A Daughter of Sarah

I am a self-proclaimed planner. I cannot do anything without a plan. Now, that's not to say I always FOLLOW the plan. I'm also a very side-tracked individual who oftentimes finds myself forgetting about my own plan. But nonetheless, I'm a planner. Tell me you need a project done, and I will plan out every detail, and then delegate the execution of the plan to someone else. I have calendars, to-do lists and sticky notes adorning my house and heaven forbid if you throw away anything that remotely resembles a note or reminder (because to you - and my husband - it looked like trash), your head will be in a sling!

Steve, on the other hand, is spontaneous and can keep a mental log of every phone number, appointment and thing to do neatly cataloged in his brain. He can spontaneously decide to take a weekend trip because he knows the route, knows the calendar is empty and has probably memorized the phone number to the hotel. To him, plans just waste time and prolong the process. Nonetheless, I am trying -- really hard - to appreciate that God knows our differences and placed us together to complement one another and to balance each other out. Sometimes I wish God wasn't so darn smart.

Getting ready for this trip has become (I'll be totally candid here) so overwhelming for me I don't even know how to put it into words. As a planner, I need a date that we are leaving. I need to methodically gather & sell each item we own and will not keep ~ but not too soon and not at the last minute! I need to neatly document and catalog each thing that needs to be accomplished and put a timeline to it. I need to keep "to do" lists and "to get" lists and of course, they must all be in one central location: the 2-inch binder with tab dividers that I created.

Enter Steve: I really think he could be a great spokesman for Nike - no one likes to "Just Do It" more than him. He wants to leave "as soon as possible". He'd be content with just loading everything in boxes and telling people to "just come get it". He wouldn't miss a thing, he says. Every month we stay here, is another month's rent we could put toward our travels. And every day he has to get up and report to a job he practically hates anymore, a part of his spirit dies.

God is stretching my faith in ways I could have never imagined. The uncomfortable feeling of abandoning my need to plan and organize this journey is overwhelming and fills me with more anxiety than anything I have ever felt. And then the Lord reminds me of something -- what must Abraham's wife Sarah have gone through! But in the end, God blessed her beyond comprehension!

I have relied on my own planning and organization for every major aspect of my life. From planning for Destini's arrival, every move we've ever made, and now this trip. But I have been gently reminded that by clinging to those comforts, I rob myself of 2 very important blessings:

(1) My husband is blessed when I bless him, and the only way to truly bless my husband is to love him enough to be his helper in his plan, thereby expressing my respect for him, and showing my obedience towards God by being obedient to my husband.

and (2) By abandoning my self-made "plan", I allow God to follow through on His plan. It is only by faith that I can relinquish control and provision of this trip over to Him. Then, I can see His work and his blessings.

Not Necessarily a Big Happy Family

It amazes me the ways God has decided to work in our lives. If you’ve read my previous posts, you know how I have seen Him work personally in my life. When Steve & I were unsure about this trip, I prayed for the Lord’s direction and provision. I guess any faithless human being would have expected something like, an unexpected large sum of money to buy an RV. But the Lord, being the Great Teacher He is, pushed us to think a little more broadly and simply provided us encouragement through the mouth of babes.

Another recent example is still playing out. (Although, as I write this, I’m thinking that is the Lord’s pattern – there never really is a final conclusion is there?)

If you are a close friend, you know the trials and tribulations that my family has undergone. I do not come from a “big happy family” by any sense of the word. Strife should have been our last name. But somewhere deep inside me, maybe because I was an only child, I have always longed for that “big, happy family” and nothing makes my heart ache more than the fact that it may never be.

Currently, my mother and I are estranged although she lives less than 30 miles away. I don’t hear from my dad, who lives in California, but seems to have a new family of his own. Just writing about it makes me have to fight back tears. There is much pain, bitterness and resentment from all the things that have happened since Steve & I met, but somehow we have managed to keep our own little family of 5 intact and each day is another notch on the doorpost that we have come one step closer to raising our children with values and attitudes perhaps we missed out on.

