The Bottom Line
In April, I traveled outside of America for the first time. I was invited by the church that we look to do ministry with, located in Southampton UK, to come and check around and be interviewed. It was a great experience-- I hiked through The (really old) New Forest, ran a Parkrun 5k, visited Winchester Cathedral, and most valuable: spent most of my time meeting and getting to know people in the church and areas of ministry. To say this trip was great would be an understatement; I highly value the experience and long to return with Aleah and Josiah in tow. And that we will do! Our hearts are still set on going as soon as we can and we are making every effort to raise support, including making more changes in our lives to make support goals.
So I thought it would be worthwhile to take a moment and share more specifically (outside of our 5 Minute Monthly's) where we are in our support-raising/ ministry journey and how this process is going!
So where are we?
The short answer: still support raising! As I write this, we sit at about 45% supported. It is a phenomenal feeling to be almost halfway there, with still more plans, people, and ideas of raising further support. And at the same time, it still is daunting only being almost halfway there. In my marathon running, getting to mile 13.1 feels amazing. Every step I take after that checkpoint is now closer to the finish line than it is to the starting line, and that thought sure helps. But there's another thought that looms in my head as I pass that halfway marker: "Great, I just have to do everything I did all over again." This is about how Aleah and I are feeling right now. So beyond thankful to God that we've come as far as we have, but as we look at the future, we sure still have plenty of work cut out for us!
Another important aspect of where we are in this process to consider is where our hearts are in all of this. I think it's fair to say that our little family has seen a lot of change and stretching in this past year, and preparing for bigger changes and stretches certainly feels like a lot. But our hearts are firm. In many ways, the Lord has confirmed for us that this is the direction he will take us, and we feel his calling to send with AT3 and join ministry at Christ Church Southampton. It would be a deep loss for us to not go; so let there be no question: we are still just as committed and firm in our hearts and minds to going as the day we started.
Admittedly, we have not been without our doubts and fears, but these have not swerved us from the goal or distracted our hearts significantly. Our ever-changing lives have been the catalyst for our own inward concerns: last year on Mother's Day, we were quietly celebrating Aleah as a mom-to-be, having just spent the day at our recently formed church in Pennsylvania, I was preparing for my second month of tree work, and we were gearing up to begin support-raising. This year, we celebrated Aleah on Mother's Day with our almost 5 month-old, after a great church gathering here in Wisconsin, as I enter my 6th month of carpentry, and we're 45% supported. To say the least, these changes in our lives have
proved quite effective at trying to take our attention away from the ministry God has called us to! What's more, our own family dreams and long-term future goals must be put on hold in every way if we are to earnestly pursue this calling. This is a hard thing to do for us as a young family, still trying to figure out how this world works and how we are to live as a light in the midst of it. But I will say it again: our hearts are firm. We are decidedly going with AT3 to Christ Church Southampton as far as it depends on us.
What's the plan moving forward?
Our goal is still to leave in August. This is a hard goal to reach at this point, but we are still shooting for it. It's difficult because we do need to be at a certain (higher) percentage in our support-raising than we currently are before we can apply for visas and make certain commitments. However, even if our window of opportunity is getting smaller, we are making every effort to reach the mark by our end-of-May deadline. Though we have discussed with our organization what it might look like if we don't make this goal, we are not going to make those plans too serious until we have to. If we don't leave in August, it's not like we missed the boat and our opportunity to go has sailed away completely, because there are more options past that; but we truly desire to leave as soon as possible and would like to keep that as our plan until it isn't.
In order to try and speed up our process here, we have made some changes to our lifestyle and are considering more changes that we can make, in order to give ourselves more time for our current endeavors and hopefully more opportunity to see the Lord working in our lives. We recently decided to cut out most of our evening "relax" time, which consisted of TV and social media, in favor of praying, making calls or planning get-togethers, or spending time meditating on Scripture. Aleah is also reorganizing how she plans her week in order to have more time to make arrangements and calls.
Ultimately, however, our trust is in the Lord and his timing. We take his sovereignty and his will as the foundation on which we stand, and from that seek to make plans and organize our lives in such a way that glorifies God and exemplifies our trust in him. I don't want to find myself frustrated that God didn't provide for my plans in the timing I wanted, because that shows a lack of trust in the Lord. But I also don't want to find myself saying, "The Lord will provide!" and doing nothing but sitting around. There is a balance to strike here, and it rests on the foundation of our trust in God. My trust is in his provision, so as a result, I will work as hard as I can, knowing he's taking care of everything that I can't see.
What do we need?
The two things every missionary seems to always ask for and never have enough of: prayer and money! Our hearts are burdened to go and do gospel ministry in the UK. We long serve in the church and see hearts turned to Christ, but we realistically can't go and do this without intentional support in prayer from our brothers and sisters in Christ, as well as tangibly supporting us financially. Practically, the thing holding us back right now is that we don't have the financial support that we need, so our biggest prayer is that the Lord would provide that (as we continue to meet with people and make phone calls!). Please join us in praying for our finances. And if you have been wondering when the right time to support us would be, or if you've been on the fence, now is the best time for you to support us. Click this link for our financial giving site.
The bottom line
Why do we want to go in the first place? Why are we going through all this trouble and putting so much of ourselves on the line for this? It's because of Christ. God has given salvation from sins through the blood of Jesus Christ, we need only have faith in God and trust in the finished work of the cross. If we really have been saved from the judgement we deserve and brought into newness of life because of Christ, don't you think we should be willing to put everything on the line for the sake of the gospel? There are people in this world who don't know Jesus as their savior. Why shouldn't I be making every effort to share with them the good news that Jesus brings? There is no answer to why we shouldn't, but the truth is that we should and must make every effort to tells others of Jesus. Their souls depend on it. That's why we want to go. We'll go through all the trouble and would be glad to make this life difficult if it means we have greater opportunity to share Jesus and glorify God. Jesus Christ is the bottom line, the end-all of our lives, the one in whom we trust. He's the reason why we are going, and it's his good news that we earnestly want to share.
