. I suspect that they stopped after we roared through the country, feeding the boys there whenever we needed to eat. The chain probably lost money!] Once, Michael left his jacket at Wendy’s, and we had to drive back the next day to get it.

We spent one day in New York City. You get there on the Parkway, and you throw money in a basket to pay for it. New York was super; Dad bought his new briefcase right on the street. We went up to the top floor of the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. We were really high up, but the wind was blowing too hard for us to go out on the observation deck.

We took a ferry out to Liberty Island, where the Statue of Liberty stands. Mom tried to explain about why the people came to America, but she got all choked up. I think I understand, I liked the statue because it is the symbol of freedom . . ..

After three weeks at CMML, it was time to begin traveling again. We left New Jersey on a very rainy morning. Interstate 80 is a horrible, bumpy highway that all of the trucks use to drive from New York to Chicago. We weren’t going to Chicago – only near Akron, Ohio, but our car made crash, crash noises because it was over-loaded, and the road was so bad. It rained the whole way.

Mom had bought flashcards of all fifty states, with their capitals, and industries and interesting facts of each. Every time we drove into another state, we had to learn everything on the card, including the capitals. New Jersey – Trenton. New York – “All bunnies go skiing in New York” – Albany (All bunny!). Pennsylvania – Harrisburg. Ohio – Columbus – as in Christopher.

Uncle Roger and Aunt Karolyn used to live in Akron, and we were going to stay with some friends of theirs. They had two girls and a boy. Michael went to school with David one day. On Saturday night, we unloaded our car and put all of our suitcases in their dining room.

“Our church is in an area where we have had several break-ins,” they told us, “so we don’t want your car to be robbed tomorrow.”

The next morning before we left for church, they went out to their van, and someone had broken into it and stolen their music tapes and their tape deck. I’m sure glad we took our stuff in.

After Dad preached in their church, it took us two days to drive to northern Florida. Mom even drove some, and she’s not such a bad driver. We really enjoyed the traveling, when we didn’t have to stay with people. It was fun to stay in motels – especially when they had a pool. Now it’s May, and the weather is very warm, and getting warmer and stickier the further south we drive.

West Virginia – Charleston. Virginia – Mother of Presidents; therefore rich – Richmond. North Carolina – Raleigh. South Carolina – Columbia. Florida – Tallahassee.

In Gainesville, Florida, we stayed with a couple who had come to visit us in Austria. Michael and I slept in their den, which didn’t have a door. Dad preached in their church, and then they took us to the beach, where they let us stay by ourselves in their vacation apartment. We were very close to the ocean, and we learned to body surf the waves. The last day we were there, a crab bit Michael’s foot, and he didn’t want to go in very deep anymore. Mom said, “I knew that crabs were there the whole time. I just didn’t want you to stop swimming.”

After a couple of days there, we left and drove to Orlando, where Disney World is. This was the place I liked the best on the whole trip. The weather was sunny and very hot, but when you went into places, they were nice and cool. The first place Mom decided to take us was to the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, but after waiting in a crush of people for about half an hour, they told us that the ride was broken, so we had to do something else first. Later we came back, and it was really neat to ride in the boats through Pirateland. They even shot cannonballs at us.

Because we are home schooling, we went into the Hall of Presidents. Mom gets so teary at all these patriotic things!

Michael: After lots and lots of Bible studies, my mom and dad took us to Disney World. We went to see the roller coaster – Big Thunder Mountain. Mom didn’t want to go but she went anyway and at last she liked it.

The Rest of the Trip

Traveling, as the boys noted, was indeed stressful as we stayed with many people – many of whom we had never met before. They were all wonderfully hospitable, and we were thankful for every one of them.

In South Carolina, we had stopped to have supper with a professor we had met in Bible college. During our meal, a huge thunderstorm with hail and tornadoes descended on the area. It was raining so hard that it was like the water was coming from a bucket. When it let up a little bit, we had to leave. The boys got in the back seat and were met by water pouring onto their seat from the ceiling of the car. Our luggage had bent the roof, which obviously had a hole in it. From that time on, whenever it rained, we had our own private rainstorm inside the car.

In Gainesville, after our time at the beach, our friends came to pick us up for a mid-week meeting. The plan was for us to go back to their home, change clothes and then we would all go to the meeting, where Floyd would share about our ministry in Austria with a slide show – which was really high-tech back then.