Still, I miss my parents and I know my children miss their grandparents. Being an only child, I’m sure this is part of my inner struggle with it all. But truly, I would not want anything less than that “big, happy family”. Last week, I had this nice long talk with God. I cried to Him, told him what my heart desired (like he didn’t already know, right?) and vowed my obedience. “I have no idea what you have in store, Lord,” I said, “but I’ll leave this in your hands and do whatever it is you want me to do.”

The next day, I got an email from my mother, wanting to get together to talk.

I have to be candidly honest. I am not particularly optimistic about this meeting, which will happen tomorrow over lunch. I’ve never felt as though I could get through to my mother and get her to understand my way of life, my way of thinking and where my loyalties lie and why. But I vowed my obedience to God and I have an obligation to follow through, because I know that it is only in obedience to Him that true blessings are bestowed.

God’s Message of Certainty

Why is it that when we ask the Lord for something, we’re still amazed when He delivers? Is it merely our human nature, unable to wrap our little minds around His wondrous love, or is it a sign of our wavering faith, hoping but never quite sure if He will give us what we have requested in prayer? Either way, our Lord and Savior never ceases to amaze me.

As I had said Tuesday, I committed to prayer asking the Lord for provision and guidance in The Big Idea (not MY Big Idea, THE Big Idea). My heart remained steadfast in my faith that He would answer, but my mind, human as it is, wondered each day how long I would be waiting for that answer. I wanted a clear sign that this idea came from Him, and not just crazy “get me outta here” wish of my own desires.

Throughout the week, Steve and I have not been able to take our minds off of it. We oftentimes found ourselves asking one another “what are you thinking?”, knowing full well as we asked the other that question, we knew the answer. We both were heavy with the thoughts of many details; money, transportation, preparations….it all but consumed us. But never is a negative way. Each time a detail came to me, I could feel a rush of excitement come over me. Of course, books have become my way of dealing with all those questions. I checked out a couple of books pertaining to The Idea, placing a couple others on hold.

Yesterday was the day we were to travel back up to Fort Morgan to pick up the girls from their week-long stay-cation. On our way out, we stopped by the library to pick up one of the on-hold books and Steve and I discussed our plans, I paraphrased things from the book, and I intermittently said “if this is what we are supposed to do.” The question crossed our minds too; Do we share this with the kids? Or do we wait until we know for sure? On the “pro” side, we can include them in the process and they just might love the idea too! On the “con” side, they hate the idea and then blab to anyone and everyone, leaving us to explain why we would do something so crazy!

After arriving to pick up the kids and spending some quality time to visit with our friend and get a recap of the week, we began to gather up the girls and their things. As we were walking out the door, across the property sat their RV. Out of no where, our friend says “You guys want to buy our RV? We’re selling it.” Steve and I looked at each other and immediately knew what the other was thinking. “It’s just coincidental,” we both thought. We decided to take a peek, really just to see what they had, how much they wanted and to get a feel for it.

As we were heading home, Steve briefly and casually talked about their RV. We had not yet decided whether or not to disclose The Big Idea to the girls, when out of nowhere, we heard the Lord speak to us loud and clear through the voice of our daughter, Koti.

“Are we gonna buy their RV? We should! We could buy it and go on the road! We could sell all our stuff, travel the country and homeschool on the road!”

It was short of a miracle I didn’t have a heart attack or that Steve didn’t veer off the road into the corn field. All I could think to say was “I guess that’s our answer.”

So, now we have received our gift of provision. I truly believe that where God guides, He provides. The coming months will entail a lot of planning and preparing, selling and saving. I know there is great difficulty and insecurity in the endeavor upon which we are about to embark. But it is through faith and obedience that the biggest blessings are bestowed upon us and so I know in my heart there will be tremendous blessings and growth waiting for us in this.