Trip to the U.S.

Dear friends, today is a German holiday, "Karfreitag", all stores closed as with all national holidays. We had a worship service with communion this morning. While we were singing a wonderful old hymn, God reminded me of Good Friday in 1974. I had been a Christian for a long time, but I had fallen into a 3-year-long depression that had left me stifled and almost unable to live. Then on that Friday, God spoke to me through John 17. He touched my heart and soul and made me well again. That was 39 years ago, and I am still as thankful for this experience as back then. One blessing I got from having gone through this was that I can feel with people who go through such a time. I know the pressing darkness AND the rescuing light. And John 17 has always been special to me since then.

Last Monday, my dear friend Barbara's 84-year-old mother passed away. When my friend was planning her wedding 33 years ago, her mother was so opposed to her Christian faith that she told her daughter: If you invite Mark and Maria - I won't come to your wedding. I told my friend that a mother is more important at a wedding than friends. BUT a few week before the wedding, my friend's mom accepted Christ as her savior and personally invited us to the wedding. And now she was allowed to join the big feast in heaven.

These two thoughts followed me throughout this day and increased my thankfulness for the gift of salvation. Then I listened to Handel's Messiah and thanked God for giving this composer such wonderful music to write. The great Hallelujah topped it all!

Now to our travel plans. We booked a flight out of Basel for May 14, and this is how we would like to fill the 16 days in the US:

Wednesday, May 15: Saranac, MI

Thursday: back to Indiana to Mark's parents

Saturday: Doris' and Chad's graduation at Huntington University, IN, where Lisa is planning to join us, then on to Rockford, OH, where Chad's family lives.

Sunday night: McConnellsburg, PA, with Anna Richards (and the Hodges)

Monday, May 20: Beltsville, MD, to the Franks where Lisa lives. Cathrin will join us there for her 26th birthday. She will travel with us for a week.

Tuesday: Annapolis, MD, where we will stay with the Skinners.

Thursday, May 23: down south to Fayetteville, NC, where we will stay with Joan Bitterman and her family and be at Church of the Open Door.

Monday, May 27: up north to Kentucky where we will drop off Cathrin

Tuesday: back with Mark's parents.

Thursday, May 30: flight back to Basel.

If anyone would like to see us at one of these places, you now know where to find us.

This is a very short and tight trip, but we cannot get more time off from school. We are thankful that it is possible at all, especially considering the fact that Mark does not have to undergo radiation instead.

But we hope to see as many of you as possible in this short time and greet you in the name of our Risen Lord Jesus Christ, Maria Walker

Dear friends, just a short update:
Last Friday, Susi had her "hole patched", it turned out to be 20-22mm
wide instead of 13mm. So we are even more thankful that it was
possible to do this procedure through a vein without
open-heart-surgery. She was in the hospital for 48 hours and could
come home with me for a week of recuperation. She must have been born
with this problem, and it became more severe with time. Now for the
first time in over 30 years her heart pumps blood with enough oxygen
through her body! I was allowed to be with her in the "heart catheter"
room until she was fully asleep, and they called me in while she was
waking up.

Mark's MRI today showed no more cancer or unusual lymph nodes. Next
week he will see his urologist who will decide if anything (and what)
is necessary as follow-up.

Thank you for all prayers and encouraging emails/phone calls. God
answered these prayers the way we had asked for!
In Him, Maria Walker

Dear friends,
we are already through 1/6 of the new year! Time is flying fast!
I had meant to write sooner, but there have been some problems
concerning which I wanted to wait for more information.
Last summer Mark's urologist had scheduled surgery on an enlarged
prostate gland for this winter since there did not seem to be any
urgency. So this was done in January. But the removed tissue turned
out to be malignant after all. So the new diagnosis is prostate
cancer.

Right now, no further procedure has been planned. There will be an MRI
on March 11 and another doctor's appointment after that. Then they
might be able to decide if Mark will need radiation. There is the
possibility that all malignant tissue was already removed in January.
In this case he would just be closely monitored (once a month).
Otherwise he might need radiation. So far it does not look like a very
troubling scenario. But it must be taken seriously.

