God put missions on my heart quite a long time ago! I have talked to Adam about it a lot and have prayed about it for years. I have gone to Mexico on several Mission Trips and felt God tugging on my heart and not letting go.  Then, in 2008, Adam came to the realization that he was tired of going to work and feeling like he wasn't accomplishing anything from an eternal perspective. He felt that God was calling him to more. And so it began. Several years of Bible reading, missions reading, much discussion and much prayer, a few bumps in the road and here we are! Nothing official yet, but hopefully, with God's blessing, we will be Africa-bound within the year! We are attending a retreat with ACM International this week and may sign up as Recruit Status Missionaries. We are working with another family that is with ACM on potential plans to work with a ministry that is already established in Ghana on the western side of Africa.

     I wish that I had started a blog or journal a lot earlier to keep track of all of that ways that God has spoken to our family about missions. It has been amazing. This past year I have really worked on praying specific prayers, asking for clarity and obvious open or shut doors, and God has certainly been faithful. One after another after another... Most recently, he has been working on Caeley. In the months that we have been having serious discussions about moving to Africa, Caeley has been upset. She does not do change. At all. And we have had several big changes in our lives the past couple years, so I felt that this might just put her over the edge. However, once again, God has helped with some major changes. We, as well as some of our family friends, have been praying that if God truly wants our family on this path, that he would light that fire in Caeley's heart as it is in the rest of us. She has been slowly seeming to warm up to the idea, and then 2 weeks ago while we were shopping, she said, "Mom, when are we moving to Africa?" And she said it with excitement!!! Then at church last week she made a prayer card, she brought it home, and Adam saw it laying on her bed. It said, "That we would move to Africa soon!!!" Silly me, I wasn't even expecting that big of a change. Why oh why do we tend to limit God when we ask for things? He is so much bigger and greater! Romans 8:28 says, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose."

     While I know there are many difficult things to deal with when making this kind of change in our family's life, I know that we are following the plans that God has for us. Jeremiah 29:11 says, "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord. "Plans to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Our goal as a family is to be sensitive and faithful to His calling. And we trust He will comfort us through the tough stuff. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 says, "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God." I know that this is just the beginning of the tough stuff as I begin to survey what is in our household. Figuring out whether each item is: something that we can do without, something that we can easily replace later, or something that is irreplaceable. It's that last one that I am struggling with. What is REALLY irreplaceable? I let go of our little red wagon a few weeks ago. Something I was saving for the possibility of future adopted children or for little nieces and nephews some day, or heck, even for our grandchildren. Next on that list is our baby crib. It's still here, waiting, but it's gonna have to go, and that's gonna be hard. I am thankful to have so many precious memories, I just need to work on the fact that these memories are not just stored in things. Anyway, enough about the tough stuff, I'm not even going to think about things like the goodbyes yet. Well, at least not too much.