On the way, there was a terrible thunderstorm, and we were delayed so badly by high water that we had no time to change clothes. We dashed into the meeting at the last minute. The people were all in dark suits and ties and fancy Sunday clothes. We had just come from the beach. Floyd was in yellow slacks and a sports shirt.

The speaker introduced him with a look of disbelief and a bit of disapproval. Floyd said, “Well, we hit one of your famous thunderstorms, and didn’t have time to change. Let’s turn the lights off, so you won’t have to look at me, and I’ll show you some slides of Austria.” That was the time the boys discovered that people didn’t always laugh when their dad was funny. We hadn’t expected people in the States to have cultural problems with us!

We drove across the Deep South, in sweltering heat and humidity, with no air conditioning in the car. Outside of Shreveport, LA, we had a flat tire. Exhausted, Floyd put the small spare on the car, found a phone number in our denomination’s directory for the nearest church, and called some people we had never met at a church in Longview, Texas. (Remember, there were still no cell phones!) The people who answered the phone told us to come and we could spend the night with them. There was a meeting at the church (It happened to be Wednesday, the day of midweek prayer meetings!), and they were having a potluck. If we wanted, we could eat and show our slides. As tired as we were, we were grateful for their care of us and told them we would come.

I don’t remember much except their kindness. They took our car to the garages at LeTourneau College (a Christian engineering university). The next morning, they brought us a different car – bigger and with air conditioning. “Take this car to Portland, and then bring it back sometime, and we will give you your repaired car.” We are so blessed to be a part of the Family of God.

Speaking of Family

Except for a few meetings for Floyd, the next few stops were to touch base with members of our family. Floyd’s uncle and his wife lived in Texas, and we had planned to stay with them for about a week. We arrived and had a lovely evening. The boys helped to pick peas from the garden, and everything seemed to be going fine. The following morning, Floyd’s uncle took the boys out on his motorcycle, which was an exercise in faith for their mother! Overall, the visit went okay, but one morning we woke up to find that Floyd’s aunt was in bed with a migraine. Before breakfast, Floyd’s uncle handed each of us a one-hundred-dollar bill and asked us to leave. We didn’t even get to say goodbye to his wife.

We packed our things and probably went to MacDonald’s for breakfast. Floyd found a phone and called the believers at our next stop in Oklahoma. Our contact was the parents of a missionary who worked in southern France. We had met her at the European Worker’s Conference, and we had become friends. They graciously told us to come, and they found a family for us to stay with who had several children. We are so blessed to be a part of the Family of God.

We didn’t let the boys spend the money all in one place!

Extended family relationships for missionaries can be very complex. Some parents don’t want their children to waste their lives on something that will not make them “enough money to live on.” Other parents are honored to have missionaries in their family. Still other parents exhibit a misplaced pride – “My daughter is a missionary!” (What good is your daughter?)

It is inevitable that the grandchildren will not know their grandparents very well, and may be reticent to communicate much. The grandparents – unless they have visited the mission field, which some don’t – can be clueless about what the grandchildren’s day-to-day life is like. Sometimes younger children even speak a conglomeration of their mother tongue and the mission field language making it difficult to understand them. Children can be frustrated by this too, and misunderstandings are sure to occur.

And then there is guilt: “Why did you take my grandchildren to such a faraway (dangerous, foreign) place?”

And obligation: “You owe it to me to let me spoil the grandkids a bit, since I see them so seldom.”

Add to this the natural tendency for many in-laws to be critical of the spouse they don’t care for, and you have a recipe for unpleasantness at a time when all the missionary family really needs is some peace and rest.

On top of it all is culture shock, and the fact that the family that stayed home has changed, and the family that went to the mission field has changed even more. Values, preferences, and even family traditions may have changed.

We had a short, pleasant visit with my mother and her husband on their homestead in eastern Colorado. The boys found dead rattlesnakes, saw a live bull snake (which looks just like a rattlesnake without the rattle!), and went swimming in a stock tank. We also saw Floyd’s stepfather and his wife, and my sister Marian made a trip to Colorado to introduce me to her first little daughter!

Prayer in Alamosa

Jeff had come to Graz to eventually minister the Gospel in Albania. He had stayed with us and gotten to know our boys. Now he was back in Colorado and had invited Floyd to come to Alamosa and lead an evangelism conference. He found lovely places for us to stay in Alamosa and also in the Rocky Mountains. But he had more plans to make the transition for the boys a joy.

