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I have got up, sat down, got up, sat down; probably ten times now after staring at my computer screen trying to figure out what to write.

First off, I am breaking the silence of our blog, so it must be important news, right? ; )

We're moving. Again.

I want it to be a long pretty story about how we feel called and it's just the right thing, and it's very sad and let you feel all the emotion I am feeling but for some reason, today the words don't come.

 

Home (Oklahoma) is a place we said goodbye to when Daniel started Ozark Christian College in Joplin, MO. We had just purchased our American Dream Home, white picket fence and all. Then nine months later, God called us to move.  In 24 hours, everything was different and we were on a new path. We had a house to sell, school to enroll in,  a youth group to tell, friends to tell, and a job to give notice to. Six weeks later, we were closing on our house, saying goodbye, and crying our way to Joplin, MO. Having no idea, what would be next. Daniel would be in school and who knows what we were going to do outside of that.


Now, 6 1/2 years later, two children later, many, many, many different people later, two ministries later, we are moving back. But not back to where we were, back HOME. Back to the only place we have prayed God would never send us. Chelsea, Oklahoma.


Since March, we have been seeking, fasting, fervently praying, seeking again, crying, seeking again, praying, fasting again, then asking again. Nothing.

God, for the first time since we dedicated our lives to him, was totally silent. We have always said, "We'll do anything, we'll go anywhere."  "We'll give away whatever we need, sell whatever we need, go without whatever we need or have whatever you want us to have." "We'll do whatever you ask, just ask." He has ALWAYS called us to something. But for the past six months there has been nothing.


Do you know what that feels like? Hopeless.


Time and time again I have thought of the Israelites who cried out to God to deliver them (Exodus). They were enslaved by Pharaoh begging God to bring them out. Finally, God acts:

Exodus 3: 7-10

God has called Moses on the mountain and appeared to him in an amazing fire inside of a bush.


 ⁷ Then the Lord told him, “I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their cries of distress because of their harsh slave drivers. Yes, I am aware of their suffering. ⁸ So I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and lead them out of Egypt into their own fertile and spacious land. It is a land flowing with milk and honey—the land where the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites now live. ⁹ Look! The cry of the people of Israel has reached me, and I have seen how harshly the Egyptians abuse them. ¹⁰ Now go, for I am sending you to Pharaoh. You must lead my people Israel out of Egypt.”

Well, obviously we (not us, nor you) are not in that type of situation but the fact still remains...

Today, we would ask, or we DO ask: God, where are you. It's been one month, two months, six months why have you been silent so long? Where are you? Don't you care? We start to become depressed, sad, worry full, and lastly, hopeless. God knew they needed him, he heard them, and he waited.

Now, the Israelites were in slavery for 400+ years before God raised Moses to come. Esther waited one year to see the king, Job sat in complete sorrow for two weeks, everything gone.

It's been six months.

But even knowing of the Israelites, Job, Esther and all of the many others, we tend to get caught up in today and start to struggle with God. Wanting an answer today.

Our answer came two days ago. We're moving home.

Last January, God started to turn our hearts towards our hometown. And every time our hearts would turn, our heads turn and look at something better ;) It is the one and only place we have always prayed, God, never send us there. In March, we visited the idea, but it didn't seem right. But looking back, of course it didn't. Our life was rocked upside down and we were having to make choices real fast. So many people, "Come here, go here, work here, help here, rest here, live here, go there." All people we wanted to be with, help, work with, etc. We had hard choices to make. Finally, we just stayed. We just stopped trying to figure it out and decided to just wait.

That is hard.

Finally, two days ago God just started to open up doors for us to move back to our hometown where are parents are. Now, let me preface this with: we haven't lived here since we graduated high school. When we graduated and got married, we were out of there. We moved 30 minutes west of home to a town 15 minutes from Tulsa. This isn't where we bought our "dream home" this is where we prayed we'd never return to. 

I don't know why. It's not a bad place. It's a sweet farming community, and you know we're all about sweet gardens and chickens =) For some reason, we've just never wanted to go back. It's a sleepy town, a quiet elderly community, a place where "everybody knows your name" (and your business ; ) There is a part of me that is strangely VERY excited and a even bigger part of me that is VERY sad. The joy and excitement I have is that we finally know where God wants us for now. In 24 hours, we had a house, a plan, and everything just fell into place. The door to this chapter of our life in Missouri slammed shut and the door to the new chapter opened and we fell through the doorway flat on our faces, praising God for hearing our cries.

We often try to explain God. So I will do that. =) One would think we are going to love on hurting students, families in the community and read books to lots of lonely elderly people. We will be there for our parents and the guilt we have of being so far and unable to help them will leave. But we really don't know why we're going there. We're excited to see.

It's quick. We move Wednesday. I'll start this afternoon when the house quiets down, calling friends and telling them. This was the only way we thought to make a big announcement to get the ball rolling.

Our Alli has her first basketball game of this season this Tuesday, Jordan just started gymnastics, and all the kids love our homeschool co-op. I have my Crazy Bunko Chick ladies and Mom's at Co-Op   Daniel has several students and friends, he has to say goodbye to. Just yesterday, he was asked to come be the Assistant Coach for the Ozark Jr. High girls again this year for Basketball.

We're sad.


My very, very dear friend, Jenny, lives just five minutes down the road. We drink coffee together every week, we laugh a lot, keep each other accountable, make fun of each other, cry together, borrow everything from sugar to toilet paper.  Our kids are as close as can be. And we have to say goodbye.

OK, now I'm crying.

Our friends in Carthage, luckily, will be only 20 min further than they are now. But it's a whole other state and there is nothing to do in our new town, we won't see them as often, we just won't.

And we won't be back. Of course, we will for visits, but not to live. It's going to be a story now. "Remember when we lived in Missouri." Man, it's hard to beleive. 

We're packing up everything this weekend and loading it all up on Wednesday. Yes, this coming Wedensday. We'll drive out that night and unload the next morning at our new house. I suppose I should blog some pictures ;) We'll see.

We're coming back to have a going away party for the kids on Wednesday, November 10th at the Springfield Skate Land. We'll send out information soon. And YES! I will be at Crazy Bunko Chicks Bunko for November. Who knows where it'll be but I'll be there =)

Daniel and I will be planning something for coming to say goodbye personally to people, even Carthage.

After I leave this post, we have a family meeting to tell the kids. 

*Sigh* another change. Humbly embraced. And you know what one of the worst parts are? There isn't even a Wal-Mart in the town. What will we do? =) Oh, the humor.