Bittersweet Beginnings of a New Adventure...

A little over eighteen months ago Jason and I decided to make the journey across the country to attend grad school in Denver. A little over a year ago we moved to Littleton...everything we owned packed into a moving truck traveling across the plains of Nebraska...no going back. We dropped his parents off at the airport. As we pulled away I cried. I cried because we were very alone in a very new place...we were starting over and I was terrified.

A little over a year ago I threw myself into this journey wholeheartedly and LOVED it.

A little over a month ago we decided together that it is time to end this wonderful, beautiful, amazing, thrilling, life-changing Colorado Adventure.

We have chosen to not complete the graduate program. We have chosen to once again move everything we own across the rolling hills of Colorado, the Nebraska plains, the fields of Iowa to the mighty woods of Minnesota. We have chosen the simple life opposed to a fast-paced career in the mental health field. We have chosen FAMILY.

In the past semesters I have worked so hard and diligently to move beyond this need for children -- many conversations with good friends over coffee and facebook -- to say "I can live my life to the fullest and not feel empty about this!" And for a season I did. I believe God was working through those moments. He was allowing me the rest and peace that I so desperately needed to get my voice and fight back. I was so tired and exhausted. He gave me energy and the gumption I need to speak out, be a voice for the silenced, and fight this good fight. And I did!! And I still am.

This fall I have felt more free than ever to chose to make my life what I want. I have been freed of the social pressures that so often occur in small town churches in regard to how we ought to live our lives (a wife is to be a mother, and if not, she must work twice as hard to justify her value, if you cannot have children you must work your butt off to improve the lives of others' children). Maybe I placed this pressure on myself, maybe not. I believe it was both I and others. This time away in Denver, where we could work hard to learn more about our calling and our God and could also disappear into the crowds, has helped us a gain a better sense of where we want to go and how we would like our lives to look.

In the past I was afraid to pursue my desire to begin foster care or adoption because I knew I was being pressured by others, probably not intentionally, to make this decision. There were well-meaning comments so often given "Well, you could just adopt!" "You should do foster care!" "There's always adoption!!" I felt that that was expected of me. I was terrified. What if I did that and then I hated it? What would that do to the children? Would I feel more accepted and included if I did that? Is that the reason why I'd adopt or do foster care? if so, that is wrong!  There was also this underlying current of doubt I felt around me. Here I was talking about how desperately I wanted children, and others seemed to be thinking If you want children so much why don't you just..adopt, do IVF, do foster care...You say you want children but...I'm not seeing it.

When we left Minnesota we were certain that this, Denver Seminary and grad school, was where God was calling us. He had opened so many doors and we felt such peace when we began school. We were learning and learning and growing together as a couple, as well as individuals in the community. I have no doubt that God was calling us here. I have no doubt that this is where we needed to go, where he wanted us to be.

Jason and I had always been committed to where God was leading us. Even in our vows we said that we would follow God's leading and plan, wherever and whenever it took us. This is what I would like others to understand:

 We are committed to God's leading, not to Seminary.

There was much prayer and discussion as we made the decision to travel to Denver. We had started out with the agreement that we would stay here and pursue this degree as long as God was calling us to. If, together and indivdually, we felt called some where else, we would go. No matter how long we had been here. No matter how much time we had left. No matter what the cost. God is bigger than degrees, money, salaries, titles and letters behind one's name.

Many people might look at me and say "Why would you quit something so great? Why would you give up all that you could have -- bigger paycheck, degree, status, your own office, you name on publications, a counseling practice, a great house?? You are so close! You could really benefit from this degree in your future career and life, especially in this economy! Why give all that up?"

Let me tell you, it is not easy. We have wrestled with this for quite some time...and not always comfortably. There have been many sleepness nights, late night whispered conversations and anguished prayers. I have been trying to put to rest this feeling that our time here is done. Believe me, I want to finish. I was reading in the Denver Seminary magazine about the 13 recent graduates who are on the "Who's who" list this year. I thought Oh, God, that could be me. I could be that person! I could be on a prestigious list. I want that to be me. I could land an amazing intership and get my lisence at a prominent facility! What am I doing?

