God is good...
all
the time.
All the time...
God
is good.
In March of this year, Michael received a job
offer that could take us to Nairobi, Kenya where he would teach and our
children would get to attend a Christian International School. Africa!
I've always wanted to go to Africa!
Now the opportunity to live there!
Five or six years ago, because of some encouragement at the
seminary where Michael was attending school, he and I began to talk about the
possibility of going to serve the Lord overseas. We had not come to seminary for that purpose
but we both began to feel that we should at least consider the
possibility. Michael had grown up
overseas, I had lived in France for a year and could already speak
French... It made sense, we liked the
idea, and we decided to put our yes on the table and see what doors God would
open. Almost simultaneously, our hearts
were being tugged towards adoption and we decided that we would pursue that
route for adding #4 to our family. There
was a LOT of paperwork that year! We
applied with our missions agency and with an adoption agency and getting
through all that paperwork became almost a full-time job for me. Of course there were bumps along the way but
we finally got everything completed for the adoption agency and began that wait
even as we were working on the final pieces for our missions agency. Timothy needed tendon transfer surgery that
year which had to be completed before we could get health clearance with the
missions agency so we had a little time.
We waited 18 months thinking any day we could get a call that a birth
mom had chosen us to be her little one's forever family but that call never
came. At the end of that time we had to
decide whether to renew our home study or not.
About the same time everything fell into place with our missions agency
clearing us to look for a job match so we decided to put adoption on hold and
move forward with going overseas. That
was hard for me. I did not understand
why God had not given us a baby. I felt
certain that He had given us the desire to adopt and had led us in that
direction. In the months and years following
that, I remember several times holding or playing with a friend's baby who was
born about the same time that we were expecting ours and getting teary eyed
because my baby never came. (The desire
to adopt is still there for us and we continue to wait for the Lord's timing.)
During that next
year as we continued to pursue finding a job match with our missions agency, we
would think a door was opening only to see it close again. This happened several times. Another opportunity came up but even after
much prayer, it didn't seem to be the right fit. Eventually, for a variety of reasons, we
stepped away from the possibility of going with that missions agency. We applied to go to a Christian International
School as a direct hire but were also turned down for that job. It was hard.
Again, we did not understand what God was doing. We felt certain that He had given us the
desire to go and that desire, in spite of the consistently closed doors, seemed
to be growing.
In the meantime, we
were "stuck" at a GREAT church with a wonderful community. I received training through our church in
biblical counseling and had multiple opportunities to put that to
practice. We transitioned out of care
group leadership in preparation of leaving but as it looked like we would be
there a while longer began helping to lead the college ministry at our
church. We had to move out of seminary
housing so we decided to buy a house. At
that point we felt like it would be at least two years before we could go
anywhere so we bought the house thinking in terms of being able to sell or rent
it fairly easily when the time came. We
both thought that was the best idea but struggled with the feeling of
permanency that comes with buying a house and the added responsibility of being
homeowners of an older house. It did not
help that within the first few weeks of living there, we had a big rain storm
and water flooded under our house and into the basement. There were some tense moments as we fought to
get the water stopped and wrestled with our own emotions and thoughts of
"what have we done?" and "Why, God?!" It was a defining moment for me when I
finally realized that I was asking the wrong questions of God. I stopped asking "Why, God?" and
starting asking, "How can You be glorified through this?" I was able to get outside of myself and focus
on the task at hand to be a better helper for my husband and get the water
stopped. After that we still wrestled periodically
with having the house and wishing a tornado would come along and level it. None of us ever loved living there but we
were thankful for God's provision for us and saw Him working through us in that
neighborhood (thanks initially to some gentle pushing and help from our Caregroup).
During that time of
waiting, Michael and I went to Haiti with our church and last summer we even
led a group (along with all of our children) to serve in China for 3
weeks. And through it all, Michael had a
good job at a local two year college. The
wait was long and hard at times. We learned
to lean into and trust the Lord in ways we had never had to before. We didn't always see it as such but God was
faithful to continue to grow us and provide for us and prepare us.
Now, here we are 4 days out from moving to Kenya,
Africa. The last several months have
been crazy with getting rid of stuff and packing and selling a house and two
cars and getting rid of more stuff and saying goodbyes, and visiting family and
more goodbyes and training, and planning and getting everything in order... the
list goes on. The list is still long but
in just a few days, we get on an airplane and leave.
The contract is for two years. We
might stay longer.
I am filled with a deep gratitude for this opportunity on so
many levels. It is an opportunity to be
stretched out of our comfort zones and to continue to learn to trust God more
fully and deeply. Just the process of
getting rid of so many worldly possessions has been refining and caused us to
consider what is really important. This
is an opportunity to decide if we truly believe that God is sovereign. Is Christ enough? Do we trust Him? It is an opportunity to "go to the
nations" and continue to live out the gospel and share Christ with
others. It is an opportunity for our
family to live in an international community - to experience a different part
of the world and see God's faithful hand at work regardless of location,
language, background, or skin color. It
is an opportunity for our children to go to the school where their Daddy will
be working. It is an opportunity to
experience another culture for an extended period of time and to learn to see
life through a different set of lenses.
There are so many other things
that I don't even know how to express.
At the same time, it is hard to leave family and friends and
our church behind. We will certainly
miss them! There have been and will
continue to be days that we cry over those losses.
Through the joys and the sorrows, God is good...
all
the time
All the time...
God
is good.
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