Dear Friend,

Good Friday is a public holiday in the UK. That meant Leon had the day off. We packed up our little family and went walking in the Lake District! It was the first time we'd taken both Asher and Eva Joy on a walk. Cat Bells was our climb of choice, since we'd just read "Mrs. Tiggywinkle" a few days before (and she apparently lives on Cat Bells). We enjoyed climbing up together -- Asher scrambled along beside us, and Eva Joy got to ride in a carrier on Leon's back. Once we reached the summit of Cat Bells we took in the view.

Even though we've climbed Cat Bells before, the view at the summit is one that we'll never tire of. We took a moment to breathe deep. So this is what it's like to breathe again. Life after Titus died has been like learning how to live all over again, learning to breathe again.

The Monday after Easter is also a public holiday. We took the opportunity to visit Titus's grave for the first time since the funeral (and since Leon's parents were in town). As we drove into the cemetery Chrysti was uncertain if we'd remember where his grave was since the day we buried him was a blur. Thankfully Leon remembered where it was, and as we got closer we noticed a headstone was now in place. I (Chrysti) took a deep breath again. It seemed wrong that we should be visiting our son's grave.

Titus's headstone felt cold as it stood among the headstones of other children who died too soon. It stood as a reminder of the broken world we live in. At the bottom of the headstone were the words boldly written, "In Christ, we have the hope of eternal life." Those words help take away the sting of our loss. They're a reminder to us that we'll see Titus again one day in Heaven with our Saviour.

On Easter Sunday, we stood in church singing songs we've known for a while. Songs about the cross and being saved from death and our sins. I (Chrysti) had tears in my eyes because I sang with a greater understanding of hope in the Gospel. Titus's short life has given us a different perspective on Jesus's sacrifice for us on the cross. Yes, we live in a broken world. But Jesus suffered, died and rose again to defeat sin and death! Because of that, we have the hope of eternal life with Him. Because of that, we can grieve with hope. Hope that helps us breathe again -- and reminds us to keep breathing.

In Other News

This past month has been incredibly busy with work for me (Leon.) We need to upgrade our Linux and Windows servers to CentOS 7 and Windows 2012 R2 as some of them will soon be running on non-patched operating system version. We have a year to get this done, but getting it done sooner rather than later is always a good idea.
 
My helpdesk project has made good progress. We have started to pilot its use in a few places. This week I am in Germany for our annual Int. IT meetings. We will be discussing this amongst other topics this week at our meetings.
 
I am trying to identify the email servers that send email from one of OM’s email domains. The OM.org has thousands of emails per month sent of which 100,000 are sent from unauthorised email servers who spoof the OM.org domain. I am working to authorise approved servers. It is a long uphill struggle to clean-up our email domains.
 
Finally, our internal developers are progressing through the beta stages of the new software we use for accounting and HR across OM (OpenPetra.) I am setting up the cloud servers where fields can connect in remotely to run this software.
 
I return from Germany late on Friday and the following week on Thursday I am in the US at our sending church’s missions convention for 12 days. I would love to meet up with people for lunch and breakfast while in Bloomington. Please contact me if you are free to meet.