Visible Pain

We live on a small post.  I'm not good with numbers...but it's small.  This past week a majority of the 173rd deployed.  It is a very visible pain.

The Lord saw fit to keep Timothy behind and we couldn't be more grateful for that blessing!  We just surpassed his one year mark returning home from his last deployment and if you haven't heard already, we are expecting baby #4!

It has been really hard to watch everyone go.  It has been even harder to watch the families left behind struggle through the first few days.  My heart hurts for them.  Tears have been shed for them.  It seems everywhere you turn there is someone else who's husband just left. 

In our three deployments I don't think we have ever felt the weight of a deployment like we do now.  For the first, we were only dating/engaged and I was no where near his post.  The second..I was in OK, he deployed out of TX.  At that time, I only knew one other woman who's husband deployed.  Our deployments overlapped for a bit, so we spent a lot of time together for a while.  :)  The most recent, back in Texas it was more of a reality.  There were many other ladies of the church that we went to who's husbands were military and they had either just come off a deployment or were going into a deployment within the next year. 

This past week not everyone was deployed, but out of the friends we have made so far, and the soldiers that have been coming over on the weekends...they have all gone.  All but one...and he leaves within the next two weeks. :( 

Again, I'm not great with numbers, but with the Unit that just left, and another Unit that is already gone, and one more about to leave, I would say it's safe to say that a majority of the post that is left are wives and children.

Even the chapel was more barren than normal this past Sunday and there seemed to be an unspoken weight that surrounded the morning.

In PWOC we have been going thru the Basic Series by Francis Chan.  This past week was the video on Fellowship and what God intended it to be; demonstrated in the early church.  There was a topic interwoven through the morning though that was obviously only orchestrated by God Himself.  Lonliness.  In a post this small, so far away from everything that is "familiar", a lot of women tend to pull into themselves and struggle with isolation and lonliness.  Add on top of that a deployment. 

For me, this truth seemed to cry out this past week.  The pain that is so real to this post became much more evident.

The pain is visible in the faces of the wives left behind. The wound is deep. In the last five days alone three new faces/names of women have been laid heavy on my heart as the Lord has revealed them to me. They are hurting. They are struggling.  They are crying out psalms of desperation.  Some are Christians.  Some of them are not.

Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun:

I saw the tears of the oppressed—
and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors—
and they have no comforter.  -Ecclesiastes 4:1

My heart wishes to take their pain away.  How can I possibly be a friend to all of them?!  How can I possibly serve all of them?!  But as another friend said recently in her blog, "I am not their Savior."  He is.  Such a great reminder that nothing I do for these women is as great as what He can give them.  Generally speaking, I can provide dinner, a playdate, and a listening ear.  He can provide a peace that surpasses all understanding (Phil 4:7).  He IS the great comfortor.  He is the great sustainer!

The Son (Jesus) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him.  He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (OUR SUSTAINER!)  And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,  and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. -Colossians 1:15-20

There is nothing greater than to be securely held in the arms of our Creator!

I just pray that we would be able to create a fellowship with everyone the Lord leads our way; leaving them more deeply aware of the Savior that He is.

For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being,  so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love,  may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge —that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. -Ephesians 3:14-21

 Even though my husband is here, I believe my heart will continue aching and I will be praying just as ferevently as the rest for the next 9 months to pass quickly!

To Deploy or Not To Deploy?

That has been the question of late!

If you remember, the morning after we arrived in Germany we were informed that Tim's Unit would be deploying in June.  Around March time frame they announced that not everyone from the Unit would be going.  Before they could say who was going, and who was staying, they needed to receive their mission specific orders so they would know who they needed to take.

For the last two months we have received a different answer almost every week.  One week it even changed three times within 24 hours!  As a result, Tim's B Bag (his duffel with some of his gear) was loaded onto the connex and shipped to the desert with everyone else's.  The next day he was told there was miscommunication about the MOS needed and he wasn't going.  That was about three weeks ago and since then the "message" we have gotten is that he is not going.

All the other soldier's have received their shots and cleared medical.  Tim didn't go.  All the other soldiers who are deploying started wearing their multi-cam uniforms to work last week.  (Nauseating to see in itself.)  Tim didn't.

While we are grateful for the opportunity for him to stay home we have struggled with alternate feelings like we are skimping out on a duty.  It is strange to have all of Tim's soldiers deploying; yet he is staying behind.  Don't get me (us) wrong.  We want Tim to stay.  We want to be a whole family unit.  Yet, there is something about being part of the Army and being called to a mission that brings up within you a sense of honor and duty that makes you want to serve as an active participant.  (At least for us!)  It has been a new/different circumstance that we are still trying to find a way to balance out our thoughts/feelings about it.

