Where We Thought We'd Be Today

If you had asked us 3 years ago where we thought we'd be today, this is how we would have answered...

We'd be living in a nice house in a nice neighborhood (we actually had signed a contract to build a house very similar to this one before God caught our attention and we headed on the path we're on now) ...

Ben would be working construction...
Alisha would be teaching English...
And we would have the cutest dog in the world (this was our dog Jack who got hit by a car and killed 2 summers ago :( )...

We had always been considering missions but didn't know where we would go or with whom, so we figured we would keep going down the "American Dream" path until we knew. Then God used several things to stop this path.

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Francis Chan's Crazy Love. We read it on our 1 year anniversary trip to Florida and were convicted in our pursuit of the American dream and what we thought were our "rights" as an American Christian (i.e. owning a house).

Chris and Evie Jones who were in training with New Tribes Mission (they are now in Papua New Guinea) came and talked to our small group. We were intrigued, so we had them over for dinner and learned more...

And of course, the Bible and prayer...

Through these things, God opened our eyes to the need in the world and our mediocre attitude to it. We realized that we were expecting God to just throw missions in our laps... and truly, we were waiting for that clear, you'd-have-to-be-deaf-blind-and-dumb-to-miss-it kind of calling before making any big steps toward missions We failed to recognize that God already MADE that clear calling in the Bible when he said "Go into all nations." We didn't need to WAIT for one. We also realized that we just needed to take it one step at a time. We didn't need to have our entire life planned out before us. And so we took the first step.

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Alisha graduated from Grace College, we sold some things and packed up and moved to New Tribes Bible Institute in Jackson, MI. So now, this is our house (our apartment itself is 730ish sq. feet so a bit smaller than the house we planned to build ;) ... but hey, we have a gym and weight room and cafeteria and library all in our extended house, so we can't complain). We are so thankful for the Bible training we have been receiving here...
Ben works at Red Lobster...
We are preparing to take the gospel to those who have never heard it...
And we have a sweet baby girl who has brightened up our lives...

Our family of 3...

To be honest, we still grieve the loss of the house we were going to build. It's hard to give up materialism. We still desire it, even though we have peace about giving it up in order to follow God's plan for us. We miss other things too. We wish we could have another dog but know that a dog doesn't fit in our life right now since we plan to head overseas. Ben greatly misses working construction, but maybe he'll get to do that within missions. And once we move overseas, we know we will miss our family and friends greatly. Following God's calling isn't always easy, but we know it's rewarding. Please pray with us as we follow Him, and pray that we would be strong when giving up our desires is hard. Thank you!! Your prayers mean so much to us.