Clarity

Hi All!  We are loving it here in New Zealand, although FREEZING in the winter weather. We've already been really challenged and encouraged by the leadership and the staff and what's come up, even during this orientation week.

For example: our leader felt led to talk to the school as a whole about independence, what values independence is based on (I'll give you a hint - dependence on God is a biblical thing!). He challenged us all to intentionally seek vulnerability and transparency with each other and dependence on God.

That was a pretty big challenge for us, especially as we applied that to the issue of our finances and how we were leaning toward leaving the DTS, heading home early, and starting to pursue education in the areas God has brought to our attention in the Solomon's with the money we'd budgeted for our DTS fees. Long story short, though, we've chosen to take what we perceive to be the most extreme route of faith, trusting that the Lord has significant things for us here, and even though the DTS is more than we budgeted, and our long-awaited news on our tax payment is more than we hoped, and all of this is taking hits out of our emergency fund, meaning we will likely come home with about half (or less!!) of the money we'd planned for our "stateside relaunch" and we'll be broke and jobless and carless and homeless and needing to pursue about $40,000 of schooling (insert me trying to not panic here and thinking about how long it took us to save up for this trip!!!), we are desiring to trust God. Full stop.

We trust that if he wants us to pursue the educations, he'll supply the resources. We trust that this season won't be a "waste of money" like we're tempted to wonder. We trust that Proverbs 9:10 means what it says, "Knowledge of the Holy One results in good judgement" and the knowledge we gain of God in this season will provide us with good judgement for all our future seasons. We trust that when God says, "I will supply all your needs" it means just that. And we trust that when he commands, "Don't worry about tomorrow" he means that too!!! Well, we're working on it, at least 😉

As for our education desires: Gabe feels like the Lord has led him to become a Bible Translator. We'll be exploring exactly what education will be needed, but most likely a bachelor's degree with some focus in linguistics. I, meanwhile, feel like midwifery is my calling. So I'm researching what my options are for training and certification in that. And we still both feel strongly that the Lord has directed us to work among unreached people groups, so we'll be keeping our ears and eyes open for opportunities where those three different things intersect.

We just want to keep you posted on what's happening in our lives and our hearts, thanks!