Who is worthy to be praised

"I will love you, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer; My God, my strength, in whom I will trust; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I will call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised; so shall I be saved from my enemies." -Psalm 18:1-3
If you had been here this morning you would have heard me singing these verses over and over to God. Every once in a while I wonder what I would think if I were in your shoes reading this blog-at home getting ready to celebrate the holidays, praying for this family who's stuck in Bangladesh. We've been in a fierce battle again lately. We have been weary beyond words.
We've had so many praises and victories these past few days, really the whole month of December, but every victory has required a battle. Nadeem has been out doing active battle while I've been in the home doing battle as his prayer warrior. Two days ago I spent time with God while Kalina napped, and I just couldn't connect with Him. I sat reading the Bible, but the words had no life. I turned to different books still with no result. Finally I heard God in this verse: "You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ." (2 Timothy 2:3) I read it over and over. Yes, we can relate to this verse! That wasn't all. "The Lord stood with me and strengthened me.....the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory forever and ever." (2 Tim. 4:17,18)
That night I told Nadeem that God had given me a word of encouragement and shared the verses with Nadeem. He said, "What else do you have?" I guess it's like giving a soldier facing an entire army one pistol and that's all. Nadeem needed more weapons than this! This was his response after our earlier victories this week, just to give you an idea of how difficult this has been. Please give God so much praise, but keep praying for us! We need your prayers to stay strong!
Ayesha and Someira left this morning to go to India. The teenage servant left a couple of days ago to start a new job. She was only supposed to work here while we were here. The apartment felt very empty and lonely. It's now winter here in Bangladesh, much to our surprise. The temperature is around 70 degrees during the day and 60 at night. I've found, to my sadness, that the winter is not much better than the summer. You see, in the winter, the sky turns gray and stays like this for a month. The sun looks like a fuzzy white ball covered with fog and haze. By late afternoon it seems like nighttime. In addition, the floors here are hard tile, and they feel quite cold. Gray chilly days tend to bring me down, and that's what we're having here.
Nadeem went by himself to the passport office this morning to try to get the needed corrections to indicate that we're Kalina's guardians, not her birth parents. He was very nervous because he doesn't speak the language here. Yesterday Hasan's parents and Nadeem had gone to the home of the director of the passport office to seek his help. He indicated that this was not a simple matter to correct but that they would try to help today. We had no idea how long this would take, what would be involved, or if it would actually be done. There was talk that they might need to get my signature as well on the revisions. Also, at first they wanted to wait to receive their official copy of the "no objection" certificate in the mail.
While Nadeem was gone, Kalina and I were here virtually alone with only our sweet older deaf and mute servant. The apartment seemed dark, cold, and eerily quiet. Then suddenly we heard shouting and chanting outside. The riots had started! Off and on all morning we heard this. I felt this tremendous loneliness and fear overcome me. What if there were an emergency? I was alone with Kalina, unable to speak the language and without any phone numbers to use to call for help. When I took Kalina out of our bedroom this morning, she did her happy dance and started squealing because she expected to see everyone. Instead she found silence. She looked around, puzzled. It's one thing for me to deal with loneliness, but I certainly didn't want Kalina to feel sad. I tried to play with her and get her to laugh (fortunately not a hard task) and meanwhile I sang to the Lord. Then I opened my Bible to pray His promises aloud since I still felt very troubled, and I knew Nadeem needed prayer support for his mission. This is when I found the Psalm.
I prayed and sang and walked Kalina through the apartment. We sat for a moment by the phone which rang just then. It was Nadeem calling to say that he had the passport after only 2 hours (way ahead of the time we thought we might get it if all went well), and he was on his way to the US Embassy. At this point it was noon. The US Embassy doesn't even open for visitors until 1:00. He had plenty of time!
At 1:30 Nadeem called with more amazing news! They accepted our "no objection" certificate and revised passport and told Nadeem to pick up the visa tomorrow (Monday, December 22) at 2:30 p.m.!!!!!! He asked the lady who has been helping us if she was sure or if they needed any more paperwork. She laughed and said no, this time it's really true. Nadeem plans to pick up the visa tomorrow and head to the Emirates airlines office to try to book a flight home!!!! HOME!!!! PRAISE GOD!!!!!
Please pray for us as we get the visa and book flights home during this busy holiday week. We will fly on Emirates from here to Dubai, and then we'll use Delta to get the rest of the way home. Forget Santa! God gives much better Christmas gifts....from Bethlehem to Bangladesh, from long ago to the present.
Thank you for praying for us and celebrating with us the miracles of God!