Merry Christmas!

Just thought I'd take a moment this Christmas eve to wish everyone a very blessed Christmas and happy New Year!

Also a little update on life, the universe, and everything. Things have been going along here at home. I'm currently taking a break from painting our "exercise room" in our basement.  The whole thing was a super dark green, and with only one tiny window and a few dinky light bulbs, it was just too dark! So we are leaving the bottom half (which was a plaid wallpaper), and painting the top half a much much lighter beige color. The room looks bigger already! I can't wait til we get more lights in here. The past few days I was over at our old house painting rooms on the main level, getting it ready to rent out. Can I just say, I'm glad I don't do this for a living? I think I have tennis--er--painter's elbow! My arms are sore, my elbows are sore, my wrists are sore, my hands are sore...you get the idea! I cannot wait til all the painting is finished.

On the support front, things are moving along a little slowly.  I realized when I was calculating, I forgot to include one of my biggest supporters, so I don't have as far to go as I thought! I've also had a few more commitments over the last few days, and I've had some encouraging conversations with friends, so I am feeling pretty good! At this point I am about 60% funded. I know God will bring the right people in at the right time. The right time might not be my time, but I trust that God has it all under control.

on my way to Nineveh

I've been going to the women's Bible study at my church here at home in the 'Burg.  I wasn't planning on going, but decided last minute, about an hour before the first meeting, interestingly enough.  We're going through Priscilla Shirer's study on Jonah, a "life interrupted".  My life has been full of interruptions, or "divine interventions". Basically my plans don't go...well, according to plan! The story of my life, in the last few years at least, has been to let go of my need to plan, and to know what is coming. But I digress...

Basically you have Jonah, a prophet of Israel. He's all fine and good doing his daily thing, and then God says, "I want you to go to Nineveh to tell them about Me!" Nineveh, the place of Jonah's enemies, where they are really mean (understatement) and there's a good chance they'll kill you (not an understatement!). So we know the story. Jonah says "heck no!" and gets on the first ship bound the other direction and three times as far away.  A storm comes, they throw him overboard, he gets swallowed by a giant fish and given a second chance to complete the mission that God has called him to.  And he's obedient, the second time around.

During this study, Priscilla asked us to think about what our "Nineveh" is, the people we know God is telling us to reach out to but we are reluctant to.  For the longest time I wasn't really sure what that was for me. I'm just living at home, going to church.  All my family knows the Lord, who on earth do I have to "reach out" to?  Then I realized, my Nineveh doesn't look like what she described.  Mine is different. My "Nineveh" isn't really reaching out to people, but it is doing something that God is telling me to that I'm not really excited about and have been putting off for a while.

The whole reason I'm here is to get a new visa and work on raising more support to go back to England. I was also hoping to get a job to earn a little extra money.  But then, we moved right when I got home, and I was busy for the first few weeks.  Talk about an interruption! Then I wasn't feeling well. Then there were things planned for the next few weekends to prepare for.  Then I found more and more excuses not to contact people. I knew I should get around to working on support, but what's the rush, right? More excuses, and then, oh hey, its November! 

This has shown me that yes, I did have some legitimate reasons to begin with.  Moving is stressful. Not living the house I called "home" anymore is considered a loss, and I needed time to emotionally deal with that before engaging the real world. But now God is showing me my "Nineveh", and calling me to do my part to go back to England. I can't be disobedient anymore.  Even if I finally get a temporary job offer that will bring in some money. Which I did, and had to turn down.  Just because something is good doesn't mean we can use it as an excuse to disobey what God is actually calling us to do.  So my friends, please pray for me! There's a reason why I've been putting this off.  It's hard work. It's uncomfortable. It's impossible for me to do on my own.  But God desires my obedience more than other "good things" that I think I have to offer Him. And I know from experience, He will not leave me hanging!

So, we know what my "Nineveh" is, what's yours?

yes, I'm still alive...

So, been back home for about a month now! Let me explain. No...there is too much. Let me sum up:

The last few weeks at the office were spent finishing off things, packing up, and saying goodbye to all the lovely people I was blessed to work with this past year!  The flight home was long but uneventful. My sister met me at the airport with a GIANT sunflower balloon! It was truly epic. Then she drove me home to our family's new house, where I had a mattress on the floor in my room and that was it.

I should explain this part.  Back in August, my parents put an offer in on a house about six miles down the road from where we used to live. After they closed, they were going to take a while to paint the new house and move in as rooms were finished.  That was before some people we know from church needed a place to live after a tree fell on their house from the hurricane. Also, to make matters more interesting, our old house's basement flooded.  So, my parents started moving stuff from the main floor of our old house so the family could move in...which happened to be three days after I got home.  My room was in the basement...luckily it didn't get flooded too bad.

So anyway, after I got home it was all packing and painting and moving and craziness for a few weeks.  It was really difficult not living in the old house. On top of all that, I decided to have a get-together for my supporters in the area this past Saturday, and mom said we should have it at the new house! So basically I was busy painting and trying to get the house ready.  Now that the party's over and I'm a bit more settled in, I feel like I can focus on re-connecting with people and start setting up meetings to keep my support going so I can go back to England in January.  I also am trying to line up a temp job to help earn a little extra cash and get me out of the house a bit.  I will miss sleeping in every day (!) but its time to get back to work!

Anyway, that's about it for now. Tune in next time to hear Rachel say...