As the days and weeks continued to go by, we wondered just
how the Lord was going to provide the funds for us to purchase our plane
tickets to America. We’re talking
thousands of $ that we don’t have. For
those of you that have been following along, you may recall that we only had
enough funds to remain on the farm in South Africa through this month – April. That’s no joke. Our family also knew that in order to
continue doing the Lord’s work here in South Africa, we would be required to
renew our visas and the kids’ passports this year. Unfortunately, visas must be applied for from
your country of origin – hence the need to head back to America.
My trust in the Lord is very strong and I rarely waiver in
that, but I’ll be honest, as the summer season in America continued to approach
things weren’t looking very promising for us to return to America during the
time we had hoped for…
BUT GOD!
About 2 weeks ago Josh felt a tug in his heart to get real
specific with his petitions to the Lord.
He began believing for and praying that the funds needed to purchase our
plane tickets would arrive in 2 weeks. That
set the deadline for God for Wednesday, April 27th, haha! Okay, okay, I know we don’t give God
deadlines. He operates in His own
perfect timing…but I think you get my point.
Psalm 37:4-5 & 7 “Take delight in the Lord, and He will give you
the desires of your heart. Commit
everything you do to the Lord. Trust Him
and He will help you… Be still in the presence
of the Lord and wait patiently for Him to act.”
Is it always easy to wait??
No! But is it worth it?? Yes!
Josh and I both agreed that we weren’t going to try and take
matters into our own hands. Sometimes
we, as humans, can try to force certain things to happen when we want them to,
but when that happens it just leads to unnecessary frustrations, heartache and
pain down the road. Taking matters into
our own hands is not “helping God out.” Don’t
rush into making the wrong decision. You
will only regret it in the long run. A
little advice - lack of peace is a good sign that you may be a little off track
with a particular direction you are headed or a decision you’ve made. God will help you to get back on track as you
submit all of your plans to Him. Don’t
ever make a major decision without including Him in it.
On the evening of Tuesday, April 26th I received
a message from someone stating that our donation Web site www.Four18.org was not working. I tested it out myself and found this to be
true. It had been a month since anyone
had used the site to make a one-time donation, so I have no idea how long it
had been broken for. I contacted someone
to have this looked into, and by the next morning (APRIL 27TH) it
was up and running again and a $350 donation came in! Then the funds continued to pour in. As I was in conversation with Josh’s mom
about this gift, she informed me that another $200 was being deposited that day
and that another friend of theirs wanted to bless us with a financial gift as
well.
At this point I’m already excited about what the Lord was
doing in people’s hearts, but then He just continued to WOW me! Later that evening, around 7pm, I had
informed Josh’s mom that we’d been watching the price of tickets very closely
and in the last 2 weeks they continued to DROP!! Josh had received a message from Amazon
stating they were forecasted to increase by 45% in the next week but they did
the exact opposite!! Don’t believe every
report you hear, haha! At this point,
each plane ticket had decreased by roughly $200, saving us over $1,000. The prices were the lowest we’d ever seen or
heard of for this particular flight. I
told her we just needed approximately $350 more to purchase our biggest plane
ticket from Johannesburg to Seattle. Minutes
later she messages me again stating that she BOLDLY called a family member and asked
them to deposit the remaining amount needed to purchase these particular
tickets. This family member doesn’t
really understand why we sold everything and left good jobs to move to South
Africa, but they wanted us to get our tickets and agreed to make the deposit of
$350 that day. Then, as I was responding
to her message I received an email notification from PayPal stating that another
$500 was JUST donated online!! At this
point, I was in tears!! The money was
literally coming in ALL AT ONCE at the end of the day APRIL 27TH,
the day we had prayed for!!
God waited until the last minute, but He is NEVER late!!
He is faithful and
honored our heart’s desire.
What excites me the most is that our kids are experiencing
God’s faithfulness and answer to prayers, and they get to see Him move and make
impossible situations possible!! My
heart and prayer is that as they watch us step out in faith and follow God’s
leading in our lives that they will have that same hunger as they grow up, no
matter the obstacle in front of them!
But the surprises didn’t stop there!!
When Josh was getting ready to book tickets, the kids’ tickets
ended up being a combined total of $240 LESS than ours…another sweet surprise
from the Lord!!
To make the announcement official, WE PURCHASED OUR
TICKETS!!!!
We are scheduled to fly out
of Johannesburg, South Africa on Tuesday, May 17th (my dad’s bday)
and arrive in Seattle, Washington on May 18th. We are waiting on funds for our tickets into Boise, so we do not have our exact arrival time for that yet. Our departure date back home to South Africa
is July 19th. We are still short
funds to make everything come together, but we know that the Lord is going to
provide a way.
If you feel led to contribute, you can do so securely at www.Four18.org. All donations are tax-deductible. A huge THANK YOU to those that have generously
poured into our family financially to make this all possible! Also, for those that have been faithfully
praying, we THANK YOU for your hearts of gold.
1 John 2:15-17 says, “Do not love the world or anything in the
world. If anyone loves the world, love
for the Father is not in them. For
everything in the world comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but
whoever does the will of God lives forever.”
We will never be deeply fulfilled or “happy” with the things
this world has to offer. If we place our
joy and hope in God first, He will meet all of our needs. He will even grant our wants, as our
hearts’ desires begin to match up with His will. If we truly place priority on the Lord, chances
are our heart’s greatest desire will not be in “stuff” like having the coolest
iPhone or nicest car on the block, but eternal treasures in Christ. This world can never satisfy our deepest
longings, but if we choose to delight in God’s way, He will always provide
above and beyond our expectations.
Why settle for anything less than that?!
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