The boys had never been fishing because, although we loved to go fishing, in Austria the cost was prohibitive. Jeff found the boys fishing poles and we set off for the mountains. Initially, Floyd and I said we wanted to fish in a stream, so we gave it a good try, but caught nothing. We drove higher into the mountains to a lake Jeff knew about. He left us to fish, and he said he was going for a hike and would be back later.

The boys drowned a few more worms, but were getting discouraged, when a U.S. Fish and Game tank truck drove up and backed down the boat ramp. It lowered a chute into the water and hundreds of trout swam willingly from the truck into that lake. The boys were very excited and threw their lines back into the water. Within minutes, they each had caught a trout.

Jeff wandered back to find the boys nearing their legal limit of fish.

“Did you have a nice hike?” Floyd asked.

Jeff grinned. “Yeah. Well, while I was hiking, I was praying that Erich and Michael would be able to catch some fish.”

We decided that we always wanted Jeff to pray for us.

Someone just recently mentioned that he had heard this story before. Well, it happened to us, and I have no doubt that it could happen to others. After all, Jesus showed Peter where to drop his nets in the Sea of Galilee.

God’s Reason We Left Graz

As believers, we make the best decisions we can, based on the information we have. We study our Bibles and pray that God will guide us by opening and closing doors and by putting His desires in our hearts so we can please Him by following those desires. When we were planning to move to Austria, people would ask us if we were “called” to Austria. Our answer was: “We will see. This is what we want to do for God. We will have to wait for a few years to see if it was really what He wanted us to do.”

Well, my letters to Sue seem to confirm that God had great plans for Graz and the surrounding areas. There was so much we hadn’t seen coming, but what a glorious honor that God allowed us to be a part of His plans.

Now we were making a decision to leave Graz, spend a year in the States, and then move to the Vienna area. Some of our co-workers and some Austrian believers were not sure we should leave. And many didn’t want us to leave. We told them that our job was close to finished, as they had demonstrated that their faith was strong, and they were able to continue the work without us. What we couldn’t explain was the desire to leave that came from deep inside us. Floyd felt restless, and I felt as if I really wanted to go.

Well, we arrived in Portland, and the boys – especially Erich – were no longer unhappy about the move. And then one day, Erich – age 14 – gave us insight into the real reason God had moved us out of Graz. He told us that during his first year in the new Middle School in Graz, he had clung to his new faith in Jesus and had not joined in when the other kids told dirty stories and cursed. His second year had been harder, as he really wanted to have friends, and the only way he could have friends was to compromise. His third (and fortunately last) year before we left Graz, he found himself joining in with the others in talking crudely about the girls and laughing at their jokes. One of the boys in his class had offered his older sister to teach Erich how to sleep with girls. Erich, of course, refused, but he needed a Christian friend in his school, and there were none.

After telling us all this, he thanked us for leaving Graz. And he was looking forward to being in a church with other teens his age, a youth group, and even an opportunity to serve by babysitting for the ladies’ Bible study on Wednesday mornings. He would even go to the Christian camp if we wanted him too.

So, although we had left Graz so that the Austrian believers could lead their own church – which they were doing very well – we now knew that the main reason we had felt so restless. God was honoring our prayers that our children would never be harmed by our decision to move to Austria. We praise God even now for His intervention into our best-laid plans. It was clear to see that God had led us to the decision to leave Graz.

Life in Portland

Scott Walt, Dave and Sue’s youngest son, had been in our youth group when Floyd was going to seminary. Scott studied to become an optometrist so he could join his father’s practice. He married Leslie, a registered nurse, and they had taken a trip to Peru to consider working there as missionaries. In several visits to Portland, during our time in Austria, Floyd had talked with them, asking them to consider Austria as a mission field. Much to our delight, they did. The timing was interesting because, as we were planning to return to the States for a year, they were planning to leave for Austria. And since we were going to be living in Vienna, they decided to settle near Vienna so they could work with us. Our year in Portland would be their first year in Austria in language school.

Scott and Leslie had decided not to sell their little house, which had belonged to his grandmother. They made it available to us for the nine months we were in Portland, so we had a home base and a nicely furnished house right in the middle of a beautiful neighborhood.

One day, Floyd called Reinhard in Graz, interested to hear how things were going.

“How are things going? Tell me the best and the worst.”

Reinhard thought about it. “Well, the worst. . .. I guess there is no worst. The best is that you left.”

They both laughed.

