And so it begins…

… the second chapter of our lives in Macha. In just one week, we will begin our journey back to our Zambian home. You know that little verse in the book of Psalms – the one that says if you delight yourself in the Lord, he’ll give you the desires of your heart? I wonder if we have messed up the translation from Hebrew to English. I would like to think that it really should say, “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he’ll make his desires for your life become your own desires.” In the past few months, I’ve had many people ask me, “Seriously, how could you move your entire family to rural Africa? I don’t get it!” My response is always, “How could I not? There is nothing else I would rather do than exactly this!” (And, just so you know, Arja feels the same way!) I guess that’s a pretty sure sign that God has shaped our desires to line up with his!

Speaking of things I can’t imagine – the other thing I can’t imagine is our family doing this alone. When we first moved to Zambia in January 2009, we went alone! Sure, we served under a fantastic organization that had lots of infrastructure and we were part of a community in Macha that helped us learn the ropes. But at the end of the day, we were alone in our roles. This time, we are thrilled to be going as a team with Joel and Julianne Percy and their boys, Micah and Caleb. This is a family we have spent years getting to know. Joel and I started working at The Meeting House the very same day. Joel and Julianne introduced us to Southern Africa when the four of us visited Zimbabwe together in 2007. Joel was my manager for several years. We visited Macha in pairs (Arja and Julianne in 2013, Joel and I in 2014). And for the past few years, we’ve dreamed of doing this together. It’s hard to believe that in less than a week, we are actually doing this… together. (It’s a good thing we all like each other and our skills compliment each other!)

And speaking of teams – there’s another aspect that I can’t imagine this without – our team of supporters. To those of you who are supporting us financially, in prayer, in logistical details and in emotional support – we honestly could not do this without you all. We have been overwhelmed by the support we’ve received from our community. And that “community” has expanded significantly through this process. When I used to think about the process of “partnership development” (that’s the nice way of saying “fundraising”), I dreaded the idea. I thought I would hate it. I thought it would be a brutal job. I thought we couldn’t do it. Man was I wrong. It was an incredible experience. Seriously. It was exciting… humbling… invigorating… exhausting… and a thoroughly encouraging experience. I wouldn’t trade it for the world. And I’d do it again in the future.

We want to say “Thank you” (and we’ll keep saying it, over and over again). Thanks to all of you for being a part of this. Thanks for caring, contributing, praying, reading, writing and loving us! If I listed all the ways we have felt supported, this post would be way too long (it probably already is).

So, with that, I’ll just quit. This is the “crunch” week anyway. We are madly organizing, packing, saying goodbyes and just generally getting ready to start the next phase of this wild ride of our lives in Zambia!

Oh – and this blog – this is just the place where we’ll share personal stories. Look here for various posts – really wordy ones from me, short pithy (and probably more interesting) ones from Arja, photos, videos and hopefully stuff from the kids, too!

If you want to get our official newsletter (that’s the place where we’ll share more formal stories about the community at MICS), make sure you are on our mailing list. You can sign up here.