Our first international Marriage Mission! Brad and Brittney took us to Will Rogers Airport early Sunday morning. We flew to Minneapolis where we had a six hour layover. We stepped out of our comfort zone and left the airport in Minneapolis to take the Light Rail to the Mall of America. You can see our pictures from lunch at Bubba Gump’s Shrimp Co. (Richard’s choice) at our FB page.
At 3:20, we boarded the plane that would take us all the way to Amsterdam. It was a 7.5 hour flight that though uneventful (which is just what you want) seemed to last 10 hours. Richard slept more. JeannaLynn slept more comfortably. We both watched The Social Network on the flight. Use the comments to tell us what you thought of that movie.
We arrived in Amsterdam on time. Had a three hour layover that gave us plenty of time to go through the European security, get to our gate, sit in some comfortable reclining chairs, watch the sunrise, and talk about our excitement before the final flight.
Ilia and Juozas met us at the airport with hugs and smiles. They are the two ministers for the church in Vilnius. It’s funny. We tend to think of them as missionaries – and in truth we are all missionaries just as we are all ministers. Here, however, the traditional sense of “missionary,” that’s us; not them. They are the guys that serve Christ in this city.
They took us to our hotel. The Congress in the center of the city. The manager of the Congress gave us a good rate on a business room. It is not as good a rate as we would have gotten two months ago when we first started talking about this trip and looking at rates, but it is a nice room. The air (condition as they call it) is off because it is not fully into Spring, so we opened the windows to get the cool in. The temperature when we arrived was in the 50s.
We freshened up and took a two hour jet-lag correction – sometimes called a nap. Ilia and his wife Daiva picked us up for dinner. Juozas and his wife and daughter (Zivile and Tia) met us at the restaurant. All seven of us enjoyed our dinner and our time of conversation. We told them a lot of our story and they listened with interest and had a lot of questions. They told us some of their stories and we listened with interest and lot had a lot of questions. Have you ever noticed that all of us have fascinating stories! Really, all of us.
We (R and JL) took a 4 block walk, getting a cup of coffee at McDonalds along the way, and got back to our room feeling the effects of jetlag, but excited for Tuesday. BTW, it is 12:30 pm on Tuesday as we write. There is an 8 hour difference between European Summer Time and Central Daylight Time.
Grace and Peace!
Thanks for keeping us posted. We are very excited about and interested in your work there. You are in our prayers. Love to you both!