The Tension

Life has been crazy busy and once again blogging fell below the "must do" line.  The end of the school year brought exams and extra papers to grade, Alex had extra projects and exams, Scott was cramming to finish the language exam, and then as soon as all that was over it was time to end the ministry year.  Spanish schools don't let out until the end of June so the ministry year ends at the end of June as well.  This brought the end of English club and VBS and of course in true Spanish fashion, many despedidas (goodbye celebrations).  The day after VBS ended Scott and Alex left to go north to work with some teammates and a friend from the states arrived for some girl time.  Can't believe that July is now almost over!

Things are different in Spain in regards to summer ministries.  I am so accustomed to things picking up pace in the summer at the churches in the states.  There are camps, and cook outs, and VBS, and play days, and the list goes on and on.  But here, summer brings things to a slow pace.  The temperatures rise incredibly (100+ is not uncommon) and the majority of homes and churches have no or limited air condition.  This means get your errands/work done first thing in the morning and then chill for the rest of the day.

For us, this has meant time to have some one-on-one time with new friends, time to reconnect as a family, and do some planning for fall activities and ministries.  It also means a time for a family vacation.  And this is where the tension begins to be felt and why I have been slow in blogging lately.

We are incredibly blessed to be serving in Spain.  We know we are only here because of generous donors who sacrificially give each month.  We feel that burden of being faithful to each penny that is given and each prayer that is breathed.  We feel the importance of being wise stewards of every moment and every penny.  And we regularly question ourselves to know if we are. 

And yet we also know that if are not careful we can burnout, we can fall apart as a family, or we get physically sick.  We know that we need time together where we are not working and can laugh and cry and talk about things that are not work.  But are we letting down our supporters when we take time out to do this?  How much time is acceptable?  How do we meet the expectations of 125 families who sacrificially give each month and maintain life as needed here in Spain?  Do we share or do we not share our daily life?  Should we talk about only ministry and hide our downtime?    Do we only share successes and not our failures or struggles?

I sure wish there was a magic answer!