I wanted to open this post with a quote from some very wise friends, who said over and over that "It's not about the destination, it's about the journey. It's never a straight path from A to B when you are dealing with God." Boy, has this been our experience in this journey! (To hear about the beginning of this, read the post before this one.) This has truly been a very different journey than anything we have ever experienced before. Nothing has happened the way we thought, how we thought or when we thought. But, this has driven us to our knees with a deep desire to better know this adventurous God, who loves us more than we can possibly imagine, who desires to give us things that this world can't steal, or destroy. We have spent much of the almost 4 years of this journey confused and continually amazed. If I were asked to summarize everything that God has been teaching us down to just a couple of points, they would be this. 1. Don't put God in a box. He is HUGE. He is endlessly creative. He is full of adventure and goodness. He is fully just and yet full of grace and mercy. And He is God and He can do whatever He wants to do, however He wants to do it. He is more interested in shaping our characters and making us more like Jesus than how comfortable we are in our circumstances. 2. He is worth surrendering ALL that you have to serve and follow Him. He doesn't waste one single tear in our lives. He never withholds ANYTHING from us....not even His own son was off limits. How can we give any less back to Him?! And finally 3. It is not about the destination, but about the journey! Keep your eyes on Him because it isn't a straight line from A to B!
We got to Austin the beginning of May and began to unwind and partially unpack and try to get to know the lay of the land. I have to say that as much as the first 3+ years of this journey have been tough and confusing, these past 3, almost 4 months have been even more so. We came here, loaded with specific verses and promises from God and fully thought that He would put Jim's job into place quickly, we'd make friends quickly and become a part of that "keep Austin weird" landscape that we'd heard about and grow organic food to our hearts content. Oh, that God, what a kidder! First, I NEVER anticipated the absolute GRIEF that we would go through after we moved here, missing our church and friends and, much to my surprise, grief from old wounds resurfaced as well. We found ourselves not only grieving the recent losses but old losses that we thought were healed....some from the first church we were at for many years in Colorado, some from the loss of my dog, Jake and then discovered there were hurts in our family and marriage that needed to be healed as well. We found ourselves experiencing this unique dynamic of amazement at what God had done to bring us here, amazement at actually being here on this adventure but then on the other hand, this deep grief.
The grief from the old church stuff, for me, made it extremely difficult to be open to any of the churches that we went to, even the one that was planted by our amazing church at home. I never realized, until we got here, at how blessed we were that God got us into New Life back at home so quickly after the mess at our old church. We had the benefit of knowing at how New Life tried to come alongside of us during that awful time and knew their character to be sound. We didn't wrestle for long with where to go and were they healthy and have integrity because God revealed all of that quickly and the healing we received there was truly miraculous. But now we were in a completely new place and all of those questions were coming up like crazy as we tried out several really good churches. I didn't want to go through that old church experience EVER again and really had a hard time until Jim pointed out that if we could trust God in all of the other areas of our lives, we could trust Him in this too. I hadn't realized that this was something I wasn't trusting Him in and to do more surrendering of my plans to His.
Another interesting piece in all of this is that because we weren't tied to a specific church, we weren't making any new friends here. We were rapidly entering the summer phase here in Austin which means people hibernate in the a/c or live at the pool. Jim was able to get into a men's small group that our mortgage guy and friend, Tim, was in and that was great for him as he got to know a few men but I was pretty isolated and didn't have the opportunity until recently to meet any new women friends.
Then there was the job hunt piece...the one piece we thought was going to fall into place quickly but didn't and we went through the myriad of emotions and questions..."Did we make a mistake and hear Austin when God said Boston?" We didn't make a mistake as God would later affirm but at one of our down moments of trying to figure out why all of the doors seemed solidly closed no matter what we did, we briefly thought outside of the box and applied for a job that came up in an unusual way that was out of the area (I will share that story later). The amazing thing about this job has been that it's totally where Jim's passions lie. God had made us a promise during this journey that He had "the best job in the whole world" for Jim. A job with "nice people" and a "good place to work." But, while researching Austin, we determined that we couldn't make a living doing what he loved in such an expensive area and moved on to jobs that he would enjoy but would take care of us financially. This out-of-the-box job would bring us back to what Jim's passions are and how God has gifted him. But this wouldn't strike us until about 1 month later as we both quickly forgot about that job and applied for every other job in the Austin area, all to no avail.
