The ultimate hello
A life update
Hey, hello, and happy 2025!
My archives are telling me that my last post was in September, and it feels like a lifetime has happened between then and now! So I know this will be a little different than the usual content, but I thought it best to give a life update on what has been going on for our family these last few months as well as what we’re looking forward to in this coming year.
Coming to Australia, we knew it was God’s plan for us to plant a church. And, with His leading, we were able to do just that. In 2023, we planted a church and, with much joy and sweat and tears, had the privilege of watching it grow and bloom under His providential care.
I wish I could write all the ways we saw God work in those days. The doors He opened, the ones He closed, all the times He carved a way in our wilderness. I’m sure some of those stories will make it here, but many just feel too sacred and ordinary all at the same time for public consumption.
While we saw God work corporately among His church, we also began to get glimpses of what God was working in us personally — individually and as a family. We knew He was leading us on to the next thing. We just didn’t know what that was. And, in all transparency, I was terrified.
You see, I don’t work well when it comes to unknowns (I can wager I’m probably not alone in this). Certainties, plans, well mapped-out ideas — those are what I can handle. But God doesn’t call us to certainties. He calls us to follow in faith.
As we prayed and sought God, both together as a family and personally on our own, we became more and more certain that God was moving us on. After making the church aware of our plans, we began the process of setting the church up to continue without us and setting our family up as we prepared for our next location.
Shortly after moving our things up to our new location (I’ll get to that in a minute), we boarded a plane headed for Michigan for our first furlough.
I cannot even begin to describe the healing that God has worked in us during this trip. From our first glimpse of Detroit out of the plane window to being a part of the chaos on Christmas morning instead of watching it over facetime. From sharing my family’s favorite winter pastimes with my kids to walking in to a church full of people who are thrilled to see you. It felt like time slowed down and we were able to cram in every single thing we had been missing while living abroad. That’s a miracle that can only be explained by God.
We recently made it back to Australia for our second term. And I can genuinely say that we are looking forward to it.
We will be part of a church in Brisbane where there will be resources to help support our whole family while we work alongside them in spreading the good news of Jesus. It will be a mutual relationship, as church should be. We have good friends there, people who have walked the same path we are on, people who want to grow in grace along with us. Every time we have visited, it’s felt like we belong. And the longer I live outside of my home country, the more I realize what a gift that feeling of belonging is.
With all this transition, I have been learning to hold all these different emotions and thoughts in both hands. With every hello, there must be a goodbye. With every yes, there must be a no. We look forward to what is to come while also grieve the things that we must leave behind. This dichotomy of life, at times, has nearly broken me. How do you live in two places at once? How can I stay present for those in my immediate focus while also making space for the ones I love who are thousands of miles away?
I recently did a study1 on the book of Revelation. I was hit by how much hope God has infused within those pages.
Sure, there are lots of things in Revelation that we don’t (can’t, probably don’t need to) understand. There are warnings and prophecies and symbolism. But there is also so much hope if you look for it.
The theme of Revelation is victory - over death, over our enemies, over this foreign living here on earth. We will no longer be citizens of Heaven who live a life of sojourning. If we have accepted Jesus, we will all be together. With Him. For all eternity! No more goodbyes. No more sadness or confusion. No more yearning to be in another place.
There will be no other place that our hearts will long after. Yet still, that isn’t even the best part! Can you imagine just how wonderful and awesome and humbling it will be to see our Jesus — wounded yet victorious, crowned in all majesty, radiant in all His holy glory.
This hope of reunification is the fuel that keeps me going. Paul’s example in Philippians has become my prayer:
“Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ.” Philippians 3:8
Truth be told, I haven’t lost much in this life of living for Him. And what I have lost hasn’t slowed me down too much. But it is and always will be worth it if I can win Christ. His love, His fellowship, His peace, His presence in all things. It has all been, and will continue to be, worth it. Jesus is worth the pain simply because of the hope He has given me that this pain will not be for eternity — but He will.
We look forward with anticipation to the future God has prepared for us for here in this new home. We look forward to the day when we can be reunited with our loved ones on the other side of the world. But even more so, we look forward to the day when all the people we love who love Jesus, too, will all be with us together under the glory of our Savior.
And that is why we keep moving forward, even when the future is unknown. We go because He has gone. And we will be safe because He will be with us through it all.
“There was a moment when the presence of God was felt as the unease of morning sickness. Don’t be surprised if your current unease is that exact same avenue of presence.”
Scott Erickson
the miscellany
something we’re reading: I didn’t realize it until we landed, but I had left my copy of The Christian's Secret of a Happy Life in the car. Now that we’re back and I’ve got it in my possession, I’m excited to finish it up! Elin was able to pack in her suitcase a few of my hardcover Nancy Drew books from when I was her age and she’s been loving them!
something we’re asking prayers for: I regularly get asked if I have any prayer requests and this season has us feeling dependent on God and His working hand in all sorts of ways. With this big change comes lots of growing pains and adjustment for our family. If you wouldn’t mind praying for a smooth transition, grace for this season, and good connections in our new home, our family would be so very grateful!
something we’re looking forward to: To help hype us up for our new location, we’ve been taking some time with the kids to google some of the neat things to do and see that are unique to this area of the world. We recently hit up Brisbane’s BookFest (a huge used book store that set up shop in a convention center!), found a new park to play at (pedal-powered trains + a hedge maze = fun for everyone!), and are on the hunt for our go-to gelato spot.
I’ve mentioned Phylicia Masonheimer’s Revelation study in a previous newsletter but wanted to link it here again in case you missed it. I really appreciated her approach of giving the reader the tools and differing views to help aid in understanding more ambiguous and dividing elements of Revelation instead of telling the reader what they should deduce and ultimately believe about those passages. It helped me to feel more confident in God’s love and mercy rather than anxious of what is to come.