Coming Up For Air - A New Year's Letter From Us to You

 

If any year felt like treading water, it was 2020. I don't have to explain that to any of you. You can relate to many of the exact same things we have gone through: missing family, canceled plans, indefinitely delayed trips, unknown future, worry, stress, and still trying to maintain a stable life for our family. Throw the normal end-of-the-year rush on top of that, and the title of this post probably makes a lot of sense to you. Turtles can survive a fair amount of time under water. God made them that way, and He sustains us through these "underwater" seasons as well. Much of the last year felt a bit like drowning. Jesus has been there the whole time reminding us who holds us when the waves are crashing in. 

A big difference in our experience of the last few months from yours is that we live on an island that has stayed relatively covid-free. We have the occasional imported case with new arrivals, but they are quarantined and St Kitts remains safe. That means that we can do things like: gather for holidays, head to the beach with friends, game nights, and church (even though masks and some distance are required). We have not been able to update you since September because our days have been full of ministry, family, and life! Now that the New Year has begun, we knew we better let you know all that has been going on around here as we "come up for air" and remember these last few months.

CCM

As many of you know, Caribbean Christian Fellowship has partnered with Christian Community Mission to help support their food and clothing drives. We have had the privilege to tag along for delivery days. We get to meet some of the families that receive food, share the gospel with them, and pray over them. CCF takes donations of non-perishable food items to help fill up the bags of food. 

Our CCF family also always steps up to donate clothes and household items! Every week someone brings a bag to church. Which ends in a mountain of things being delivered for the CCM clothing drives!

Mary is the president of CCM and does such an amazing job being the hands and feet of Jesus here in St Kitts!

CCF

Our church had a really sweet moment when we got to baptize our sister Kiwi. She publicly proclaimed her faith in Jesus and has been growing in her relationship with Him since. We are so blessed to have her in our church family!

 We launched CCF Kids at the end of August and it has been really cool to watch it grow and develop.

I am not usually one to enjoy kids ministry if I'm being honest. However, God is really giving me joy in planning for it, and in teaching His word to this precious kids. Our little group represents 3-4+ countries between them! It is so much fun to hear their questions and watch their eyes light up when they "get" something new about God. 

We have finally moved back to recording the sermon on Sunday mornings! The service can be accessed on Facebook or on our YouTube page typically by late Sunday afternoon each week. 

Thanksgiving

Every year CCF has held a Thanksgiving dinner. As the church body has shifted to have less Americans, we weren't sure if it was still the right directions. What we discovered is that our church family from all over the world really enjoyed the Thanksgiving tradition. This year we endeavored to highlight and celebrate the many different cultures represented. The beautiful thing about giving thanks to God is that it has nothing to do with nationality, but everything to do with remembering what He has done for us. So our Kittitian-American-Canadian-Finnish-British-Surinamese-Russian-Anguillian-Puerto Rican Thanksgiving was just that - a sweet meal with amazing friends while thanking God for getting us to this point.

We also toasted to CCF's 10 year anniversary and our family's 4 years island-iversary!

Christmas

We wanted to include the kiddos in as much of the annual Candlelight Christmas Service as possible. The week before, we talked about the story of Jesus's birth and decorated paper ornaments.

We used the ornaments to help decorate for the Candlelight service! We also had the kids record themselves reading passages from Isaiah and Luke to tell the Christmas story. The recordings we woven between our carols and worship songs for the evening service. They were all excited to see themselves on the screen!

This day is one of my very favorites every year. It's so beautiful, and I usually end up crying while praising God for sending us Jesus. This year was not an exception. 

CR

Celebrate Recovery has been moving along. We miss our classes in the prison and the juvenile detention centre. Our community class has been small, but that enabled us to see 2 more 12 step graduates! Marlo and Carlos* have worked so hard over the last year and few months. God has done some wonderful things in their lives, and they are continuing to grow in Him. We are incredibly grateful for their friendship and their leadership/service with CR.

