Years Later...

God continues to overwhelm me with His faithfulness in my life. I stepped away from the blogging world to invest time and energy into my marriage- Yes! Marriage!- and my life as a mom. A year (almost to date) from my last blogging entry, I married an exceptional man, Eric. It has been just amazing to watch God continue to work and teach me so much through the journey of remarrying and integrating a new man into my life and my son's life. Due to Eric's love for the Lord and his trust through this process, I have grown in ways I couldn't have imagined. While we were dating, he said to me, "God designed us in a way to allow a LOT of love in our hearts and I would never expect you to stop loving Rich." I knew at that moment that I could marry this guy! He was right too! A piece of me will always love my first husband and there have still been moments of grief that have hit and will probably always hit me as I miss his presence in our lives. However, God has also shown me that it IS possible to love and to TRUST my heart again in a new marriage and with a new life. My love and understanding of marriage has grown in ways I didn't think possible. Eric has shown me the gift of living out adoption and loving a son that was not biologically his, and yet loves him as if he was his own flesh and blood. I have always had a heart and desire to adopt. Watching this process take place through my son's life was amazing. Eric came along at the perfect time in our lives. A time when Ethan was truly seeking and desiring a father figure. I had decided early on that I would never marry just for the purpose of Ethan having a dad, and yet it really has been a gift greater than I could have imagined! Because our children eventually leave us and we desire for them to become independent of their parents as they grow their own lives, I knew that my marriage must be based on my love for Christ and my spouse first. However, I would not marry just any guy. Eric is special and unique in that he always looked at Ethan and me as a package deal. He said Ethan was just a bonus. <3


Since our marriage, we have lived a bit of a roller coaster. We (Ethan and I) packed up and left our city (the only place, other than my college years, that I had EVER lived). We left the support of our amazing church family and my own parents to move to a new city hours away in a new state and crazy Husker fans! ;-) Eric was currently in grad school working on his masters in a field of study I didn't even really understand. It was basically electrical engineering, but he took it a step further with his research in the field of ellipsometry. (I will let YOU look that up yourself rather than try and explain it!) We redid the house he was currently living in trying to make it our own. I painted practically everything and we put in new flooring and updated a bathroom. My husband is VERY handy, but was also swamped with work outside of the home. Yet, nine months into our marriage (after he had completed his master's degree), a job was offered and we packed up everything and moved once again! Thankfully, Ethan is a pretty flexible kid and enjoys adventure. With the life God has given us, we have learned to view it as an "adventure" and are always working on developing that "Perfect Trust".


We moved an hour away to a small rural town that I like to call more of a village than a town. ;-) Having never lived in a small town my entire life, this was quite the challenge. Thankfully, God has continued to show His faithfulness even through my tears and selfish ways of trying to convince both God and my husband that this could not possibly be where He wanted us to settle in and live our lives. I was reminded time and time again through my reading of His Word, prayers, and journaling that I DID, after all, want to be a missionary at one time in my life and we are called to share Christ wherever we land, even if it felt like a foreign land. And, yes, THIS felt like a foreign land. I mean, what grocery store closes at 9:00 at night and is sometimes not open (for no apparent reason) and has produce that, at times, is just not acceptable for buying?! There was not even a Wal-Mart! Not that I am a big fan anyway. I was stripped of all I thought was important and decided that at least I could maybe find some good friends that loved the Lord. Well, this also proved challenging! I spent more nights than I care to admit, crying myself to sleep over my woe-is-me condition and the lack of Christ-loving followers to support me through this new place and new life. However, God continued to show me that HE WAS ENOUGH! We tried every church (putting all denominations aside) in town. Unfortunately, we just could not find a good fit. However, not going to church and just giving up was not acceptable. Not because we wanted to be legalistic about it, but because we knew we NEEDED it to grow in our faith, to fellowship with others, and to minister to others and if for no other reason than we felt like God calls us to be a part and involved in a church body! (Hebrews 10:25- "Not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.") So, we branched out beyond our community and landed for a year and half at a great church we could call home! Through the next year and half, we dove into the village we lived in and started living our lives as best we could in a way that would hopefully represent Christ! We both loved our church away from home, but eventually the driving and the fact that we weren't able to have extra time outside of our involvement there, led us to the decision to leave that church and get involved in a LOCAL church where God had landed us to live. This was another huge step of faith and yet God has completely shocked me with the blessings that have come in just the past couple of weeks of making this decision. So many of the people we have grown to love over the years suddenly began opening up their hearts and homes to us!


This last year, I stepped out and opened our home to women in the community (all from different churches or some not churched at all). I invited them to come to a Bible Study. In this year, I was surprised at the number of women (those who knew Christ personally and many seekers) who came into our home to learn, grow, and maybe a few shake their heads and walk away at this radical woman who had moved into their community. It was a hard year because I didn't see much fruit and I selfishly did it to hopefully find some women that would be able to walk beside me and grow and encourage me as I encouraged them. God used it more for me to trust Him as I watched Him work in the lives of many seeking. He wanted me to continue to just trust HIM for my fellowship. My sweet and very patient husband got to hear probably more words than he cared to about my needs and desires for deeper female companionship. However, once again, in HIS timing He has brought a multitude of women into my life in the last couple of months that have really met me where I am at and been an amazing gift to me as we strive to seek Him first in our lives. I'm no longer the only crazy radical in this village that truly wants to live my life in a way that is not of this world. I am still growing these new found friendships but am thanking God daily for the gift of women that know HIM in my life!! I have also learned that new friendships just take time. We live in a world that TRUST is such a hard thing for so many because there are so many hurts and walls to break down first. I guess that due to the life and hurts God has allowed me to go through, I have learned that life is too short for walls. My life is pretty much an open book! For some, they think that is scary or unwise, but I have seen God use my life by being willing to share the good and the not so pretty. Obviously, I don't share EVERY detail of my life because (let's be honest) no one really cares to know it ALL! But I will press on and share the pieces (and often the hurts) that God has used to mold and make me into a woman that is hopefully becoming more of a reflection of HIM. This will be a lifelong journey. Learning to have that PERFECT TRUST along the way is part of the adventure of knowing Him.
Psalm 9:10- "Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you." NEVER...He never has and He never will! So very thankful!!


Next blog, I will share more about another area of trust God is teaching us as we step forward in the journey of foster care!


"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."~ James 1:27