I know that there are a few other families that have been counting on Tim staying behind so that if something comes up they will have someone to call.  With Tim staying behind we hope to give the support to the other families that I/we received in abundance in Texas during Tim's last deployment.  While the situation has been different I know that the Lord is in charge and He has a plan and a purpose and that we can be a useful tool to serve those here in hopes to bring glory to Him.  We are coming to understand that our role in this deployment might be different than the last few.

All that being said...Another soldier came by the house at 12:45 PM this past Saturday and informed Tim that he is back on for deployment.  By the time you read this we are about one week out from them leaving.  This past week we have been doing our best for preparing for another deployment, but still with no 100% confirmation and no forward movement (from what it seems).  The only other thing we found out is that he would be in charge of a gun-truck, instead of working on vehicles.  This piece of news in itself gave myself a little throw-back to his first deployment and I could feel my heart starting to race thinking about it.  Throughout the week my mind would wonder, creating visions, bringing fear, and having to pray myself back to the reality of the moment.

Around 6 PM last night, Tim received a phone call from someone else and after asking around yesterday, he was told that Tim is NOT going.  (Keep in mind everytime we have heard anything "new" it has not come from the same person.  Not once.)


We've been "going with the flow" so far, but my emotions are starting to catch up with me.  And while I want to believe this, I'm not sure I can!!!  I want to hear it straight from the horse's mouth!  Not sure who that is though.

Sometimes it's so hard to wait for "the next step", to know how to prepare for what's coming.  Yet, I am reminded and comforted by the fact that my God knows.  He's known all along.   

"Do you know how God controls the clouds and makes his lightning flash?"  -Job 37:15

My God who can control the clouds, is more than capable of orchestrating this next season of our lives.  We are prepared to serve in whatever way he leads us, I just wish He would make it clear to the Army what He has already chosen for us!  :) 

The 173rd Battalion Ball

On May 31st, Tim and I attended our 2nd Ball.  The first one we went to was right after his 1st Deployment and we weren't even married yet.  I was completely nervous and uncomfortable at the 1st and we went more for the sake of making an apperance.  We stayed for 10, maybe 15 minutes.

Since then, Tim has either been able to get out of them, or the Unit that he was with never had one.  Generally speaking, if you don't buy a ticket to go to the ball you (hubby that is) is put on duty to work at the ball.  A lot of husbands will go by themselves, but not stay all night, just to get out of the duty.  Sometimes it can be hard/expensive to find a dress/childcare and buy the tickets.  Tim going by himself was an option for us at one point.  The week they were selling tickets they had made an announcement during one of the formations that since the FRG had some extra funds they were going to sell the tickets at a discounted price.  This is where Tim decided to share, OUT LOUD, "I don't care about the tickets!  I've got three kids!  I can't afford childcare."  Or something to that affect.  The next day they came back and said that the FRG would cover the cost of childcare for the whole company.

At that point we kind of felt obligated to go.  :) 

I started searching for dresses.  Everything local was too expensive.  The cheapest I came across was $230 Euro!  That's over $300 US Dollars!!  I had some friends help me out and we went shopping online.  Long story short, I ordered two dresses and one of them fit better than the second needing only minor alterations in the straps.

 

The ball itself didn't go quite as planned.  First...I haven't been able to wear my contacts since we've been here.  I almost immediately start getting a headache once I put them in.  I had recently seen the doctor and he said that my eyes aren't producing enough oil or something.  I had been treating the problem for a week and was hoping that "today was going to be the day"!  Thursday morning I woke up with my right eye all red/swollen from allergies.  Bubble burst for me.  (I snuck my glasses off for the picture though!) 

Secondly...Tim was supposed to get off early on Thursday, and then have Friday off.  That Monday, he got slotted for a class that was scheduled for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.  We had originally hoped to get a few pics outside before the ball as well.  Tim didn't get home till about 5 PM and we were supposed to drop the boys off at the CDC between 5:30-5:45.  No time for pics.  Once we did get there everything was running late so we had to stand around for a while (but I didn't bring my camera with me).  Thankfully Tim's Chaplain and his wife were there so I had someone to chat with for a bit.  With Tim having to work on Friday, and Ryan having school we left even earlier than we had planned.  I think we left around 8:30 PM and they had JUST started serving dinner.  We came home got the boys in bed and had frozen pizza.  :)

Ryan was able to snap the one picture above for us once we got home.  :) 

 

I would be lying if I didn't say I was a bit disappointed with the way it turned out.  Maybe next time one comes around we will get to stay for dinner!  I think we will do our best to find an at-home babysitter as well.  As nice as it was to have the FRG cover the cost, we both agreed that it would have been more settling to know that they were at home and in bed.  All in all, our 2nd Ball was much better than our 1st!