Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!  May your celebrations have been ones that focus on the most amazing gift that was ever given.

The new year is a good time to look both back at what God’s done the last year and forward at the year to come. Let me start by looking forward:

Looking forward:
Next week I plan on moving to Senegal in this continued “in between time.”  (Look Senegal up on Google Maps if you don’t know where it is.)  Shortly after my arrival I will be learning and helping at an “Advanced Language Workshop,” where those of us serving in West Africa learn more about discourse analysis and how figuring that stuff out is important in clearly communicating the gospel and clearly translating the Word of God.  After that, some of the things that are on the docket are the following:

• Train a co-worker in People Group Assessment
• Help others with the linguistics on the languages that they’re learning
• Finish my own Discourse write-up on the Jula language so that I can be better equipped to help others in discourse “stuff”
• Write my thesis (that’s all that’s left for my master’s degree in linguistics!)
• Start to learn Wolof, one of the main languages of Senegal
• Continue to stay in touch with friends in My Country as I can
• Help out in other ways as needs appear
• And I’m sure that there will be many other things that I can’t even imagine at this point in time! 🙂

How long will I be there?  I don’t know.  At least a few months, but maybe years or decades.  It’s a good thing God knows what He’s doing!

Looking back:
Here are a few highlights from 2019:

• Spending unexpected time with family and friends in the US (you know who you are!)
• Some fun travels around the US and the world, some of which are hinted at below
• Teaching a People Group Assessment (PGA) class at Ethnos360 Bible Institute
• Going on a PGA trip in Guinea and Guinea-Bissau
• Attending my first ever linguistics conference – in France
• Continuing grad school (in linguistics) in North Dakota
• Preparing for and going on a linguistics consulting trip in Germany and another country
• Visiting friends during a short visit to My Country!
• Helping and learning at a language-learning course in Southeast Asia
• Working on my Jula discourse write-up so that I can be better prepared to help others in linguistics.

Thank you so much to all of you who have made this year of unknowns and adventures possible – through your prayers, your finances, your encouragement, and your friendship!

Though 2019 didn’t look anything like I would have planned, I’ve been able to continue to see God’s fingerprints in my life and my plans as reminders that He’s still in control.  May we all continue to trust and follow Him where He leads, even though He often only shows us one step at a time – isn’t that what living by faith is all about anyway?