The first week

We sent out our newsletter this week and it was really exciting! A relief, too, in some ways...to finally be able to put action into something our hearts are longing for and our minds are constantly dwelling on.

It has been SO ENCOURAGING to get e-mails from our friends and family--telling us they love us, that they are praying for us, that they are exciting for us and can't wait to see us learn and grow. It is always humbling to recognize that people love us just because of who we are, and not because of what we bring them or do for them.

THANK YOU, to everyone who has written to encourage and love on us, and to those who have already pledged their financial support. We love you so much.

THE WHY

I am writing our newsletter today, and finding it hard to articulate what I feel in anticipating this trip. I want everyone to know that we are incredibly excited about serving--how amazing that these gifts and desires that we have will be used for a greater purpose than for our own gain!--but even though we don’t know the extent of it or how He will do it, we know that we are going to be greatly humbled by this trip. The truth of the matter is that we are, as Brennan Manning says, “beggars, showing other beggars where to get the bread.” We recognize that at the very core of our being, we are compelled by a Love that was given to us before we ever asked for it, by the huge, sovereign God who made himself small enough to pursue us and be in relationship with us. This is why we want to pursue and be in relationship with others, and we are grateful for this opportunity to do this in a new way.

A NEW KIND OF ADVENTURE

As a married couple, this is a new kind of adventure for us. In a little over three years of marriage, we have worked together in church ministry, primarily with college students, and that has been our focus.

That focus began shifting last summer, as we saw ourselves less involved in one particular demographic and more involved in building and facilitating strong community, leading small groups and pursuing deeper relationships with friends. At the same time, God was demolishing our ideas of what it means for us to live here in America. Our trajectory was becoming career, money, the white-picket-fence and 2.5 children, but it suddenly began to turn in another direction. Simultaneously, we were both finding that we wanted the picture of our lives to look a little differently. When we actually started talking to each other about it and realizing we were on the same page, we decided that what "different" looks like for us is living smaller and wiser, making community, generosity and compassion our goals and letting career, money, home and family fall into that path instead of the other way around.

The two biggest decisions that came out of this paradigm shift were that Mikey went to part-time so that he could work more on church ministry, and that we decided to spend summer 2009 in Africa.
Our two dreams and desires for this trip: to be useable and used in whatever way possible and to detach from some of the busy-ness, materialism and NOISE that we find ourselves consumed by here at home.