It’s been far too long since we wrote, but we’re hoping to resurrect this blog and communicate more to our friends and family, especially in this season of transition. God is doing wonderful things!
Big changes are afoot for our family… 2019 is bringing a new season, a new chapter. Back in summer 2017 we heard God tell us that we were to start packing. It was the first indication that we were going to be moving, but we had no idea to where, when or how. The past 18 months, well 2 years really, have been some of the most challenging and difficult years of our lives, yet the Lord has brought us through, is bringing us through, and has been refining and pruning us in the midst of the trials. We have been seeking God and waiting for direction and leading, contending for the ‘new’ that we believed was coming. The waiting was hard. Frequently we had to remind ourselves that God didn’t bring us this far to just abandon us… that He has a plan and it’s for good, for a future and hope.
Sometime around Christmas last year, Bill popped to our local Walmart and came out to find a small green piece of card with ‘Bible Study Scriptures’ on it – and a list of 10 or so scripture references – tucked under his windshield wipers. The scriptures were on the whole not your typical list, but the first one was Genesis 12:1-7, where God says to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.” With hindsight this was the beginning of God giving us direction regarding moving, but at the time we didn’t see it. In March we were given a prophetic word that we’d be moving to England – at which Clare cried and we both said, ‘No!’ It wasn’t a ‘no’ to the Lord, but neither of us sensed it was now – we thought maybe 5 or 10 years down the road. God is good and He knows how to work on our hearts and to make His will clear. We continued to surrender our lives to Him and seek His will… waiting and praying and waiting and praying… and He continued to work on us. At the end of June an offer was made which would entail moving to England. It was the first offer in 18 months that we didn’t have an immediate ‘no’ to as we prayed about it, and came the day after a friend offered us a place to stay to seek the Lord, for a month, for free, in England!
As we looked at some of the practicalities and costs entailed in moving there, we cried out to God knowing that we didn’t have the resources to do it, but that if He wanted us there we’d need Him to provide. The next day we received a call from friends from England who were visiting California, who (long story short) were given $500 by someone in a church they visited to invest in & bless the relationship between the UK & US. Our friends felt it wasn’t for them and as they prayed sensed it was for us. It was a prayer immediately answered and a clear sign to us of where God was leading us.
There are so many details and beautiful things God has worked into the testimony of what He has been doing these last two years in our lives. It has been both terrible and beautiful – although we are honestly only seeing the beauty now that we are out of the depths of the valley! We are excited now for the new that is ahead. In less than a month we will be heading on a one-way trip to England – initially we believe for a 2-3 year stint – but with the Lord life is an adventure and we have little idea of what He has planned for us. We have grown to know more of who God is in these last couple of years and we pray that that will continue as we venture out in faith!
Pursuing Purpose 