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I want to spend some time in this blog post unpacking what I’ve felt, what I’ve learned, and what I’ve found here in the past almost 3 months since I came to Albania. I really can’t believe time has gone by so fast. There’s so much to do, and so many new friends that it’s never boring. Is this what I want to do with the rest of my life? I can’t answer that yet. But I have met so many people here who have devoted their lives to missions. Is it worth it to do so? They would answer unequivocally yes. ...

What a great weekend! This weekend we had some visitors from Dallas. Rick Howard, the missions pastor for Watermark, and Cheryl Boyd came to visit. It was great to see them, to be encouraged by some friends from home. I’ve been looking forward to this for a while! Cheryl has been in Eastern Europe with CRU for 12+ years, and so she knew a lot of CRU staff here in Albania. She and Alma Elliot are great friends, and were super excited to see eachother. In all those years somehow she never made it to Albania, so this was a great chance for her to catch up with some of her old friends. ...

This week we had our first young-professionals meeting! We had 17 people come to hear Dennis Beck speak on worldview. He did a great job telling stories which got the participants to think. He has a talent for conveying these high concepts in story form. The discussion went well also. I sat at a table with a few young professionals. Two of them are believers from Fabi’s church. The other was Dejvis, with whom I’ve been building a relationship. He’s the manager of the Cinnabon franchise next to the American embassy. He really enjoys coming to our seminars when he’s not working, and often brings friends. ...

I’ve been in Albania now almost 3 weeks. Prior to now, the longest I’d ever been outside the US was 10 days. It definitely feels strange, knowing I’ll be here probably 6 or 7 more months before I make a trip back to Dallas. There’s a lot of things I’ve been missing - including having a clothes dryer and a dishwasher. I saw some pictures of friends going to the State Fair, and I felt a bit homesick. ...

Locked out! I managed to lock myself out of my EC2 instance when I was managing my keys. So in order to update my blog, I had to deploy it to a new EC2 instance. I decided to take the opportunity to improve the way I’m deploying new versions of my site. Note: This will be a technical post. If you’re following along with my adventure in Albania, you can skip this one. ...

I’m here! It’s just as I remember it. All the buildings, streets, people. It almost feels like a 2nd home. I arrived at 2:30pm, and was picked up by my team leader Illir Stavro. He dropped me off at my apartment, which I’m sharing with two new members of the high-school ministry team: Gedis and Pal. It’s a nice, small apartment. I have my own room, and there’s a living area with a couch and a small bathroom and kitchen. It’s different from what I’m used to but not too different. ...

Thanks to a good friend hosting an event last weekend, I have now reached my monthly goal! And I have some room to spare! I’m really thankful for everyone who’s contributed to help me. I’m excited to finalize my plans to begin this journey! Speaking of which, I bought my plane tickets today! First time I’ve ever bought a one-way flight. But it’s locked in now. I fly from Dallas to Washington D.C. on September 23, and I’ll fly from DC to Tirana on Sunday the 27th. ...

In less than 2 weeks, I’ll be in Albania :) This time just for 2 weeks, but I’m ready to go for good. But, all things in their time: There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace. Ecclesiastes 3:1 ...

So I wanted an app server. How hard could it be right? Well, not really that hard at all. I was tired of having a static site served by apache. I want to do some cool stuff with the google APIs, like maybe a form submit where the results end up in a google doc for me. To do that I need more than hugo’s static site generation. But I didn’t want to get rid of hugo because I like a lot of it’s features, so I added nodejs on top of it as the application server. ...

What is love? Is it just not hurting me, as the song goes? The scripture has a different definition of love. “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you. This I command you, that you love one another. John 15:12-17 ...