Why We Are Moving to Honduras

Coffee smells like home to me. It tastes like warmth sliding down into my very soul. I love it with all the cream and sugar until it is a caramel color. The best is on cold mornings in the fall. The mornings I actually get up early and have time to sit and savor a cup before the kids wake up is the best kind of way to start a day.

God is asking me to savor something else these days.  While drinking coffee at a local coffee shop (fitting), I was filling out my power sheets (from Lara Casey). She wrote: “Savor the season you’re in.” I sipped my mocha and realized: I’m in a season of change. BIG CHANGE. Probably the biggest change of my entire life.

We are excited, nervous, but amazingly grateful to announce we will be moving our family to the country of Honduras sometime in the next 12-15 months. Jason and I heard God’s call in Isaiah 6, and responded with the prophet: here am I, send me. A new season is approaching, and it’s one full of change.

Thinking of where God is leading us, and reading Lara’s words: savor the season you’re in…..I heard God whisper…

Savor Change

Since I was a little girl I had always wanted to be a missionary. Those who’ve known me are not surprised with this news. After twelve years of marriage, God has finally opened a door for our family. In November 2014, Jason and I attended a medical mission’s conference in Lexington, KY. We met and talked with a lot of organizations and mission boards about various possibilities. We felt God’s call on our hearts that weekend. It was unmistakable. But we still had no idea where He wanted to send us. We prayed, sought some financial guidance, and decided God was saying: GO! But also WAIT.

We decided to pay off Jason’s school loans.  In the middle of that, God revealed another call: adoption. So many of you have supported and followed our journey as we brought home two children from China these past two and half years. A few months after returning home with Liana (our first adopted daughter), Jason went on a mission’s trip with Medical Missions Outreach (MMO). They are an organization that takes medical professionals on short-term trips to help local churches in impoverished areas of the world. You can read all about them here.

Jason was privileged to go with MMO to Ecuador in 2015. The following year we called the director, Bradley Edmondson, to ask him if he had any long-term positions available overseas. Surprisingly, he said, “yes!” And asked to meet with us. We met in December of 2016 and discussed an opportunity in Honduras.

Through a generous donor, MMO began the process of building a permanent surgical clinic in El Progresso, Honduras. It would be directly controlled and operated via MMO and the local church, Iglesia Bautista El Faro. It would be staffed via short-term trips once a month. Surgeons, anesthesiologists, nurses, lab techs, and other medical professionals would fly down for a week.

MMO had been praying, asking the Lord to provide a permanent doctor to run the clinic and organize the trips once a month. Right as they began to pray, we called them. God has orchestrated behind the scenes, before we even knew it, moving us towards Honduras all this time. We had spent the past four years pursuing door, after door, and when our pastor left our home church three years ago, we were so discouraged and felt like all of the doors we were knocking on were “no’s” – no mission board seemed right. No field felt like a right fit.

In February of 2017 we flew to Honduras for the weekend. We left our kids for four days, and took one short flight from Charleston, WV to Atlanta, GA. Then, from Atlanta, GA it was only a little over three hours to San Pedro Sula. Stepping off of the plane, I felt it in the air. It was a strange and familiar feeling all at once. I didn’t tell Jason anything. We barely talked on the thirty minute truck ride from San Pedro Sula to El Progresso. We soaked in the rows and rows of banana plants and sugar cane lining the highway. We felt it in the heat, the Spanish lingered in our minds, and I didn’t dare breathe a word to anyone at the time, but I felt a nudge: I’m home.

I have traveled a lot of places. And there is a big part of me, when we traveled to our children’s homeland of China, I wondered: could I live here? I never felt at peace in that beautiful oriental country. Here, on the dirt roads and immense heat of Central America, I suddenly felt something I had never felt before.

We knew we had to ask ourselves: could we live here? I cried on the airplane on the way home four days later. It was an emotionally draining weekend. We had been unexpectedly matched with our sweet ZhuangZhuang (Joel), and I knew in my heart we would be moving to Honduras. I cried because I knew the change coming.

So when I read those words the other day: savor the season you’re in… I immediately heard God say: savor this change. I don’t know what it means, but I know this: the God who orchestrates change never changes. My glorious God who sustains my life, will walk through this with me too. He will walk through our friends and family as we say goodbye. He will hold us all close as we remember: our dwelling place is in heaven, not a house here on earth.

What does this mean? 

It means we needs LOTS of prayer. Please keep our family covered in prayer. We have lots of things we could pray about, but I can think of three right now:

Provision. – Pray God will supply our needs. Not just physically, but mentally, spiritually, and emotionally.

Protection. – As we prepare for this, the enemy is on attack. Pray for a hedge of protection around us.

Peace. – For us, our children, family, and friends as we transition out of many people’s day-to-day lives.

What is the time frame? 

The short answer: we don’t exactly know. A lot of pieces have to fall into place. We will need to raise support, sell our house and other things we won’t be taking with us, and the surgical clinic needs to be finished and ready to go. All of those things are in the Lord’s hands. Our goal right now is to be moved to Honduras in early 2019.

What can you do? 

Pray. As I mentioned before, we need LOTS and LOTS of prayer. If you would like to be prayer partners, you can sign up here. We are still working on a ministry website and a video.  It should be finished sometime in January 2018. Lots of details will be coming soon!

Connect. If you would like to connect, see the ministry of Team Honduras here. Follow them on Facebook here. You can also check out another ministry, Hope of Honduras, which is a children’s home dedicated to helping underprivileged, neglected and abandoned children. We are excited to see how God might use us as we come along this ministry to offer support. We will be serving in the church, Iglesia Bautista El Faro, under the leadership of Pastor Matt Goins. Connect with Matt and Dallita here.

You can sign up for our newsletter here. We won’t be sending out regular newsletters until January of 2018. But for now, you can sign up and we will keep you updated!

Thank you friend for reading this long post. I’m sure I will have more to say as the months roll into winter. Right now, I’m asking the Lord to teach me to be still and savor the change. To savor each moment, enjoy the smallest of details. I’m still reflecting and living out this idea of savoring change, but I can tell you, it means living fully in the present.

I’ve learned this lesson before, but maybe its time God reminds me of this truth again: living in the glorious ordinary.

Blessings friend!

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