Future Missionaries Retreat

This past Wednesday through Saturday, Jim and I spent time right out of town at the Quaker Ridge Camp and Conference Center for a Future Missionaries Retreat that was put on by the Evangelical Friends Mission. Jim grew up in the relatively small denomination of the Evangelical Friends Church, and has very strong family ties amongst its members. We heard of this retreat not too long ago, and decided on a whim since it was close and wasn't too expensive, that we might as well check it out.

WOW. We were so BLESSED these last four days. There were 28 "future missionaries" in attendance, from all over the country. They ranged from just having graduated from high school to "second career" types. Some knew missions was three, four or five years away, and a few are headed to the field in just a few months. Church leaders from all over the country came to support us, as well as retired missionaries representing over 200 years in service all over the world.

The Friends are a small, lesser known church denomination, but their heart for missions and their generosity of time and resources is to be admired. It is just incredible what the Church has done in the past 80 years all over the world. The people I was privileged to meet this weekend are some of the most humble, loving, and fun I have ever met. Even though Jim and I will not be going with EFM, they were interested, supportive and excited about our work just the same.

The information that we received is somewhat similar to the preparatory teaching that we were given during our candidate week with AIM in November, but what a blessing it was to hear it again and let it sink in a little further. We are excited to share insights and teachings with you that struck chords within us during this time...we won't be short on blogging material for a little while!

Summer Vacation is Here!

We started our summer vacation with a bang last Saturday! We headed up to Denver to spend five days with some wonderful friends of ours that we have known for many years. Jim and Benjer were friends and roommates during college, and then Jennifer came into the picture a few years later, around the time Jim and I were engaged. Benjer is a youth pastor, and they are wonderful parents to one-year-old Bethany, with another bun in the oven! They are getting ready to move to Ogden, UT to be a part of a church there. So we wanted to have a good chunk of time to spend with them before they left. We decided to do some Denver sightseeing, since we don't usually do that sort of thing when we visit, and we had such a great time!

The Denver Zoo!

High-flying backyard fun!

What a fun little girl
At the petting zoo...Joel did a lot of observing...

More petting zoo

On the Belleview park train...I think Faith will talk about this for a long time!

And some good playground fun!

We will miss having these dear friends of ours so close by, but we are excited for what God has in store for them and for their new church home in Utah!

The Journey to Here

For a while Jim and I wondered if this would be our last year in Woodland Park, heading to Africa the summer of 2009. That all changed back in November, and I was quite comforted early this year knowing there was still one more year to tie up all those loose ends and get ready. Yesterday was our last MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) meeting of the year. I will continue to serve our church through MOPS next year, but my position is changing, and the team is changing as well. I was caught off guard suddenly during the meeting a few times, holding back tears. I didn't think I'd have to cry until next year!

A really wonderful mom I have served with over the last two years is moving to Las Vegas next week. This came on somewhat suddenly this last semester, and it was hard to say goodbye yesterday. At the beginning of this year, I wondered if it would be me saying goodbye on the 19th of May, and I wasn't sure if I would be able to handle it. It has been good to talk with JoAnna through her process over the last several months, gain some of her insight, and see her handle this transition with prayer and grace.

We are asked pretty often about how we reached this point of being appointed missionaries to the Rift Valley Academy. I have felt incredibly blessed lately to be filled with peace that we are where the Lord wants us to be and we are going where He is clearly leading. I cannot believe the journey we have been on over the last five years. It hasn't been ANYTHING that we expected, or even thought we wanted, yet we have been so blessed.

Five years ago, Jim and I were getting ready to be married in July. We had talked about all sorts of things we were going to do as young married "kids". I was going to get my master's and become a teacher with Jim, we would travel and explore and be adventurous on our summer breaks. We wanted to stay in Woodland Park for three years or so, and then go teach overseas in a third-world country for a few years, then we'd get back and have some cute kids and raise them in the same place until they left home.

These plans and dreams were turned upside down pretty quickly. My twenty-first birthday present in September was a positive pregnancy test. Life went fast and we grew up fast from that point on. Faith was born six weeks early, another unexpected turn of events...we were not ready at all! (If there really is a "ready" when it comes to having kids!) I worked on convincing myself that this was God's plan, and I didn't know what was going to become of our hopes for serving a community overseas. We quit talking about it because we weren't sure how it would fit in. Life looked so different from what we had planned.

Fast forward three, sometimes long, years: all sorts of adjustment, a serious bout of postpartum depression, another cute kiddo later, God began to place events in our lives again that showed us our next steps. It was a struggle believing and trusting that God created me to be a mom to Faith and Joel during these years that we never thought would have the pitter patter of little feet in the mix. Through the gift of friendships and MOPS, I learned that everyone's world gets turned upside down by that pitter patter sooner or later, and I have come to absolutely ADORE being mommy to these precious souls. This feeling of truly belonging to motherhood and wifehood was a search I needed to complete before we ever jumped on a plane to some remote destination.

After Joel turned one and Faith turned three, we began to think about our future again, this time with a little more life experience under our belts. We noticed a school in Tanzania that could use Jim, this school led us to Africa Inland Mission, who we began interviews and applications with in May of 2008, we attended candidate week in November where we were led to the Rift Valley Academy.

It is amazing how much our lives changed in that first year of marriage, and now in our fifth year. To have the gift to look back and see how God has been preparing us all along, is such a treasure and an affirmation of his hand in our lives. I can't imagine these five years any other way!

Our little star!

For those of you that want to oooh and aaah over our little Faith, here is her performance at MOPS this morning. I have to say, I think we have a front row girl...she needs a few more inches for that second row! Anyway, it made my day to see her up there, I hope it brings a smile to your face too!