off to Darwin

We're off to Darwin in a few days. I've started a tumblr just for the trip. I'm hoping to do a short blog each day with some of the highlights of doing a missions trip as a family. You're welcome to follow along at darwinadventure.tumblr.com .

traveling companions

I'm so excited! In just a few weeks time we'll be off on our adventure! This is something we've all been waiting for, not just because we are going to Darwin (somewhere we've never been before, which is really cool. I just can't wait to see crocs in their natural habitat - argh!), but this our family's first missions trip all together. Mark has been on heaps of trips overseas since having kids, and Josiah was born in Japan when we were serving there. But now we have our complete family of five and we'll be doing this all together.
Something we really believe makes up the DNA of our family is changing the world together. We want to raise our kids to have confidence that they can change the world, and we want to do that by showing them the way and including them while we have a go at it ourselves.
So off we're going to Darwin, where our home church has just started a new church run by our good friends Troy and Nicole.
It's got me thinking about traveling companions and journeys. It would be so easy to just jet off on my own, leaving the kids behind, and go on a superwoman world changing expedition, at super lightning speed, nothing to hold me back, no extra bags to carry, no extra mouths to feed, no nappies to change. And believe me - that is very tempting, and may still happen one day!
But for this journey - we are doing it together! And that means things are going to have to go at a different pace, have a bit of a different feel, and have a little extra grace and patience added.
Have you ever been for a long drive with your kids? Lots of potty stops, vomit stops, games of eye-spy, and especially sleeping tigers. The drive definitely has a different pace. You can definitely have a deep conversation with your husband, just with lots of interruptions.
One long drive we had, I made pirate maps for the kids, that led all the way to our holiday place and had pictures of things to circle as we passed them on the way. Other times we've pretended the car was a giant spaceship that sped and jumped and twisted and turned along the way.
What I love is when my oldest has some deep question to ask, and I have hours to explain in imaginative ways the meaning of life, creation, God, space and boogers.
I love that as we journey together, our kids grow up, they learn new things, and we get the chance to walk alongside them and help them to discover things that they haven't seen before. I love that we can pray together. Whether we are building a sand castle together or God's kingdom, we can have fun and enjoy our adventure of life as a family.

embracing life

This morning after pressing snooze on my phone about 5 times, I finally woke up at 6:30 and opened up my Bible on my iphone, which was open at Psalm 139, specifically these verses:

"certainly you made my mind and heart; you wove me together in my mother's womb. I will give you thanks because your deeds are awesome and amazing. You knew me thoroughly; my bones were not hidden from you, when I was made in secret and sewed together in the depths of the earth. your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. All the days ordained for me were recorded in your scroll before one of them came into existence."

One of my favourite Psalms, that I've read over and over - but today it suddenly awoke in me something new, and was just the thing I needed to hear. 

While I struggle with my mind and my heart, He not only knows my thoughts and emotions, but he created my mind and my heart - He understands me intricately, more than I know myself. He has grace for the way I think and feel and act, and though perhaps the way I work/feel/think seems strange to me, He actually created me that way. He knows me thoroughly. He gets me!

What a relief to know that I am loved so thoroughly, so knowingly. He made me, and what he makes is awesome and amazing. Though I don't know how I will get over the hurdles in front of me, especially sometimes the internal ones, He knows. 

He has written a book about me, about my life, every single day, in beautiful intricate detail, about every day to come. And He is the most creative, interesting, deep and thoughtful writer. 

Through all the twists and turns of the story, the low points, the high points, only He knows how the story will end. And all I know is that the ending will be good and perfect.

And so today, though the journey may take me through a dark valley, I will embrace the story, I will endeavor to make it to the next page and the next chapter. 

You are the heroine of His story, and He is your hero.

^{Jeremiah 29:11 - 13} 

For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.