Patty

We started this blog before we moved overseas because I wanted a clear picture of the journey. 

That’s important not only for Tom and I, but for the people following that journey, in the hopes that they could pray with us, keep us accountable as we put decision making in black and white, and also so that people could come on that journey with us. While that means rejoicing with us as we rejoice, it also means mourning with us as we mourn (Romans 12:15). 

While in Europe, we visited three teams – Albania, Kosovo and Bulgaria. 

It was a truly difficult decision, but we decided that the team in Kosovo wasn’t for us. 
The three little ones hugged us goodbye as we got on the bus and one got teary; I managed to make it to my seat before I started to cry too. It’s so difficult for me to put into words the way I felt like I could have been an answer to someone’s prayers, and that I was letting them down, especially when you become so bonded so quickly just over the fact that you’re Christians, and missionaries, and they have shown such hospitality and genuine kindness. 

Then, a few weeks ago, we heard back from the team in Bulgaria.
They were living in a small town that Tom and I couldn’t see ourselves working in, and Sofia, the main city, was too great a distance for us to be a team over. While this was understandable due to different visions, their family commitments (and the fact that the highway is currently under construction, which doubles the travel time), it was a great blow. 

Finally, this morning, we heard back from the team in Albania, who have also said they cannot take us.
Like some dark retelling of Goldilocks, while the team in Bulgaria was too small to support us from so far away, the team in Albania is too big, has grown a lot recently, and were looking for people to support their specific ministry. What Tom and I had been considering (me with education and Tom supporting the local church) was adjacent but relatively disconnected. 

I write knowing that some of those team members may read this post, and wanting them to know that I understand where they’re coming from, and I don’t hold it against them. Wise decisions, by their very nature, can’t suit everyone. Ecclesiates 7:12 says ‘Wisdom is a defence as money is a defence, but the excellence of knowledge is that wisdom gives life to those who have it.’ I hope to have leaders, and maybe one day be a leader, who will have a vision which prioritises the work of the gospel and the life of the team. I trust the people who made these decisions, and more to the point, I trust God when he closes a door. 

However, I can’t deny that this has been genuinely heartbreaking. As I wept when leaving behind a team we didn’t want to join, how much more is the loss of two places where we really wanted to be? I am actively fighting the thought that it somehow wasn’t worth it – the people we met, the time and money we invested, the vision of the future we started to have – just because not having it hurts. 

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. …  Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.

– C.S. Lewis

So now we are back to looking for our ‘just right’. 

My initial prayer was, as it often is, “what do you want from me?”
I’ll admit, about 50% of the time, this is sarcasm.
What the hell do you want me to do?
What could I have done differently?
I thought I was doing what You wanted.
It’s an effort to turn it around to genuinely seeking, like being parked in on both sides and having to make a twelve-point-turn. We need to emotionally recover, and we want to look, open-heartedly, for the next place where we should go, both physically and figuratively. 

Ultimately, I pray that this blog would be a road map of God’s faithfulness. Proverbs 16:9 says that ‘A man’s heart plans his steps, but the LORD establishes his steps.’ I love the word ‘establishes’ over ‘determines’, because it is not just that God is guiding where we go, but he is creating firm footholds for us, he is carving out the path before us. He has walked it before us, and so we will keep following. 

That’s why I chose the title ‘change of course’ rather than ‘change in plans’ – nothing has changed in God’s plan, we are just figuring out what it looks like. Also, such is life – there will always be change, of course. 

Prayer: 

• Future, both ours and the teams in Albania, Kosovo and Bulgaria. Pray that God would provide strength, discernment and courage as we each take our next steps. 
• Finances. With T working at Koorong as he finishes his masters, the budget is tight, and we poured our savings into the trip to Europe. We had already decided to fund the survey mission out of pocket (along with some Christmas gifts from friends and family), so that we could have a clear vision to present before we started fundraising, but now it looks like we will have to do that again. 
• Fine fettle. Googled a synonym for health, so I could keep the prayer points starting with ‘F’. I’ve started regular blood testing, which led me to faint on Friday (so this morning, I stopped by Maccas to pick up a proper breakfast and some water, and it went a lot better). Looking at perhaps starting a new course of medication soon to help.