I'm going to skip some pieces of how God brought this job back on our radar and share those a little later but about 1 month ago, God began to put some different things into place. We had just gone from 17+ outstanding job applications down to 2 or 3, 1 of them being this job. As we were talking over what to do next, we began arguing over following up on this job. My point was yes, it's out of the area but it's still open so let's let God close it and Jim's being that it was just a distraction and he didn't want to waste any time on it. At some point, unbeknownst to me, later that day, Jim was praying about what God wanted us to do next and said that he felt this job was a distraction so if God wanted us to consider this, then have them call him. A few hours later, the phone rang. Jim came out of the office area totally laughing and said, guess who just called? Holy cow, talk about TOTAL confusion! They wanted to do a phone interview w/him a few days from that one. We seriously spent the rest of the day in complete shock because we were supposed to be in Austin, right? And God is never unpredictable, right? Over the next few days, we began to pray about this and ask God to show us what to do. The day before the interview, I listened to 2 different messages by 2 different pastors, both sharing similar topics having to do with how our God is a BIG God and the second you start to put Him into a box, He does something differently, etc. We also began to realize at how far away we had gotten from Jim's passions and how this job, as we began making a list of the things he wanted to do, checked every box and then some.
We still didn't know what to do with the Austin piece yet but Jim went into the interview the next day anyway. After telling Jim that his resume' leapt off the page at him, he was asked why did he apply for this job if he thought God had called us to Austin (Jim had shared the unusual nature of how this job came onto our radar w/them and what we thought was a possible calling to Austin). I'm not even sure what Jim answered him but needless to say that became the burning question for us to get answered before we went any further with this organization. We spent the next week+ praying and seeking God's wisdom through listening prayers as well as trusted friends and family who had been a part of this journey with us. Did we actually fulfill God's purposes for us in Austin or did He have further things for us to do here? Did He really want us to consider this job and could/would He actually move us a 2nd time? Did we hear him correctly the first time or did we make a mistake? The more we prayed and sought His wisdom, the more He revealed to us. Our purpose in moving here was for our family...to have hurts be revealed that couldn't have been revealed back in Colorado Springs while we were distracted by Jim's job, selling our house, school, etc. He wanted us here where we had no one and nothing but Him to look to and listen to, where He could bring these unknown hurts up and heal and strengthen our family and our marriage. There were no promises about Austin that He had given us, other than He wanted us here and would we obey Him. Yes, He did not only want us to consider this job but we all heard many times over the next few weeks that Jim would get this job and that this is the job God has for Him. No, we did not make a mistake in moving to Austin. And yes, God is a BIG picking God and He can call us to move again if He wants. He needed to get our attention and needless to say, now He has it.
So, here is the point where everything is now going to fall into place and Jim is going to be told he's going to the next round and soon we'll have a job offer, right? Wrong again....at least, not yet. We received a very confusing letter a week or so ago that they were moving forward with 2 other candidates but will be keeping Jim's resume' on standby as their third option should the other 2 not pan out. We went back to God over and over and over on this asking, are you sure that Jim is going to get this job because it sure doesn't look like it. Last week, all week, I felt like the wind had been punched out of me. God had been affirming up and down that this was the job but the letter said otherwise. Did we hear correctly or had we been taking too many vitamins? I seriously doubt that I'll ever be able to do justice to the amount of stress, turmoil, anxiety, etc that we have had throughout this process in trying to make sure that we were hearing God correctly. We have NEVER gone through anything like this before. If I weren't completely sure that God loves us more than we can ever possibly know or understand, this would feel cruel. But God is not a cruel God. He is loving and amazing, creative and HUGE. He's gotten us through the worst losses and betrayals, cancer and this journey. He's not about to let us down. I believe He's about to come through in such a huge and miraculous way that many will marvel at how He does it. One of the verses that He gave us about 1 1/2 years ago was Psalm 20:1-5:
"In times of trouble, may the Lord respond to your cry. May the God of Israel keep you safe from all harm. May He send you help from His sanctuary and strengthen you from Jerusalem. May He remember all your gifts and look favorably upon your burnt offerings. May He grant your heart's desire and fulfill all your plans. May we shout for joy when we hear of your victory, flying banners to honor our God. May the Lord answer all your prayers."
He has told us to boldly proclaim it so we are. We are standing in faith that our God will come through and He will give Jim a job (this job) that is filled with his areas of God given passions and giftedness because God made us a promise and He always keeps His promises. Will you stand with us?
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