But when I look at my life and what my heart desires and where I see myself -- where God is pulling me toward -- I see something different. I still feel that I do not need children to compete my life. The lessons that I learned semesters ago --"I can live my life to the fullest and not feel empty about this" -- still remain. It's as if God is saying, "You laid it down and I am proud of you. But now you are freed  do go after the life I have created for you. Children or no children. Run after it like you have never ran before, girl!"

I am called to a simple life. A life of slow, easy days; breeze swirling around in my hair, laundry drying on the line, cooking and baking my afternoons away. I am called to a life of mothering -- in whatever capacity that means. Walks in the woods, leading Bible study at church, leading support groups for post-abortion, infertility, miscarriage and stillbirth. Being an advocate for the special needs community and their families. i am even lead to coupon for charity!

More recently the idea of foster care has been placed heavily on my heart, and Jason's. And I have come to see that the time of laying down our desires for children and our feeling the need to have children was needed so that God could work more freely in our lives. It was needed so that we would allow God to work in the capacity that he chose, rather than us telling him how and where to work. We were so focused on what we didn't have, what we wanted, rather than how God could use and and what we already had. We needed to lay down what was hindering us in order to more more freely.

And imagine that! The thing that we so reluctantly laid down is the thing that God is pushing us to pursue! I believe, with all my being, that had we not come to Denver Seminary, we would not be so free to move in that direction. We would not have met those that we did, had the conversations that we did, heard the messages that we did...all these things added together builded up in a tidal wave within us -- giving us direction as God spoke through every word while we were here.

Understand this: 

Both worlds are right, just, and Godly. Both worlds are places I could be and be amazing in. It is not a question of wrong or right, greater or lesser, my will vs God's will for me. It is a question of where God is leading my heart. And I have just realized this life, this life of private practice, clients, liability insurance, confidentiality paperwork, office hours -- is not the life for me. It could be, but it is not...I want to be a wife and mother who takes great care of her family and home. It's not lesser or greater. It's just different. And it is me. I could easily finish grad school. I'm not failing -- not even close. I'm a great student, and proud of that. I am just called to something different.

I know it's not going to be easy or painless. I know that it's going to be a lot of work, but what good things aren't?

Jason keeps reminding me that this time was not a waste. And he's right. Not finishing does not equal failure. We have met some amazing people here. We have learned so many incredible lessons. We've had some wonderful adventures and grown so close together. We have decided, through our experiences here, that we want to pursue adoption and foster care. What's more amazing than that? Yeah, we won't get a piece of paper that says what we've learned but our souls spill over in amazement with joy and wisdom.  

Just last night God used a man at the church food shelf. This man had recently graduated from Denver Seminary, from the same program that we are in right now. He was going on and on about following God in faith, even when the world and the church may not understand. How we need to give up our lives for what Christ is calling us to and how that might look differently that what others expect. He prayed that we would follow Christ in faith -- wherever he leads us -- that God would bless us with children (!!!) and that God would bless us in our "journey."

I am confident that he was offering us encouragement to stay in school. But as Jason and I pulled away we looked at each other and laughed! We felt such a strong reassurance and peace from God that we were going in the right direction in our plans for discontinuing school. God works in crazy ways to bring his message to his children -- even in people who are trying to give another message. Faith to do what God asks even when it seems against logic and reason to others...

This man said that he and his wife would be praying for us each week. I know that they will. And I am excited to see what Jesus has in store for us as we journey on from here. I would also like to one day find this man again and tell him all about his prayer for us and how it impacted our lives!

I am ready to discover and enjoy the simple life that God has for me, has had for me all along.

be ready for some amazing adventures coming soon!!