Thursday, July 28, 2011

Journey to Africa~ Part 1

The past week has been a week of many thoughts and just plain "mind" busyness! I have SO much going on that sometimes I just sit and let them sift through my heart. I have lost many hours of sleep with them all! HOWEVER, it has been a time of prayer and dependency on my Savior like I have never known before! He has drawn closer and closer to me because I have been laying it all at His feet and have actually LEFT it there instead of trying to take it back! WOW, it works!

As you will find after reading this post, our family is going to go down a treck we have never tread before!  Please pray for us in the coming weeks!  Although THRILLED with an opportunity of a lifetime, our minds can overtake us with fear and dread of the unknown!  Now, for the "scattered" thoughts of my mind!

In less that 2 weeks, my oldest son and daughter will be leaving their predictable, comfortable home in America.  They are going on a journey that we NEVER thought possible!  They will be headed to Malawi, Africa!  Not with mom and dad, grandparents or ANYONE else that we "know" per-say!  My home-educated, "sheltered" teenagers, will be going this alone!  Neither of them have ever been in an airport, and only traveled to the south (In america that is!)!  We are being stretched and the rubberband will only continue to stretch further until they return home 6 weeks later! 

How did this all start and come to be?  Well, it started with mom (that would be me) saying in a VERY firm, matter of fact sort of way to my 15 year old daughter, "NO WAY ARE YOU EVEN GOING TO THINK OF GOING TO AFRICA NEXT YEAR!  YOU WILL ONLY BE 16 YEARS OLD!  IF YOU THINK I WOULD ALLOW YOU TO DO THAT, YOU ARE WRONG!  I WOULD NEVER LET YOU DO THAT!  MAYBE WHEN YOU ARE 18 OR 19 (OR 30) YOU CAN COME AND TALK TO ME ABOUT IT AGAIN, BUT FOR NOW, NO WAY!" 

Well, needless to say, my daughter is 16 and the plane tickets are bought and she is going to be headed to Africa on August 9th.  It's not that I gave into begging from her or anything of the sort!  In fact she never said another word about it after I layed my foot down.  HOWEVER, God got a hold of my heart.  I was folding clothes about 2 hours later chatting to myself about how she even THOUGHT I would consider sending my child away, and then He gently spoke to me in that "daddy" sort of way... "Do you really want to stop MY plan just because of your fears or will you listen to MY ways and rest in Me!"  And that is when everything changed!  I asked my daughter to come with me to talk to dad about it and the journey of God's perfect provision began...

Stay tuned to part 2!
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