I believe that adversity is the testing ground for our faith in God. While not always a perfect analogy for our spiritual walk with God, the mountains hold a lot of opportunities, and challenges, for a young person to discover how to apply the faith they receive from God’s Word. This summer, we tested that theory.
Every season, we give the kids the choice of the sport or extra curricular activity they want to participate in. Once things started opening back up this summer, we asked Scottie, and he said that he wanted to try rock climbing. Still unsure about gyms and being around crowds, I proposed an alternative – let’s climb as many “14ers” as we can over the summer, slowly building up to rock climbing.
For our unacclimated friends, “14ers” are the mountain peaks in Colorado that stand over 14,000 feet above sea level. In the lower 48 states, there are 64 – 14,000+ foot peaks. Colorado alone has 53. The 14ers can range from basic walk-ups on established trails to serious rock climbing, but in every case, they are physically grueling, mentally demanding, and altogether dangerous for the inexperienced and unconditioned adult. In one summer, at the age of 10, Scottie climbed 18 – 14ers!
Now I wish I could say that I foresaw all the spiritual benefits that would result from such an experience. But I can’t. For example, there were times when there were falls, panic attacks or puking. (Among other things, alpine climbing requires waking up at 3AM or earlier, and spending sustained periods at altitudes with much less oxygen – resulting in these unpleasant side effects). Every time Scottie faced adversity, I would find out that he dealt with it by praying to God. I didn’t have to remind him in the moment, because he already knew that God could help him through his struggles! What a heart he has!
Certainly, there were many more positive aspects other than facing adversity. We had great father / son bonding time, where we could talk about anything that was on his mind. I believe that will persist for many years to come because of our time this summer. We also learned qualities such as patience toward each other and perseverance when faced with obstacles. We camped a lot, which I believe is one of the best experiences you can have to prepare for foreign missions, since it requires preparation, adaptability and “roughing it”. Altogether, I would say this experience was a valuable substitute to our previously planned trip to Asia. We are thankful to God for all of His beautiful creation and for the gift of fatherhood. You just can’t take for granted the time you have with your children and the opportunities you have to teach them about life and faith, through real experiences.
Preparing for Full-Time Foreign Ministry
While not climbing mountains, the Ihle Crew had two other summer experiences that are important for our training for future foreign ministry. The first was that I preached and taught Bible class every Sunday at congregations throughout the state. While preaching and teaching was not entirely new to me, the doing it every week was. This was important because it required me to learn the skills of planning lessons every week, studying Scripture more deeply and building a routine. This is giving us more confidence in our ability to do full-time ministry. In foreign missions, weekly lessons are just a small part of the ministry, but it does take a large amount of time in preparation. Starting the routine now will help us to be more efficient once we go out into the mission field.
The other new experience is homeschooling. Alexis made the brave new decision to home school the kids after our remote learning experience last spring.
Homeschooling is something we were considering anyways since education is an unknown factor in other countries. But the schools going remote really caused us to take a long hard look at it this summer. Here is what we found out… homeschooling has huge rewards, but it is also incredibly challenging! Just the process of planning out curriculum and schedule was a huge project. What we decided here was to piece meal different programs since you can find different companies have strengths in different subjects. Also, this allows us to tailor the subjects to Scottie and Samantha’s individual needs. On top of the common subjects, we have also added Chinese and Bible, which we are able to create and lead on our own. The reward is getting to be more intimately involved with our children and their growth. And they seem to be loving it so far!
New Semester of Classes
We are excited as we started a new semester of classes last week. We’re really looking forward to seeing what we can learn from God’s Word this semester. I’ll be taking classes in Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians, Personal Evangelism and Bible Geography. Alexis will be taking classes in the Godhead and Personal Evangelism. We will be taking classes over Zoom again, but our great teachers aren’t missing a beat! Plus, we still figure out how to get together to fellowship occasionally. Please continue to pray for us and for our journey. We are so grateful for your prayers, encouragement, and support.
Love,
-The Ihle Crew
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