God Turns Our Mourning Into Dancing

It's been a very difficult 2 weeks for our family.  I've been needing to update the blog but not really wanting to.  Our family lost our precious 29 year old nephew, John C. Flach Jr. (JC), in a tragic accident on September 6th.  He leaves behind grieving parents, a brother, a fiance (they were to be married in November), grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, a race team, and so many friends and business associates.  J was a successful mechanical engineer in the family business.  He was an excellent stock car driver and achieved his first win this summer.  He was treasured by so many people that the viewing lasted 8 hours!  As the funeral procession made its way through town the entire local Ford dealership lined the road in honor of J.  This tragedy has taught me the meaning of the word "surreal".  It's the only word I've been able to find to describe the past 2 weeks.  Our entire extended family has rallied around JC's immediate family.  But this is a long road for them, for all of us, and it holds no answers this side of heaven.  We take comfort in knowing that JC knew the Lord, so we know we will see him again one day.  But that doesn't make life any easier here and now.  I keep thinking that since we're all appointed a time to be born and a time to die, as it says in Scripture, then maybe we should each come with an expiration date stamped on us.  How much differently we would all live, how much differently we would treat each other, if we really knew each others expiration date?  Life here on earth really isn't about life here on earth.  But we get so wrapped up in it:  what to cook for dinner, what will I wear today, what will we do this weekend, and on and on we go never giving a thought to eternity.  I don't have the answers, but I know who does.  Will we get the answers to the questions we ask?  Probably not this side of eternity.  And I'm not really sure if any answer to the "why?"question would be good enough for any of us anyway.  Since the first night of this nightmare I've been asking the Lord to show me what we're to do with this?  Because of my intimate relationship with my Lord, I take Him at His Word.  I know He is good, I know He is God and that I am not, I know He works all things together for good (however I've been asking Him to show me how this could have good come from it).  He has been giving little glimpses of good.  One way is by how this tragedy has brought so many people together, especially the family.  

 I've been reading through the New Testament, and the other morning I came across Hebrews 2:14-16 - Since the children have flesh and blood, He too shared in their humanity so that by His death He might break the power of him who holds the power of death - that is the devil - and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.  This scripture was powerful to me.  God created man without death as part of the plan.  Adam and Eve lived a perfect, disease free, stress free, death free life...that is until sin entered the picture.  But the devil, in his power (he has power, but he does not have authority), brought death to mankind in 2 ways:  1-when he tempted Eve and she sinned, physical death entered the world (the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is life eternal).  And by the way, I'm not saying that our sin is the reason why we die.  I'm saying that because of the fall of man, way back in the garden, death became a part of life on earth. For up until the fall of man there was no death, disease, or suffering.  The devil has power and his plan is to steal, kill, and destroy.  2-With physical death, spiritual death also came - sin separates us from God.  This is Satan's goal.  But God is all powerful and has all authority, so He did an over-ride.  He sent Jesus to break the power of the devil and death.  Jesus made the way for us to have eternal life where there is no sickness, pain, suffering, darkness, or death.  Now we have eternal life - living forever with God which was God's original plan.  So we get life, eternal life...with God.  Life on earth is not about life on earth, it's about eternity.  It all makes me realize that life should be lived with eternity in mind because that's real life.  Well, that's what the Lord has been "down-loading" into me.

God loves us.  We live in a fallen world where we are guaranteed pain and suffering, but God is good because we don't have to go through it alone.  And we have the promise of eternity.  And yes, I did say God is good.  He knows exactly what we need when we need it.  For on September 19th, a very special baby boy was born into the Flach family.

Deegan JC Nichols

My niece Jessica (JC's cousin) and her husband Jimmy blessed our family with this precious little bundle.  He's the first great-grandchild for my in-laws, our first great-nephew, and a special gift that has brought us some joy and dancing in the midst of the heartache and grief.  And as you can see, he's already a race fan - he's sporting on that tiny little hat JC's number:  77J.

If you patiently read this post all the way to here, I would ask you to keep in prayer my brother-in-law and sister-in-law (JC's parents) John and Liz Flach, Keith Flach (JC's brother), and Nicholl (JC's fiance).  Thank you.

