Thursday of last week was the end of another era.  The wandering one.   Our months of journeying have begun to be finished as we set out for “home”, an apartment in Redding California where we will spend almost one year sitting with fellow Jesus lovers, learning more of His ways, for us.

This has been a long time of homeless unemployment (as David likes to say!), yet in it we have learned gratitude.  We are blessed to have so much,  though we carried with us mostly only suitcases.  We have been cared for by old friends and by strangers.  By acquaintances and by family.  We have been enfolded by the family of God. In this 170 days of suitcases we have been Elijahs at the brook; fed by ravens, housed in wonderful caves, nourished outside of our own human provision through the supernatural care of God.  As you would expect from rock-dwellers fed by aviaries we are not exactly totally rested but we are at PEACE.

He has met us.

We are thankful.

And . . . . . “to be grateful . . . . Is to whisper a doxology into the darkness”

More thanks:

• fresh fish dinner against the backdrop of the Bay
• laughing children dashing in the darkness of the dock
• more gelato
• conversation that carries
• words from the Spirit
• discernment opening, His thoughts shared
• gifts of prayer, spilled into soul-space
• rained-out morning picnic, and a kindred spirit
• dreams of Egypt
• free dental care
• medical milestones passed
• David’s relief from the splint; graduation to the brace
• American Girl birthday party
• unexpected van ride with friends
• scripture, leaping alive, again
• more good books than we can read
• my husband’s mind in captivity to Christ, even more beautiful than usual
• God-dreams, God-thoughts, crazy love in our hearts ready to explode into the world
• listening to the precious adoption stories of friends; waiting with God for our children
• kids that adapt wonderfully through challenging changes
• heading home to Redding for a precious almost-year of stability
  

We’re in the home stretch of our wandering, now.

Day 164 in suitcases.

I realize that when this is all over it will be half a year of vagabonding . . . .

and I find reason to be glad.

He fills up this, our world, with so many everyday joys and abundances.  How can we not dance?  How can we not lift lip corners with gladness, and smile into laughter and skip a little through the day?

my curly-blond boy, grinning from the back of our borrowed convertible.  What a ride it’s been and what a ride it will be!

more doctors but only one single shot . . . . a reprieve

school applications, apartment searches, car purchase . . . . the future looms good.

friends, friends, more friends.  We rediscover people we love.

“This is the great mystery of the soul.  Whenever something is being accomplished, it’s also in some way being undone.”                           Thomas Moore

Our days fill with last minute appointments, and speaking opportunities, and last lunches with friends, and simply savoring our little town.  God has provided a place to stay in Annapolis now;  a God-offered haven from folks we barely know.  A gift.

So we do the things we love: agree on a last minute picnic with old friends and slurp it up on the shores of the bay, paddle our bodies far into the luscious coolness, and watch the minnows dance on the water’s surface.  We eat cinnamon rolls still warm from the oven with our sandy fingers, we ride home damp and happy.

We head out in the evenings to walk our sweet little town. How we love Annapolis.  We play on old-remembered playgrounds, eat the best gelato in the world, and climb the neck of the Alex Haley statue.  We dream of  calm seas as we caress old wooden sail boats with our eyes,  we pet each dog we pass.

When Sundays come, we drive to Gramma and Grampa’s where the kids love to hang out.  Uncle James chases them with swords and guns, Aunt Ali brings out her newest bunnies for holding, petting and general admiration.  Hope cooks great food for us to share.  Friends next door beckon.  Food is always on the grill, salad always fresh from the garden, our collection of children’s books sits on mom’s “gramma shelves” ready for reading.  The cousins run and laugh and chase and color together.  We remember family; the sweetness of coming-from somewhere, and of belonging there again.

We notice days slipping away as our departure for our year in California nears.  Is this a goodbye? Or just another extended trip?  In some ways it is hard to imagine we’ve really said hello to this east-coast world, and yet we’ve grown comfortable again here too.  We struggle with this final transition, with how to give up on seeing everyone and reconnecting everywhere and just BE for a little while before we’ll BE somewhere else.  We wonder whether to say goodbye or just see-you-soon.

We plan our trip out west, by car; we browse the Ikea catalog looking for that one special bed that will speak “home” to Naomi’s new life, we do the tiresome work of researching health care and car registration and neighborhoods and schools in Redding.  We try to fit in more reading and writing and rithmetic practice for our currently unschooled children who will soon hit academia again.

A new bit of life is about to begin.  Perhaps a catapult season.  I have been resting in the gap between lives for months now, yet there is still much rest my soul needs.  I trust I will find it in the coming months.  Unknown, they sparkle, full of promise.

And we wander forward.

Bundibugyo is ALWAYS close to our hearts.  As our friends and former team leaders, the Myhres, prepare to leave their 17 year calling in only ten more days, much must change.

Heidi, nurse and friend who lives and works in bundi, shares a GREAT overview of the need for prayer in four most recent posts.

http://hlutjens.blogspot.com/

Read.  Pray.