The Long Haul
My favorite! Another guest post from Chris. I hope you enjoy a bit of his perspective on our waiting for the walk sign. -Rose
When Rose and I were first married she had one more year left to finish at the University of Oregon and I had a job up in the Seattle area. That means that we had to live 300 miles away from each other for the first year of our marriage. Not a fun way to spend your first year of married life.
During that time we would see each other every other weekend, as we had done while dating and engaged. Either I would go to Eugene, or Rose would come up to Seattle. If I was driving to Eugene, I would pack a bag for the weekend early in the morning and head off to work. I would work a full day and then leave right after work for my trip down south. With traffic and everything else, I knew I would be in my car for about six hours. I usually left work at 4 pm so I would get to Eugene at around 10 pm.
During that drive the part that felt the longest was once I passed a sign that read "Eugene 27 miles." That would always sound great when I saw it. I would do the math in my head and estimate how much time I had left in the car before I got to see my wife again. I then would creep past and I would think to myself "certainly I am almost there!" Then, after what seemed like 45 minutes of more driving, another sign would go by.
Eugene 24 miles
WHAT!!!
How can that be? It took so long to go three miles? I should be there by now.
I would perhaps speed up a little and settle in for what I understood to be 20 short minutes left of driving. Then, as the road noise thrummed in the car and boredom settled in again time would seem to slowly creep by. On and on it would go until another sign.
Eugene 17 miles
AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!! The city is running away from me!
Obviously that wasn't happening and I always made it safe and sound and happy to be with my wife again. I tell this story because any journey can feel VERY long at times. Sometimes it can be a journey of only 10 miles that can feel like it drags on and on.
Rose and I are at the point where it has started to feel like serving in Spain is running away from us; like I felt like the city of Eugene was running away from me near the end of the long drive. The exception is that we are only just over halfway to what we need in support to leave for Spain. We have been trying to reach churches and individuals for three years now and are currently at 57% support. This is actually pretty average according to ABWE. It just feels so slow. As I call churches and get few responses or I'm told that there isn't any budget left to take on anyone else, I sometimes wonder if I'm just really bad at my new job. Am I saying the wrong thing? Do I not ask correctly? Is the information I send goofy looking or not professional enough? Do individuals not think we are capable of doing missions work so they don't want to invest their money in us?
Those are some of the many things that go through our minds these days. For all of those thoughts, I try to focus on the fact that God will provide what we need when He knows it should happen. And he'll do it despite the things we aren't doing well. Success or lack thereof is not always an indication of God's blessing, after all!
It just seems that we passed a sign that says 43% to go and we have been driving for a very long time and have yet to see the next sign. Please pray for Rose and I as we work through this. It is a challenge that we want to grow in and respond well in. It is tempting to want to go back to something with a consistent and bigger paycheck. We know that would be disobedience so we continue, knowing that God is guiding us and that one day we will be writing these posts from the field. Thank you to all who support us and thank you all for praying for us. It is needed and appreciated.
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