I am doing a new thing

In 2001, Lee and I had been married nine years.   We had two beautiful children.   Tori was 2 and Josh was 5.   We had pastored two churches ( the second one was a plant).  In May of that year, we released the church but did not have direction what the next step was.   Ministry had been hard on us. We were weary.  I did not want us to be in full time ministry anymore.   We moved in with Lees parents for a time of just asking God what was next.

It was during this season that I remember feeling discouraged.   It was during this season that we met a man who has remained one of our greatest mentors.  He never could have known then, but what his words of encouragement did for us.   Our lives could have gone a very different way.   But he believed we could do it.  We could try again.  We could plant another church.   And we went on to plant two more healthy churches and see both moved into a building before the Lord releasing us.

This weekend, Dennis and Patsy Easter came to Belize.   It was their 49 th anniversary and they came and blessed us.  They blessed me in such deep ways.

I kept looking at Dennis as he ministered to our leaders, took our pastoral staff to dinner and ministered again on Sunday morning and could not believe he was really here.   And his wife, Patsy, so down to earth and loving and encouraging to me.   How she understood things about my life that her words just breathed life and energy into me.  Dennis is a brilliant man.   His ministry was annointed.   I hung on every word as I felt God speaking through him to me.

Sunday morning, he spoke on Isaiah 43:18-19

Isaiah 43:18-19 New International Version (NIV)

18 “Forget the former things;
    do not dwell on the past.
19 See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland.

The message was for our congregation but so perfect for what Lee and I are walking through.

Right now, I am sitting on a beautiful balcony overlooking the ocean.

Dennis and Patsy have and continue to support Lee and I here in Belize.   Their desire was to take our family on a vacation so we could recharge for this final sprint of our journey.   The heartbreaking part is that Patsy got sick and they had to go home.   But allowed us to still stay here lwith our girls.

We would not have had a vacation now.  Not here.  Not like this.  But God used them to bless us so we could just be as a family.   We have so many big changes coming.

God is doing a new thing at LifeNet.  We are so excited.   But he is also do a new thing in our family. And we are excited about that too.

We are so thankful that He goes before us.   He prepares us for what’s coming.  He prepares the place we are going.



I sat on the beach this morning watching my girls attempt to body surf and having the time of their lives.   Feeling that we don’t deserve this.   And God just smiled and told me to soak it all in.  To enjoy what He is doing for us.  So I am.

Trust

I think of how as a child, if we grow up in a stable home, we just trust.  As a child, I always knew my parents would take care of me.   I never knew hunger.  I always had a safe place to stay.   Even during times of transition.

Several people have asked me how am I doing.   Not knowing what’s next.   And honestly, I am totally covered in His peace.   I’m in a season of feeling God very close to me.   Or I’m close to Him. I have no idea where I’ll live in six months, but I am peaceful.   I love worship.   You know that by now I’d you’ve read my blog.  God speaks to me so powerfully as I worship at church or alone.

My current favorite song is, “I am no victim.”    Here’s the link if you want to listen.  I am no victim

This particular verse just keeps playing over and over in my spirit.

Cause He is my Father, I do not wonder

If His plans for me are good

If He'll come through like He should

'Cause He is provision and enough wisdom

To usher in my brightest days

To turn my mourning into praise

I do not know where we will go next.   I know that my Father God knows Lee and my giftings.    I know that He also knows the desires of my heart.   I know that He has never let me down.   And that He loves our family.   And that is just the most beautiful place to be.  

Mission Accomplished

This is what I feel the Lord telling me these days.  It is a weird place to be...the transition.  But I feel like He has been telling me thank you for doing what I sent you here to do.

Seven years ago tomorrow, we got up in freezing cold temps, with two kids throwing up, a dog in a carrier, an active preschooler and seven suitcases and many carry-ons and headed to the airport before dawn.  Just a few hours later, we landed in Belize City.  We were already weary, but thankfully were greeted by missionary friends who just loved on us and welcomed us into this new, very hot life that God has called us to.  We spent the first night with them and it was a friendship that we really treasured over the years.

Even that first day, we felt the beginning of the spiritual battles that we would endure over the years.  Our poor kids.  But we survived and only were made stronger through each experience.

The next day, we came and moved into a hotel for seven days.  We went and ate lunch at a restaurant of a couple that would become one of our first families in the church.  I just met with her yesterday and she shared how they look to us as parents and how much they will miss us.  God called us to be spiritual mom and dads to the Belizean people.   To teach them what healthy, real, godly families look like.  And we have many sons and daughters now here in Belize.  So many young women that I love like a daughter.  Lee has so many sons.  So many marriages that we have walked through hard times with and seen them come out victorious.  I think we have also taught what a healthy church should look like.

Today, Lee posted the newest picture of the new building.  It is still a little surreal.  For so long, we worked and worked on raising funds for the building.  For so long, we prayed to be in the new building.  Now, it is all happening.  Lee and Kudzai are overwhelmingly busy as things are moving at the building and pastoring the church.  But I am so thankful we are still here for this part.  That we get to see the dream come to completion.  To see what God asked us to do, come about.  It is the most beautiful thing.

Coming and leaving.  It is always such a long process.  Today, I looked at an apartment for our final months here.  I am not sure if we will get that one.  But the landlord is who we had for a month seven years ago.  She remembered us well.  She couldn't believe how big Erika is.  As we sell all of our things, figure out what to ship home, there are just so many details to deal with.  Yet, I feel peaceful in the midst of it all.  I feel God's arms around me in a deeper way than I have in a while.  Just a sweet contentment in the season we are in.

I want us to leave in a healthy way.  And I feel that we are.  I feel that God has been in every step of the transition.  I feel that the people at LifeNet are at peace, as well.  There has just been such a sweet presence of the Lord in our services lately.  The set up of our current sanctuary is intimate.  Something that was lacking at George Price.  I am thankful that we had someplace to rent all of those years, but there is something about worshiping in your own home.  Being able to set the atmosphere.  Not the sterility of a rented facility.

God is so amazing.  I am so grateful to Him for the way He has been just so faithful to Lee and I all of these years.  How He is faithful to Josh and Tori at their college.  Tori calls me all the time and just tells me how thankful she is for where she is at.  I love that she wants to share what she is learning in class or at chapel.  God knew that SAGU would be the perfect place for our kids to land after years on the mission field. 

Please continue to pray for LifeNet, that they will go to the next level without us!

Please pray for our family, as we don't know what is next.  We pray that soon we will have some direction.  Pray as we integrate our children into a very different culture over the next year.  We are excited to see where God will use us next.