Life as we now know it

our new routine…

Our house in Buies Creek is for sale, but we haven’t had any activity on it.  We’re surprised but not anxious.  We know that there is a time component to God’s purposes and so we’re praying for patience.  KJ continues to commute 2-3 days a week working on raising support, getting to know Durham and also working on The City Project (http://thecityproject.summitrdu.com).  On Sundays we drive up as a family to attend church at The Summit.  This has really been a lot of fun. During the drive up we always listen to Family Music by Jason Upton and there is a song on the CD called time to move on that has become our family theme song.  These are good days and we often comment on how much we appreciate our girls’ flexible attitudes – not sure where they came from, but it makes us smile!   After church we usually drive around to explore and look at houses and then go play at a park.  It has been good family time and the girls seem to enjoy it, too.  Liz’s days are full caring for our girls and she has also been helping care for our friends the Moody’s girls while Cali has been in the hospital for the last 6 weeks.  We think it’s pretty cool that in God’s timing we haven’t moved yet and so we are able to support Chad, Sara and their girls in this way.  To hear more about Cali’s amazing story, go to  www.caringbridge.org/visit/cali.

excerpt from our 12.10 newsletter - ordinariness

embracing the ordinary:

The theme for me over the last few months, that keeps coming up through prayer, scripture, books and JD’s sermon series at The Summit (you can listen at www.summitrdu.com) is God’s desire to use humble and ordinary people to show his greatness.  I understand this truth and have learned it through many experiences and have been confronted by it at many times throughout my life – it is a part of my journey, you’d think I’d get it.  Yet I still desire to be extraordinary, in fact my whole life I have tried to resist ordinariness.  God is exposing my sinful and rebellious heart and reminding me of my continual need of a savior.  God has chosen the weak things and people of this world to display his greatness.  He wants the ordinary so that he can do the extraordinary and he’s not looking for me to try to “take it from here”.  This has been a very hard few months, but I see God’s kindness in leading me toward repentance and I see his love for me by bringing me to a place where I have to depend on Him through others (you) to meet all of our needs.  This is humbling.  This does not make me feel extraordinary, but small and unnecessary which is good because it exposes my unhealthy need for validation and my desire to find my value in something other than God’s extraordinary love.  I think the point is that God is extraordinary and doing extraordinary things all over the world.  In fact, we have been experiencing him meeting our financial needs through some extraordinary ways, displaying his supremacy over everything– including the health care industry – now that’s a story!  So, I’m learning to embrace being ordinary and to be amazed by my extraordinary savior – Jesus.  (1 Corinthians 1, 2 Corinthians 4 and 12)