*Names and photos shared with permission

Goodbyes

One of the losses of 2020 has been friends who no longer have reasons to stay on the island. Dean's buddy Axel (on the left) headed back home with his parents. We had gotten very close with their family, so it was hard on all of us to say goodbye. Another one of his friends, Daksh (unpictured), moved away to a different island. We are so grateful that we went through mission training and learned about saying healthy goodbyes! Dean really misses his friends, but we are helping him work through that process.

Saying goodbye is not new for us. At least 3 times a year we send students and other church family off to new adventures around the world. This December we had to say goodbye to Celina, Tori, and are preparing to say goodbye to Kenrick (who has served on CCF leadership for more years than we have been on this island). We love each one of these people, and goodbye was not/will not be easy.

Sometimes goodbye is extra hard. Tori was one of those friends who didn't just love me well, but loved our whole family well. She became "Auntie Tori" to our kids, spent time in our home, and blessed us with her heart and kindness over and over. 

I am so glad that we have technology to stay connected, and that we know we will spend eternity with each other when that time comes. But there is still a huge hole in our island family without Tori here!

Finally Seeing My Parents

Like many people around the world, covid has kept us indefinitely separated from our family back in the US. Our boarders finally opened in November, but with very strict quarantine guidelines in place. So strict that we are still not able to practically travel, and most of our family still cannot come here. My parents decided to try. After two canceled flights, a canceled hotel reservations, late approval, and almost being sent home from the airport in Knoxville, they finally made it to St Kitts to visit! 

As per St Kitts mandates, upon arrival my parents headed straight to their hotel for a two week "vacation in place." This meant they would be restricted to certain areas of the resort and no close contact with us. We rushed to greet them, and did our best from about 30 feet away. There were tears and smiles and lots of waving.

We found the closest allowed spot to "have dinner together" on their second day here. That same night my parents got bad news; two passengers from their flight had arrived with symptoms, been re-tested, and were positive for covid. This turned their vacation-in-place into 12 days of room-bound isolation. 

The time passed pretty quickly. After a whole day of waiting on their test results, we raced over to pick them up when the negative results were confirmed. We had10 months of being separated, so now we didn't want to let each other go!

We celebrated Addalyn's 12th birthday all together!

Went out for a Halcomb family traditional "fancy Christmas dinner"

 and spent a few days in Nevis on vacation together.

We celebrated Christmas with them. Another Halcomb family tradition is to have a "birthday party for Jesus" so we made cupcakes! Then we spent time sharing what we wanted to "give Jesus" this year in our lives.

If you look at the legs, you can tell that Dean is smack dab in the middle!

The worst part of every visit - saying goodbye. We hugged, cried, thanked God for the time we had, and hoped for the next time we can be together. Even though goodbyes are the worst, it was 100% worth it because of the time we got all together! We miss the rest of our family deeply, and we are looking forward to when we can be in person with everyone once again. We are trusting Jesus with that, and we will wait to see what will happen with covid, boarders, quarantines, and mandates in the next months.

Island Life

Besides that, life has been usual in many ways. The kids started back to school after a month-long Christmas break.

We got to go to a concert with two of our best friends, Shackila and Marlo. It was really fun!

A bit unusual, but due to not traveling we have learned all about shipments and mailing things in. This was a sweet care package from precious friends, John and Kristen, full of goodies we have missed!

Dean began piano lessons. He loves music and is excited to learn!

Monkeys, monkeys everywhere. Over 50,000! Still pretty cool to see them running around. Much less cool if they are running off with fruit from our yard though. I'm developing more of a local attitude towards them as that happens.

Our pets, Dandelion and Clover, love their sweet island existence. Their days are filled with barking at stray dogs, catching lizards, and basking in the sun.

Thanks for catching up with us and all God is doing here! It is a HUGE privilege to serve with CR and CCF in St Kitts. How are you doing? Let us know! We miss you all very much.

Love,

The Comers