My favorite season is fall, but I love all the seasons. I love that the seasons change, and that with
every season there is something unique and fun that I enjoy. I have discovered that life is very much like
the seasons, only in life you don’t necessarily know when the current season will
end or what the next will begin. And I’m
learning that just because God has us doing one thing for a time or season of
life doesn’t mean that he will have us doing that for the rest of our lives. Maybe he will, but we need to be ready to move
or change at any time.
Season 1: The first few years after finding my lovely bride
and making her my wife were spent building a solid foundation in our marriage,
serving on short term mission trips, and being involved in urban outreach in Lancaster.
It was a fun season, full of necessary
time spent doing everything we could together; fixing up a house or two sped
the process of learning to work and communicate well with each other.
Season 2: We then entered a different season of life which
involved nursing school for Sara and business-building for me. Life became very busy with what we sensed was
preparation for whatever God had for us in the future. Sara learned valuable nursing skills and
professional workplace knowledge, while I learned more about being a leader and
the world of business and people. During
this time we found out how important it was to make time for each other no
matter how busy we were or what we both were involved in. This continued for the past five years. Within the last year we both felt God was
telling us a change of seasons was approaching in 2014.
Season 3: Without
conferring with Sara, I felt God was calling us to take at least 1 year away
from the “normal life” established in season 2, to spend time traveling the
world and serving with various established missions. While walking in downtown Lancaster one night,
I told Sara what I felt God was telling me for our future. To my amazement, she told me that she had the
exact same sense from God as well. God
sure knows how to bring about a change of season! With much excitement we began praying together
about how, where, what, and with whom did God want us to spend the upcoming season.
He has lead and directed, and here we
are, ready to experience this change in life. Like the seasonal changes in nature, there
will be things we will miss about the past phase of life, but we look forward
to all the new things God has for us in this upcoming season!
On January 13th, we will begin our YWAM
discipleship training school in San Francisco for 3 months of education and
outreach focused on urban and justice ministries. After completing the training in CA, we head to
the Old Country and spend 3 months working with a mission in Rome in
urban/justice outreach. The biggest
reason we feel like this will be valuable for us, is to learn from others practical
ways to reach our cities in the United States. We’ve always both been interested in urban
ministry and want to learn to be more effective and intentional in the way we
live and interact with those in our community. Follow the link in the right margin to learn
more about YWAM San Francisco.
September of 2014 (if God has not shown us differentlyJ) we’ll head off into
the unknown of spending 11 months in 11 different countries serving alongside
of an established mission or church. We
don’t know exactly what we will be doing, and I’m sure there will be a huge
variety of places and things we’ll do to serve Christ through serving others. Follow the link in the right margin to learn
more about The World Race.
A huge thanks to our family and friends for their support
and encouragement to follow God and actually do this mission trip. An even
bigger thanks to the great people at The Fence Experts for stepping up and
making it possible for me to take off for so long and filling my role in the
company while I am gone. You guys are awesome! All of you!
-Jason