Therefore we will not book a flight for our planned trip to the US
(May 16 -31) for another 4 weeks. By then we will know more.
If it is possible, we would like to come to Doris' graduation on May
18, then travel east to Maryland to visit our daughter Lisa and our
friends in Annapolis. On the way, we would like to see our dear friend
Anna Richards and also the Hodges if they still are in the area. From
Annapolis, we would like to go south on Thursday, May 23, to spend the
weekend in Fayetteville, NC, and travel back to Indiana. On May 29, we
could come up to Saranac, MI, until the next day, and fly back to
Germany on May 31. This is a lot for 2 weeks, but Jana and I cannot
get away longer since the school year will not be over by then.
Cathrin and Doris would like to join us on this round trip. That would
be great.
But all this is still a conditional clause, "If .....". As actually
everything in life, as we are told in the book of James. Only these
times make this more real.

Another concern is with our oldest daughter Susi. She is in the
process of getting a private pilot's licence and only needed a
physical by a doctor specialized on aviation. And he discovered a hole
in her heart (between the left and right atrium), 13 millimeters wide,
that needs to be fixed. This finally explains all the dizziness and
fatigue she had been experiencing more and more over the past years.
On March 8 she will have that hole "patched" through a tube through an
artery. If it turns out to be too big for this procedure, she will
need open-heart-surgery which would be done the following week. Please
pray that the simple way will work.

In Lisa's life there is a young man she has known for more than 2
years. They met while she was doing her internship in Annapolis, MD.
They are both in their late 20s, so this is quite a challenge. They
are seeking God's wisdom in their decision about as common future.
Lisa has struggled through the first months of doing everything in
English, that was hard for her. She enjoys her life of being a student
and a teacher at the same time. We are so thankful for the Franks
where she is boarding. Lisa really feels at home there.

Thank you for all prayers on Cathrin's behalf. She did find a good
place for her internship at a preschool/kindergarten for mentally
handicapped and autistic children, and at the same therapist's place
where she did internship hours last year with horses and children. Her
school also sends groups of children to this place, and she is in
charge of this. The only drawback is that she does not earn any money
and even has to pay her own health insurance because she is not
enrolled at a European university. But all that is manageable. At the
same time she keeps up her online studies with all kinds of books to
read and papers to write. There is still some time left to help me.
She is still looking for a place to stay during her next intership in
Covington,
Georgia, from June to December.

Doris got engaged to Chad Shellabarger (from Ohio) during Christmas
break here in Germany. He is also a student at Huntington University,
IN, and will graduate at the same time. They are planning to get
married this summer, with the church wedding here in Germany on August
17. They will probably get "legally" married in the US because of all
the paper work this would involve for a wedding over here with a non
EU bridegroom. And with Doris' dual citizenship it is no big deal in
the US. They need a lot of wisdom for their time after graduation.
Chad has been involved in an inner city ministry in Detroit, MI, and
would like to do an internship there plus possible full time work in
this field starting this fall. Doris is going to look for a job in her
field of business management in Detroit. For the summer until August
she is looking into some outreach programs, possibly among Muslims, or
an internship. She would appreciate your prayers to find the right place.

Jana is making great progress in school. She is catching up really
fast. In math she is still half a year behind her class, but has a
special math class together with two other students. The Discovery
Program (2-3 times a week for 80 min.) is also doing her a lot of
good. Her reading and writing is getting better from week to week. The
teachers are amazed at her progress. There is still a lot of ground to
cover, but this won't happen over night. Once she was let out of her
box of being considered "just not smart enough", it has been going
uphill. Thanks for all the prayers!

I myself am doing quite fine. I am in the process of reducing my
prednisone dosage, and my body is taking it well. Prayer and daily
workout work together and keep me in pretty good shape with longer
times without pain. I am very thankful.

Last week God really watched over our house. There was a fire in the
adjoining building, wall to wall with our house, around noon. The
neighbor heard his dogs go crazy and found his furnace room on fire.
Since it was discovered soon enough, the fire only damaged their
basement so that they can still live in their house. If the neighbor
had not been at home (none of us were at home) the whole building
complex could have been destroyed. I wonder how often we are spared
and do not even know it.

This week Mark is organizing 4 truckloads of aid. He can tell that his
health is not the same and would appreciate all prayers.

This turned out rather long, so I better stop before you fall asleep.
I will keep you posted about the latest news. God bless you all, Maria