Old Faithful

Old Faithful is a cone geyser located in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. It merits its' name because of it's predicable eruptions. Old Faithful will erupt 65 minutes after an eruption lasting 2.5 minutes, or 91 minutes after an explosion lasting more than 2.5 minutes.

Two choices: live in Vancouver where home and our short history was, or live in Southern Ontario where our family was. This was the decision Andrew and I faced a year and a half ago when we were thinking about where to live after we got married.

After lots of prayer and contemplation, we felt that God was leading us towards Ontario for three specific reasons:
1) Spend intentional time with our immediate families, since we doubt we'll be in Ontario long-term
2) Be intentional about getting to know each other as husband and wife and building a strong marriage foundation for decades to come
3) Be local to 'do life' with many life-long friends, instead of always playing 'catch-up'

Well it's been 7 months. So far we've been blessed to have spent loads of time with family! Andrew played on a hockey team all winter with his brothers, we've been to Ottawa twice to visit my sisters, lots of Hill family dinners and trips up to Listowel to visit the Hartungs. Andrew's youngest sister has spent a couple weekends with us in Kitchener and recently joined us for our roadtrip to Florida. It's been awesome!

We're so thoroughly enjoying being married to each other, building healthy communication habits, joyously (most of the time!) sharing life together, learning to make decisions together and getting to know each other better and better. We've read some solid marriage books, and are working through Mark Driscoll's recent Real Marriage sermons. We're learning how to work through conflict and being challenged daily with humility and lessons in selflessness.

So many fun times with friends! Games nights, birthdays, coffee dates, hockey... and a summer of 7 weddings coming up... we're loving time spent with old friends!

Yet, there are some big things that I love about life that are missing.
Urban culture.
Beautiful environment.
Being part of a Jesus-loving church.
Local outdoor rec - hiking, kayaking, biking.
Working with youth, especially urban Aboriginal youth.
The ocean. Mountains.

It dawned on me this week.
God didn't lead us to Kitchener to be active, to love the city, to be passionate about our jobs and community involvement. He didn't call us to a specific church. He didn't call us here to work at jobs that we love.
He called us here for our family, old friends, and to build our marriage. And that's exactly what is thriving right now.

So he IS faithful! I have been thinking for months that Kitchener just sucks, or we have the wrong attitude about being here or we're doing something wrong.

But no, God is providing exactly what he purposed us here for. And we are being challenged daily to not complain about what's missing, but living fully in what his purposes are. (And hoping like crazy that there are mountain-bound adventures in our future!!!!)

He's never going to lead us somewhere and not have a purpose in it. He is faithful to fulfill his purposes. And I need to keep my eyes and heart on HIM and not me.

The Sweet Spot

While visiting a local church this morning, we were surprised to be there for the lead pastor of 9 years announcing his resignation to the congregation. No scandalous secret sin, no conflict, he had simply become tired of filling a role that didn't allow him to use his God-given gifts. Instead of never ending meetings, budgets and other executive responsibilities, he takes joy in teaching, preaching and loving people - pastoring the church. He is hoping to remain on staff at the church, but in a role more suiting for his gifts.

Beautiful. He had my respect.

He said, "I want to serve through my sweet spot instead of persevering through every day."

Our goal with moving to Ontario for a year after getting married was to spend intentional time with family and Ontario friends because we sense we may not end up living here long term. And that part has been awesome! Neither Andrew or I have lived in Ontario for longer than 4 months since 2007. I'm loving getting to know his family more and he's enjoying spending time with mine. It's great spending time with friends that we haven't seen regularly for years. And we have seven weddings of friends/family this summer - and we can actually GO to them without having to buy airfare!

God's given us some pretty interesting jobs for the year. Andrew is a youth care worker at Hope Manor, a youth jail. I'm a child and youth worker / educational assistant with the Waterloo School Board, right now working in a classroom of 6 students with learning profiles such as autism, intellectual delays and other learning disabilities. Both jobs that are definitely interesting and require us to use our brains and hearts. We can do them and find success but... not our niche.

I yearn to build relationship.
To share life.
To share wisdom and teach.
To mentor and disciple.
To be able to openly share faith without political barriers.

My heart aches for the west coast.
For beautiful East Vancouver.
For glorious mountains.
For culture beyond industry and farming.
To work out of my sweet spot, and not just persevering through every day.

Passion + Gifts + Need = Sweet Spot.
Passion: mentoring through relationship, pointing to Jesus
Gifts: compassion, encouragement, [some] wisdom, teaching
Need: ____________ (where, God?)

So, where's the sweet spot? Not sure at yet. But oh, it will be good when we get there.

And the journey continues!

My last post was one year, two months ago! YIKES!
I'll tell you why!
Life was slow.
Then it FLEW.
Then it got slow again.
Here's a little photo essay:

Packed up and left Vancouver in June

Drove across Canada to Ontario 

Got married!

Drove to Newfoundland for our honeymoon

Set up home in Kitchener, ON 

My mind feels alive when it is actively writing. I need to write, I want to write, even if for the sole purpose to figure this life out. And perhaps I may inspire even the tiniest bit along the way. 

I'm back!