Hi friends! Today I thought I would try a new format. There is audio for those who prefer to listen, and for those who like to read, the entire post is also down below in the description area. Just scroll down to get there. Today we begin part 4 of Julie’s faith journey. This part of her testimony reminded me about how God has a plan, even in the smaller steps. After recently coming back from mission with her, I can tell you that not only is she incredibly kind, but she also has a great sense of adventure. She is not paralyzed by the logistics and unknowns, rather she has a willingness to jump into a new task, figure out what she can, and remain open to what God does along the way. I really admire that in her, and I think it is one of the reasons that I love this part of her story. It allows me to see how God was developing that even more in her bit by bit throughout her life. Enjoy!
After returning from Panama, we wanted to do missions every year if possible. We went back to Panama and loved it. Then we decided to see other countries and went to places like Chile, Belize, and Costa Rica to name a few. As we went back and forth on mission, the yearning I had for an orphanage began to emerge once more.
Most years Gary and I went on mission together, but there were a couple years where I was unable to go. I became pregnant with our son, Joshua, a year or two after our first trip to Panama. Although we were blessed with all our children, Gary and I still had it in our hearts to adopt. We wanted to adopt from Central or South America and did not care if it was a boy or a girl. Our hearts were for those sweet children with those big brown eyes that we encountered on all our mission trips.
The day we came home from the hospital with Joshua we started the paperwork to adopt. Guatemala was the only country that had an international relationship to do adoptions with an agency from the United States. Countries that did not have a relationship with a U.S. agency required prospective parents to move to that country and get an attorney there to do the paperwork. With a newborn and a 2 ½ year old at home, moving was an issue. We decided it made the most sense to proceed with Guatemala.
Those who adopt have to really, really want it. My heart goes out to anyone in that process. Adopting our child took intentionality. It took love. We knew that blood did not make a family, love made a family. The adoption process itself was very involved. We had to do background checks, compile a dossier, overnight and courier things, and get everything certified. It seemed like everyone had to stamp it, the consulate, the US Embassy, etc. It was a lot of paperwork.
It was all worth it when Daniel came to us at eight months old. He and Joshua are only 14 months apart. We were thankful that we timed things close to Joshua’s birth because our children, except for Kendall, do not remember a time where he was not part of our family. They have always known Daniel to be here, and he only remembered us as family. To us, he was chosen, wanted, applied for, prayed for, and was special.
Daniel always knew he was adopted. He had an adoption book and pictures of his birth parents. He has copies of letters I wrote to his birth mother telling her how grateful we were for her and how special she was. We always wanted Daniel to know that he was never unwanted or given away, rather, his birth mom loved him so much that she wanted something different for him. Her choice was done with the hope that it gave him a better life. Hopefully one day he will be able to meet her again. We want him to be proud to be Guatemalan and always know he was special, chosen, and loved.
After receiving Daniel, Gary and I thought about adopting another child. After we talked, we realized we could make one more child’s life special through adoption, or we could do something that made a difference in many more children’s lives. Through all our mission trips, that dream to have an orphanage was cultivated. Pursuing this desire would be far more impactful in our hopes to reach many.
Our dream to start a mission, and hopefully an orphanage, was one for the future. We thought it would begin when our kids were older and we could move to a different country. However, things changed after a mission trip to Costa Rica.
We had gone on mission with Larry and Cheryl, a dear couple we were friends with, and they absolutely loved it there. Larry had his heart in Costa Rica and felt that God was pulling him there. They wanted to start a mission together with us right away, but we had envisioned waiting until our kids were grown. Larry, who was older than us, said something like, “If I have to wait for you to retire before we start a mission together, I will be dead.” The point was made. It was better to just begin.
Larry set the wheels in motion in Costa Rica. We began by starting a nonprofit. In 2006, Larry, Cheryl, Gary, and I started Faithful Servant Missions (FSM). We assembled a small board together and began the legwork to do mission trips. There were two ministries that were conceived, one was FSM in Costa Rica and another one, that we named Manos de Fe, would be set in another country. We finally had a platform where we could go be like Sally Struthers.
At the time Gary and I lived in Ponta Vedra, FL. My mom had been coming down from Tennessee (TN) to babysit when we went on mission. Once my siblings started having children, mom was busy babysitting for them and could not make it down as often. We could not leave our kids for a week with just anyone, so it hindered our ability to go on mission.
To stay more involved with FSM, Gary and I decided to move to TN to be close to my parents. We gathered our stuff, weeded out the items we did not need, sold the house, and headed to TN. Gary worked remotely and with my parents nearby to babysit we were able to go on short trips to Costa Rica again. Moving gave us the flexibility to continue our mission work and help build up the mission site.
Despite being in Tennessee, we never felt quite settled. We bought land with the intention of building our dream house on that property. In the meantime, we rented a house. We would go out to our land, but never looked at plans for our house. We never went that next step.
Gary and I started having these dreams about going out on mission longer term. We wondered if we were supposed to be at the mission instead of going through the day to day of making life happen in TN. Perhaps God was calling us to do something bigger and go down to Costa Rica for a while. At first, we were a little nervous, but the excitement began to build. We started praying about what to do.
It was funny because as we were trying to figure out whether to stay or go, God did something to clearly direct us. One day, we were in the living room when suddenly a truck pulled up in our front yard. Two guys jumped out and began hammering a giant sign in the front yard of our rental home. We had no clue what was going on. As soon as they left I walked out and saw a sign that said, “Absolute Auction.” That was how we discovered that the house was going on auction in a month.
I called my landlord and explained that we had been paying rent so we did not understand what was going on. He said that he had four houses and he could not keep up with all the payments. The bank was taking them back. It was all occurring during the housing crisis that was in 2006-2007. Our landlord told us that the house would be auctioned in a month and we would likely need to move out a month after that.
God had literally put a big sign in front of our house telling us to leave.
What was amazing was that God brought us to that point in steps we could digest. It came in little bits at a time. We had already either sold our stuff or put it in storage when we moved from FL to TN. We never built our dream home. By the time we no longer had a rental home to live in, God had positioned us in a place where we were ready to be sent. If I had still been living in our home in Ponte Vedra, I am not sure I would have gone if God said, “Julie, I want you to move to Costa Rica and then head to Panama to start an orphanage.” That would have been too big of a bite to swallow. I would have thought, “I’m not selling everything I own and moving off to be a missionary. That’s what crazy people do. I’m not doing that.”
But God did things one step at a time. Gary and I took one step in faith, and then He would reveal another step. God took a huge, scary life change and gave it to us in doses that we could withstand. Looking back, we can see those overall big changes that occurred, but during the process we were focused on the smaller steps and it did not seem like such a huge change at the time.
Once we had the rental house yanked out from under our feet we realized nothing was holding us back. It was time to go. So, Gary quit his job and we headed off to Costa Rica to become missionaries.
To be continued.
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