We have been living full-time in the RV for over 1 month. Wow! Where has the time gone and what have we been up to?
Well, that's a great question: what HAVE we been doing with our time? Answer: being filled up spiritually and emotionally, second guessing our decision to embark on a new adventure, reminding ourselves that God actually did speak to us, learning to just rest, and trying really hard to be okay with not being busy. This has been our emotional and spiritual journey this past month. Ohh, man! We spent 10 days in Redding, CA and it was unbelievably refreshing for our spirits. We felt Holy Spirit confirming all of the words he has been speaking to us over the past year. And, we were surrounded many times by thousands of people completely in love with Jesus. It was so beautiful! Then, we left Redding and headed south. We felt like we were leaving the safety net that would protect us if we fell to our doom. Honestly. We were leaving into the complete unknown with absolutely no plans until February. What are we supposed to do? Where are we supposed to go? What will people think of us wandering around California? We knew that this would be our journey. We knew we were entering into a lifestyle of complete trust in our Father God. A lifestyle that would require us to pray a lot and listen even more. A lifestyle that would be unusual to most people; an out-of-the-box life that would bring us to the places God needs us. Knowing all of this doesn't make the quiet, uneventful waiting times easy. We are so conditioned to being busy; to be working and doing and being in endless, exhausting movement. We are trained from such an early age that being busy is equivalent to being productive. I would have to disagree. We have lived many years of busy. We have spent seasons where Josh worked 50+hrs per week at a regular job, we managed a coffee shop, we served regularly at our local church, and had 4 young children (2 of whom were foster kids)... All of this was at the same time! I'm 100% convinced that if God calls you to something, he gives you the grace needed to complete it. We actually thrived during that season of our lives. It was actually in a different season that we began to feel the effects of busyness. When tedious tasks began to get in the way of ministry, we began to feel the tension of burnout threatening the fringes of our family. When our family's peace was threatened, we knew something wasn't right. So, we pressed into what God was speaking to our hearts. I began hearing God say, “striving is NOT a principle of the kingdom of Heaven” and “BUSY-ness is a trap to rob us of the joy of life.” In John it says that the enemy of our souls comes to steal and kill and destroy. Therefore, if our peace and joy were being stolen or destroyed, I knew it was from the enemy. I began to recognize that God was calling us to a lifestyle of rest. And, that is how we land back at the question from the beginning: what have we been up to? Learning to rest and trying really hard not to be busy are actually super difficult! It honestly seems counterproductive to not be busy. But, that's a lie. We are learning to spend quality time with our family...doing nothing. Not really nothing, but not “working”. Just being together. We believe that our kids are our first disciples and we want to train them to listen to Holy Spirit and follow wherever he leads. So, we pray together and we play together. We have gone mini golfing and swimming and chasing geese. We have spent hours in worship and prayer and talking to them about participating in God's Church. None of what I've mentioned sounds like something worth writing home about, but it is the only thing God has put before us. Because of that, we are trying to do it with all the gusto and intentionality of anything we have been a part of in our lives. So, we are writing home about it, so to speak. We are writing to you, our online family, so that you know we are still on this journey and we are still hungry to hear the voice of our Father God… It might not be him giving us specific instructions on where to go. It might simply be him speaking to us deep in our hearts about what is important to HIS heart. And, we want to be totally, 100% involved in whatever that is.
2 Comments
Tiffany
10/29/2018 03:21:33 pm
Guys, thank you for writing “home”! I love this chapter in your lives, and I know the Father does too! I have been contemplating this phrase lately “family is revival”... and if this is true (which I believe it is!)... there’s a great revival happening in your lives, and any move of the Holy Spirit is uncontainable and spreads like a wild fire. This is you- vessels of the uncontainable revival of Jesus!
Reply
Leave a Reply. |
Hello!We're a family of six living full-time in a skoolie (aka a school bus converted into an RV). We are inviting you to join us as we live life to its fullest and empower others to do the same. Welcome to the family! Archives
January 2021
Categories
All
|