He continued, “After you left, people looked around, realized that you were gone, and they began to do all the things you had been doing. The church is growing, Bible studies are still running well, and things are good.”

We were so thankful to hear that.

Still Busy

Dear Mom,

Slowly it’s beginning to dawn on me, that if I wait until I have a huge block of time and the computer, I may never get to the letters again! So I am handwriting this letter.

Until three weeks ago, we were still living out of suitcases. Our friends, John Lennox and his wife and children, were here. They lived in our house (Scott and Leslie’s), and we lived with our dear friends, Hank and Sharon, for three weeks, so that the Lennoxes could have some privacy. John spoke at Eastgate – and probably other churches as well; I can’t remember. Hank took Floyd and John and Sally for an airplane ride over Mt. St. Helens. It turned out to be quite scary, as an updraft from the volcano tossed the plane into the air. We were glad they landed safely. Very memorable!]

We also had a week at a family camp in southern Oregon. After we finally moved back in to the house, we took off on a sailing trip in the San Juan Islands [again hosted by Hank and Sharon]. We island-hopped from Bellingham, WA to Victoria BC on Vancouver Island. The weather was lovely, and it just cost us our food because our friends invited us on their sailboat.

Erich and Michael are each playing on a city soccer team. They are above average in ability and fit in well. Floyd is coaching Michael’s team, and I do quite a bit of water-carrying and driving, so that keeps us busy. [The regular coach was tired and gave Floyd some help, but the boys lost every game. He celebrated each week with pizza to encourage them. He was able to teach them his theory: losing presents us with opportunities for learning things that we could not learn by winning. Most people in the world are not winners; if we don’t learn how to lose, we will never know how to relate to most of the people in the world.]

Because we are home schooling, Erich is able to teach a pre-school Bible class during the ladies’ morning Bible study. He earns good money and is also learning to teach the kids. He also does as much babysitting as he can. One mother said that she liked him better than a teenage girl for their son. I said, “Well, your son probably enjoys the attention of a big boy.”

“It’s not that,” she said, ”Erich’s the first babysitter who washed up the supper dishes!” He doesn’t really even need an allowance anymore!

March 1989 – The End of Our “Vacation”

Dear Mom,

You asked about how we could afford to travel as we do. We don’t have a choice always where we would like to go. We go to the places we are invited, and the churches give us an honorarium and/or pay for our travel expenses. We usually break even, but we are able to enjoy wherever we stay and the sights along the way

I’ve actually spoken at two ladies’ missionary conferences and have had to turn down an invitation to one in May in San Jose. One conference was last fall in Providence, Rhode Island, and the other was in Long Beach, California a couple months ago. The warm weather was wonderful! Both conferences were attended by about 120 women. My messages were planned to fit their topics. In both cases, my plane fare was paid and I also received an honorarium, which I splurged on fabric and sewing patterns for myself and the boys.

Traveling as we do has its advantages, but there are plenty of difficult things too: strange beds, other people’s foods (awkward with all the allergies I have), chatting sometimes with people who are difficult to talk to, keeping the boys happy when they’re tired of strangers. Long Beach was so smoggy that I got a headache. Rhode Island in October was gorgeous.

While Floyd was conducting meetings around the Pacific Northwest and beyond, I was home-schooling the boys. We needed to get their English reading and writing skills up to grade level before they entered the English-speaking school in Vienna. Besides soccer, Michael was taking piano lessons, Erich was working on guitar, and they were both learning to type on a computer program. Erich picked an NFL football team – the San Francisco 49ers – to follow for the year, and they won the Super Bowl! Floyd had also found me a writing class at the local community college so I could find out if the historical novel I wanted to write was worth writing. The time in Portland flew by, the boys improved their English skills, students in my writing class encouraged me to continue writing my novel, Floyd was itching to return to leading evangelistic Bible studies, and it was time to get back to Austria.

Sometime during our time in Portland, Floyd had driven the air-conditioned car to Texas and picked up our now-repaired banged-up station wagon. We needed something a bit larger, however, for the return trip across the States. We found a bigger station wagon and left Portland the middle of May. We had seen the south; now we would see the north. Floyd set up meetings in churches, and along the way we were able to visit national parks and other sights of interest. We again made the trip a learning experience for the boys, while Floyd preached and we shared with believers what we had done in Graz and what we hoped to do in Vienna. When we got to New Jersey, we gave the car to CMML to give to the next missionary.

We Never Saw It Coming: An Introduction to Christian Missions (textbook)

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