Our Blog | Missionary Shary Frahm

Nov
3, ’16

Kids of the Kingdom

This wonderful group of young people of Kids of the Kingdom at Immanuel Lutheran School in Crystal Lake have known of us and God’s ministry in Cambodia for nearly four years. They have raised up a strong base of growing prayer warriors and partners with Snor half a world away. Today as they all made Christmas trees and angels for Operation Christmas Child boxes, we were able to renew that friendship and give each one of them woven bracelets made by local moms and kids. They were so excited and surprised to get them.
These were some of the responses about Cambodia that they shared back to us:
1-people in the villages live in houses built on stilts.
2- not everyone has good water to drink.
3-people get a lot of rain.
5-they don’t know about Jesus, not all of them, just like us.
6-we love them even if we don’t know them.
7-we pray for them.
8-thank you for the bracelet.
Thank you for embracing us and sharing this ministry with us, both here and in Cambodia.

Aug
17, ’16

By gfrahm

45 Years and Counting ~

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This month marks the 45th years of life together with this man. If someone had showed me a list of line items for this life that day at the altar, I’m so sure I would have headed for the hills and never returned. But here we are today, having walked thru life together, learning and being equipped as we go hand in hand in His service. Gratefully this has been shown in bits and moments at a time, with a huge learning curve, and blessing upon blessing time and time again. Honestly, when you don’t think it could be better, then something comes along to raise the bar. God is always there at the helm.

So, taking a break from our insanely complex schedule of the moment, we purchased evening boat cruise tickets to go out on Lake Michigan just like tourists who visit Chicago do, riding the train in and out, walking the streets, the whole bit. We had hoped it would be a bit romantic. It was a lovely evening, a perfect time to see the beauty of this city from a different perspective. We are not city people by any means, but once in a while the vagabond spirit takes ahold of us and drags us down the road to stretch our necks.

Of course, we wanted to add in an ethnic meal of some sort, but which to pick was another subject.

We had so missed one of our favorites, Pho, (pronounced Fa) which hailed from the Vietnamese community. We had a favorite restaurant we frequented in PP by the name of Viva. This family owners were also Christian and shared their lives all around their staff and clients. Their Pho was usually really great, especially when the ‘boss’ did the cooking.

We found this one spot on West Van Buren and while it was just a ‘hole in the wall’ sort of place, it served up a wonderfully delicious Pho salad and a cup of vietnamese ice coffee. Let me add that this muddy coffee shown here will kick butt,big time. The lovely gal at the counter said “you know that this is strong, right?” YES!

So included in this blurb are a few photos of our ‘walk’ and ‘boat’ time along the streets and waters of this gorgeous city.
Happy Anniversary my dear! I’m looking forward to many more years of praying and holding hands with you ~

Aug
9, ’16

By gfrahm

Khmer Khronicle July, August, September 2016

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KK July ~ August ~ September 2016

Aug
9, ’16

By gfrahm

Rio Olympics 2016

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While this is already Tuesday here as I write this, just a few short days ago at the Rio summer Olympic opening ceremony, one very special group of six young people who hailed from our ‘second’ home entered the stadium representing their country Cambodia in the finest form of pride. We understand that our five grandchildren were caught in the excitement as they watched the opening ceremony and cheered them onward with love and the gusto. Way to go!
Six young people, the pride of their country, will be the stars for a while in the areas of swimming, track and field, taekwondo, and wrestling. Nagaworld is heavily invested in these six, offering them up monetary awards for their medal placement in addition to the fanfare and glory of competing and standing on that podium to receive a medal.
In a country where most people probably have not realized the Olympic games as they are today, stands an empty stadium called ‘The National Olympic Stadium.’ Built in the 1960’s to seat 50,000 it stands empty, never having been used for something like this in all this time. Back then it was part of the new Khmer movement with a Cambodian flair with a worldly flavor. Mostly likely the throngs of the folks to the north will bring forth its demise quite soon in view of some more lucrative results. It’s a sad reminder of the ‘other’ history of this country before the Khmer Rouge came to power for those years thereafter.

Go Cambodia team 6~

Jun
30, ’16

By gfrahm

Wonderful Greeters

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Just a short month ago we arrived back to US soil for some quality family time and to get new passports.

The whole idea at the time of our arrival was “mom, go slow, be the last one, I have to get from school to the airport to pick you two up with all your luggage. It’s M’s last day of school and I need to finish up there first.”