School's In Session

We took the kids to the Columbia County Fair for a final summer hurrah.  My parents joined us and we had Curtis, Sierra, Andrii, Anna, Jordan, and Slava. 

Jordan & Anna on the swings.

Slava loved the rides!

Jordan, Slava & a Police Dog.

 Jordan is obsessed with becoming a police officer.  Much to his delight the State Police had a nice exhibit at the fair.

SCHOOL IS IN SESSION!

And I am so thankful for the freedom to educate our children at home!

Studious Sierra

 Sierra is dual-enrolled at home and at Liberty University this year.  She's doing 11th grade at home and is a year ahead at that.  Her subjects are:  English 101 (LU), Biology 101 with Lab (LU), Algebra 1 (again), and American History using "America:  Covenant & Calling" by Peter Marshall Ministries.  Peter Marshall wrote the books "The Light and the Glory,"  "Sounding Forth the Trumpet," and "From Sea to Shining Sea."  His daughter, a friend of mine, wrote this new curriculum.  On top of academics, Sierra has weekly piano lessons, Karate, a baby sitting job, a part-time job at her uncle's laundromat/dry cleaners, Missionettes, and Youth Group.  Yup, I'm tired just typing it!

Happy Students:  Slava, Andrii, and Anna.

 Andrii is in 9th grade and is doing Saxon Algebra 1, Mystery of History (world history), for English he's doing a combo of:  Learning Language Arts Through Literature, Total Language Plus, and 180 Daily Grammar Lessons.  For science he's doing God's Design for the Physical World/Machines & Motion.  In addition to his academic subjects he goes weekly to Fife & Drum, Royal Rangers, Youth Group, and will be working 1 day a week for his grandfather.

Anna is in 6th grade.  I just had to explain to her that she has not been held back (which she was telling her friends), but she started late.  It's this thing that happens when you come to the U.S. at age 7 and can't speak English yet...you have to start from the beginning.  Sigh.  Anna is a good student, but things don't come all that easy for her.  She's doing Saxon Math 7/6, Mystery of History, Exploring Creation with Zoology, and for English:  Easy Grammar, Total Language Plus, and Spelling Power.  She's also doing Growing in Wisdom a Character Concepts study.  During the week she also has Karate, Flagging, Missionettes, and this year she can start Youth Group.

Jordan is in 2nd Grade

 Jordan is doing Saxon Math 2, A Beka's Letters & Sounds and Language, A Reason For Spelling, Hand Writing Without Tears' Cursive (his idea), Exploring Creation With Zoology, and for history/geography I'm doing a study with both little boys on the 50 states.  Also with both Jordan and Slava I'm doing Character Concepts as our daily Bible Study.  Weekly Jordan will also go to Royal Rangers and Karate.

Slava & Anna

 Slava is very excited about doing school.  He's an official Kindergartner this year!  He is doing Saxon Math K, A Beka's Letters and Sounds and Kindergarten Readiness book, and an Activity Book by Christian Liberty Press.  Slava will be doing Zoology, 50 States, and Character Concepts with Jordan.  He too does Royal Rangers and Karate weekly.

Slava & Jordan doing puppets.

Anna got the little boys doing puppets which was really cute.  Two of the puppets were Wayne Jr. and Kerri (they did a lot of kissing....hmmmm).

Pretty much the little boys do school, go run and play, do some more school, jump on the trampoline, do school, ride bikes, etc.  Basically if they were stuffed in public school they'd be pumped with meds...no thank you.  Plenty of hands on activities and tons of patience for mom (pray for me please) and we do pretty good.

With the big kids we're finishing up a Bible study that we'd started last year which I love.  It's called "What We Believe Volume 3 - Who Is My Neighbor? And Why Does He Need Me? by John Jay and David Webb.  Previously we did Volume 1 - Who Is God? And Can I Really Know Him? and Volume 2 - Who Am I?  And What Am I Doing Here?  Like I said before, I'm so thankful for the freedom to home educate our children.  It's important to us for them to have a Biblical worldview.  Each year I ask the Lord to give me a Scripture for our school year.  This year He gave me Colossians 2:6-7:

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord,

continue to live your lives in Him,

rooted and built up in Him,

strengthened in the faith as you were taught,

and overflowing with thankfulness.