Learning, Planning and Stuff

We’ve had a busy few weeks full of challenges and answers to prayer.

We’ve seen letting agents for our house, submitted our applications to become mission partners with our church and started to think through vaccination programmes for the children.

I’ve also added some FAQ’s to the blog. Do have a look and do remember to subscribe to this blog for automatic updates.

There seems like so much to do and it’s really overwhelming sometimes; but we keep putting one foot in front of the other trusting that God will guide us on what to do next and give us enough time to do everything.

I recently found this thought from UCB really helpful:

Who Are You Depending On?

'My help comes from the Lord...' Psalm 121:2

If you desire to do God's will but don't draw on His power, you'll fail in spite of your skill, your connections and your resources. You must develop an increasing sense of dependence on God. Now you can't just sit on the sidelines expecting Him to do everything for you. You've been called to step out in faith, obey His instructions - then trust Him for the right results. God-sufficiency should become your goal, not self-sufficiency! This calls for praying, 'Lord, I'm tempted to do things in my own strength, but I don't like the results. Teach me to strive for excellence, not omnipotence; to maximise my talents and minimise my ego. Remind me that You will never give me an assignment that doesn't require obedience, commitment, and Your enabling grace.' The Psalmist cried, 'My help comes from the Lord.' Think: if He's Lord of every situation and He's promised to help you, then your victory is assured. It's when you think you can do it without Him, or with limited input from Him, that you get into trouble. Jesus said, '..."The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do..."' (John 5:19 NKJV). Jesus knew He couldn't do anything apart from the Father, so He never bothered to try. We, on the other hand, quote the verse, '...without Me you can do nothing' (John 15:5 NKJV), then go out and act like it all depends on us. And what happens? We fall flat on our face. So learn to stop regularly and ask yourself, 'Who am I depending on?' Then answer, 'You, Lord!'

February

One of our biggest next steps is for Allie to take Andrew (17) and Harry (10) out in February for a visit (Becky Longman (17), a friend of the family, will be joining them as well). Whilst for Caspar (4) and Felicity (3), home is where Mummy and Daddy are, for Andrew and Harry, this move is going to have a massive impact on them. As such we feel it is reallyimportant that they get a chance to see where they’ll be moving to.

Flights are being reserved, vaccinations booked and passport forms filled out…all in faith as we don’t actually have any money for this trip. The total cost is likely to be just under £4,000!

This is going to be a common theme for the next few years I suspect. However we have really seen recently how God provides what we need, when we need it…so I guess the money will turn up when we need to pay for these things.

Please pray for us to have peace about God’s provision and timing

Stuff

For a little while now we’ve been wrangling with whether to store or ship our belongings…both of which are really expensive options. However, recently, we’ve felt really challenged about our ‘stuff’. And it’s not our stuff; it’s God’s and we should hold on to it lightly.

That’s all well and good until you find yourself in a situation where you’re talking about getting rid of most of your stuff…then it’s just really scary!!

Please pray that God will help us to hold on lightly to ‘stuff’

Learning

Allie’s been great at making contact with so many people in Burundi and the UK who have experience of living in Burundi. Their support and advice has been wonderful.

Please give thanks to God for providing us with some many great friends and advisers

We’ve also been eagerly reading ‘Funding The Family Business’, which is a ‘how to’ guide to raising finances and living off gift income. Its bible based approach is really helping us to adjust to a very counter-cultural way of living.

Planning

Finally, despite my moan at the beginning, the planning is going well. I have managed to change my working hours so that I now have one morning a week to prepare for our move.

Please give thanks to God for how EDF have been so accommodating with our plans.