"How bizarre, how bizarre"

This is a long one...sorry!

When I look back on the last five months of my life I want to break out singing "How bizarre, How bizarre." A 90's musical wonder by OMC. Have you seen the video for this song?? Quite bizarre and will keep you laughing hysterically...or either I am just easily amused. Probably the latter.

Truth is the last five months of my life have been bizarre from the worlds lens. Five months ago Steve put in his one year notice! That just sounds bizarre to some people, but totally what God led us to do and it was a wise decision. Preparing for the mission field takes a lot of time we have learned. The bizarre part, is that when Steve put in his notice, it was to leave his wonderful job at a more than wonderful church to go serve in a place we had never been, to a people we had never met and for a purpose we were not exactly sure of at that time. The important thing, is that we were being obedient, following our Lord wherever He chose to take us. Since then, God has graciously granted us a lot of clarity.

The children's pastor from my home church in GA and his wife (who I will fondly call Aaron and Robin) have started a non-profit organization called Belief in Motion. They also have a non-profit in Romania called Project 127. It is based on James 1:27, "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." We have always had a great desire to serve children and families, so when we found out the purpose of this ministry we knew we wanted to be a part in some way. We had hoped to go in 2009 for a short visit to see if this was something we were to truly pursue. For different reasons that trip fell through, but the burden and desire never left us...not just one of us....but both of us! This was a God thing too...that we were both on the same page all along. For a lot of reasons we believed that January of 2011 was when we were to go, but instead of two weeks, how about a year? Aaron and Robin were on board and very excited, as you can imagine since, "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few." Thanks to our church, Steve and I were able to go for a week in March to get a lot of questions answered and to SEE with our own eyes the people and the places. This was an amazing and humbling opportunity and though many things were hard to see as reality, God really affirmed us in the direction we were headed. Good thing.

Now we are in the process of trying to rent out our house in Knoxville by July. In May we hope to send out letters to start raising prayer and financial support.

This morning as I was talking to God, I said, "I just feel like a child." All along I have been so sure of GOD. This task ahead is so beyond us and we know we cannot do this on our own. This is HIS doing! I haven't questioned how we are going to raise $35,000 in 7 months, or how we are going to rent or sell our house in 7 months, or what happens if we absolutely hate it there and we have no job to come back to?? I have just felt like a child who completely trusts her Father and knows He is bigger and stronger than her and has promised to never leave or forsake her.

"He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: 'I tell you the truth unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.'"

Matthew 18:2-3