Got it!

The other two older grandchildren were still in school at that time, in fact, they had school until the 21st of June. Nope, they couldn’t make it either. Or so we thought. Surprise !

The sixth grandchildren is just shy of 2 and lives out of state. We assumed that she wouldn’t be there either as she can’t travel by herself. Surprise #2.

Well, you can see from the attached picture if you count correctly, that there are indeed 6 very excited grandchildren (well, maybe 5 excited and one who clung to daddy) who greeted us as we came thru those ‘magic’ doors, leaving no-mans land behind. (Anyone being on either side of such doors understands the ‘feeling’ of those doors.)

We came thru the doors to the usual plethora of people and signs around the roped area. Initially we couldn’t begin to figure out ‘where’ the (three) grandchildren were in the midst of it all. Ah ! To my left I see jumping beans of hair flying, arms waving, hollering, all over the place SIX little ones trying to get our attention. How we could have missed that bundle of excitement first off must have been due to jet lag cloudiness of sorts. But that was soon dissipated as those kiddos gathered in to welcome us (with parents in the wings). Hugs and “I Love You” knows no boundaries. Skin to skin stuff, just what God ordered.

As was mentioned before, this had been the most difficult deployment ever of any of them. The grandkids were older. They were more vocal, more engaging, more involved in our lives than ever before. We had a deep relationship with them that knew no boundaries and yet was strained by the loss of their presence on a regular basis, except over the internet (not always cooperative) in our lives. The loss was more in the front lines in many ways in our minds.

As I said it’s been shy of a month since we departed Cambodia. We have spent hours of catchup time with each of the six now with their parents and can now settle in for a few months of usual as we await the return of our passports ~ new and spanking clean. It is also summertime here and the usual school restraints are not there for a bit, though it will come all too soon. In the meantime, we will enjoy the time given to us with each of them to strengthen that bond that God has put there for us to nurture.

Then we will do this another time one more time ~ something not to think about at the moment. No thanks!

May
23, ’16

By gfrahm

The Eagle Has Landed

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Immanuel Lutheran Church has invested faithfully in us for many years, beginning way back in our days on the campus of Universitas Pelita Harapan in Jakarta, Indonesia to our now current deployment in Cambodia. As we look back, we could easily cite many small steps that were taken at those strategic moments along the journey. God seemed to glue us together again and again, even when the boat was rocky or the road very bumpy. I guess ministry goes that way, even though we would wish otherwise. Even the early church we’ve read about we can identify some parallel moments when they too had ‘their’ moments. But God remained faithful. And so did His people.

It is not the easiest thing to live in a culture so unlike our own, more noticeable by us as the years go by. The language hasn’t been any easier to learn, and the weather hasn’t been kind either. But the unfeathered heartfelt attachment to all of this hasn’t been shaken out of us in spite of this. We can’t tell you why or how, but we know it’s there.

One of our steadfast ongoing prayers has been for people who knew us and were our partners would venture across the pond to see what God is doing thru His people here in this country. One team came from our son’s locale during our last deployment.

And then ~ Just a mere three weeks ago God sent us an energized, organized, passionate and godly fivesome to see His work here in this country. The eagle had landed, bringing to us five hearty souls from Immanuel Palatine to share Jesus with their hands and feet (and all the energy they could muster). As we gather in the final tally and regroup all of those photos and videos (7.7 GB) into a firm resting place, we can look back with sheer awe and wonder of it all. Like did we really pack that much up in those mere 14 days we were blessed to share time with them? Yup, we did. And it was beyond good! We couldn’t have been more proud of their efforts to engage Snor and Svei villages under the leadership of Pastor Samuel and four translators who stood strong with each of the team as was needed. They kept us on the move ~ that was good.

Do we, as local in country staff know the results of their time here? Nope. But our Father does. Do we, as local staff, realize the impact that could have happened in this time and this place? Absolutely. The love and encouragement were abundantly seen during all of those strenuously challenging days shared forward in the villages with each person that was sent their way, all the way from the eyeglass clinics to church services to coloring and playing games and all that in between. Somewhere along the way even we, as hosts for this team, fell in love one more time with these people. God always tugs at the heart of His people for the very souls he longs to call his own.

Immanuel, thank you for sharing your time, yourselves, and your resources with the people of this country ~ half a world away from you. We love you!

