On our way to Lesotho!

We’re on our way to Lesotho!

Seven months have flown by and it is time to say farewell and head to Lesotho. It is one of the hardest things we have to deal with as cross cultural missionaries. Seems like we are always saying farewell. We are thankful that God promises to give us the daily grace to make it through each day of packing, saying farewells, and traveling. It has been so good to be here to be with family, meet some of the newest members of our extended family, welcome new people into the family through marriage, and just enjoy the beauty of Michigan. We’ve been blessed to have a house (Clarksville Bible Church mission house) just 2 blocks from Larry’s parents for the past 7 months.

Our family is about to be spread around the world. Megan is in the middle of her semester studies in Senegal, West Africa. She is loving the West African climate, the people, her new friends, and the studies. We’ll see her next May in Lesotho, then she’s off to Vietnam for a second semester abroad. She loves new languages, new cultures, new people, and life in general…

Adam is half way through his year working at Miriam’s House/AmeriCorp in DC. Last weekend we visited him and got to walk the George Washington University campus where he will do his MPH/Physicians Assistant study program (begins this August). It was exciting to be there, see the facilities (only 5 blocks from the Capital), eat some great food, visit some of the Smithsonian museums, and most of all, just hang out. He has some really exciting times ahead of him. We continue to pray that many people will be impacted by his love and compassion for the hurting and disadvantaged/disenfranchised.

Kelly’s enjoying her time at Taylor University in Indiana with her growing entourage of friends. She hasn’t fully decided on her focus of studies, but is doing a great job getting her basics in. When you grow up in Uganda, you don’t get to start driving like you do here in the US. Our mission doesn’t allow kids to drive our vehicles so her first experience was last July! The great news is that she got her Michigan driving license this Christmas break. Her day for her driving test turned out to be a small Michigan blizzard but she endured it and passed. We’ll leave the car that Adam had with Kelly so she can carry on the Pepper tradition of road trips. Adam is busy convincing her and some friends to plan a trip to DC soon.

It has been good to be here in the US the past months. As we look back we see God’s hand in the timing of this stateside as it has allowed us to be near excellent medical facilities when Sally had retinal tears that needed expert care, and for Larry’s dad in his varied medical issues. Although we had not planned on spending so much time in ERs/hospitals/doctors offices, it was God’s plan and we are grateful to have been here. Mom is doing really well and Dad continues to improve emotionally and physically. We have learned that recovery from depression is a long slow process. They continue to live in their home for now.

As you might expect, we do have a few ‘unknowns’ in our life right now. As of today, we don’t have a house in Maseru, Lesotho. Our team there is looking and we know that God will provide. We have a shipping container of our things that we packed in Uganda, but can’t ship it until we have an address and work permit in Lesotho. The same applies to our crate that we packed here in Michigan. We’re not really sure what the first weeks in Lesotho will entail besides beginning to learn a new culture and new language (Sesotho – a Bantu language). Although we have a number of ‘unknowns’, we are at peace in our hearts because we know that we serve a living God who does know all things, is working out things for our good and his glory. In addition, the amazing blessings we have seen in the past that were based upon his promises, his person, and his graces will be there fresh each morning as we go through the coming weeks.

Thanks for praying for us and for God’s work in Lesotho. We’ll make the next update from Leso