May
23, ’16

By gfrahm

See More Clearly (by the Immanuel team)

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The following links are to three of the four services (all different) of the Immanuel Lutheran Church Palatine, IL short term team post interview done during church services this past Sunday. I did not do links to any of them, so please do a cut/paste to view them yourself (unless it does it magically without my help.). Each of the discussions is during the sermon time, about 25 minutes or so into the complete service format.

We are grateful beyond words for the Immanuel team fivesome who came across the big pond of water to come and see how God is working amongst His people here.

May 22 / 10:45 – Seeing More Clearly In Cambodia – Contemporary Lutheran Worship video

May 22 / 9:15 – Seeing More Clearly In Cambodia – Blended Lutheran Worship video

May 21 / 5:00 – Seeing More Clearly In Cambodia – Sat Blended Lutheran Worship video

May
21, ’16

By gfrahm

Khmer Khronicle June 2016

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KK June 2016

May
20, ’16

By gfrahm

“We Want to Learn More” ~ Part 2 Soap making

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A note in my email was simply put “We Want to Learn More” so here we are today ~ doing that.

May seems to be a busy month of holidays here in Cambodia. As I looked over their twelve month calendar of holidays, I count seven for this month. Only two other months come close to that number, five in October and four in November. Let’s see, there is the King’s birthday (current one) which huddles over a weekend no less, giving a long four day weekend. We just had that over this last weekend. May 1st is the Cambodian Labor Day, celebrating the achievements of workers in this country. We didn’t notice that since we were working in Snor Village with the Immanuel short term team doing church with Pastor Samuel and his flock.

Since that was on a Sunday this year, it rolled over to Monday with another day off. May 20th is the designated birth of Buddha. That also is on a Friday this year, making another three day weekend. The last holiday for this month is May 24th which is the start of the planting season celebration. Considering that 80% of the population live in villages and are rice farmers, this is a very important one indeed.

This month also ushers in the rainy season as well. Our Immanuel team left Cambodian soil on Thursday of last week, May 12th, and the next day, just twenty four hours later, the rains began. Since then it has rained every day, with most of that occurring during the nighttime hours thus far. The triple digit temps have plummeted during those brief moments and given a huge sigh of relief for those who have endured the harsh dryness of late. It also energized others to anticipate and consider new projects in the days ahead. “We want to learn more.”

April 27th I posted a note regarding soap making across the waters. If you’ve not had a chance to read it, perhaps backtracking to that would be a good point about this time….. Read on ~

Anyway, with the last meeting of the ‘soap gals’ we had completed two different types of soap. The first one has been found (a piece thereof) in the downstairs office bathroom for anyone to try out. It is really nice. The second one was an affirmation of what had been taught thus far, plus the addition of an essential oil fragrance. Until now, we had no digital thermometer to measure the ‘heat’ in each of the components of a soap recipe without causing undesirable results so we had to keep to a narrow window of recipes.

Then the thermometers arrived at the end of April in a suitcase from IL.

So today’s class, the last one at least for now, converged in the office this morning to learn how to use a thermometer correctly (our American Imperial system doesn’t roll over into their metric learning) and for the girls to do everything on their own. There was an obvious intense discussion for a bit about the ‘future’ of soap making in the villages and how to do it there, with some excitement in the air. But then the process began one more time, and George and I were only observers now as the three soap gals measured their container, calculated the amounts of oils and lye/water to fit into it, and finally put it all together. New items for the day included the scent of lavender and the color of turmeric. The weather has changed somewhat since our last soap date, and this time the gals used a cardboard lined box instead of a silicone loaf pan. Those are a lot of exchanges in a new learning curve. We hope they understand this curve will continue to move further out with each time they try something new in this craft, and we hope that they do try new things.

Yet as I write now, I’m think the learning curve in this craft will only continue to grow going forward. These three women are committed to not only fine tuning their skills, but to share it forward so other women can have something like this. As one of them said, “we all would prefer to have or make things that are only locally made. We like to support the local community and grow the local community.” We couldn’t agree more.

As I returned comment I said “Ladies, you will continue ‘to learn more’ each time you do this. This I am most certain of you three.”

Godspeed in your venture going forward~

Thank you also to a gracious daughter who was willing to add into her already hectic schedule the patience and time to share in the learning curve that we had no knowledge of at that time. Even if it meant a 12 hour time zone difference and an ocean between them all. They are friends now ~

“Friends are friends forever if the Lord’s the Lord of them ~ and a lifetime’s not too long to live as friends.” (Michael W. Smith, 1967).