2 Year Anniversary

Two years ago we stumbled off a plane at Heathrow airport. We had flown overnight from Newark, New Jersey and we were tired, hungry, scared and excited. We were finally here, after all the prayer, worry, packing, talking, and support raising. After a three hour drive to Dudley borough, Birmingham, we entered the small upstairs flat that we had only seen for ten minutes back in January 2006. It had been cleaned and the kitchen painted; but it still looked very dreary to me. I was stressed out at all we had to do to make it livable. We were provided a box of some food staples, but I needed to feed three hungry, tired boys. I also needed to stay cheerful and upbeat about this new strange place, even though I was scared. We bought a few things from the Aldi's just down the street and I made dinner. That night we went to sleep with no pillows and very few covers on our beds. We had only brought what we thought would get us by, until our other things would be shipped over in two months. It was much cooler here - shockingly cold at night for August. Somewhere in the middle of the night Paul and I woke up. We sat in shock and talked for a while about how different everything was. The next morning we woke and started sorting things out.
I soon realized that all my props were very far away - my family, my friends, my home culture.
Just because I stepped off a plane as a missionary did not mean that I was accepted by those we had come to serve. Our directors were out of the country for the next month (in the US!) and the other workers were very busy. I was lonely, disoriented, scared of the people all around us, and worried that I maybe had gotten it all horribly wrong - that God never called us to this place, it was just my ego talking. That God would not provide for our needs - we were idiots to have sold all we had to come here.........

Now we are living very close to the main center, in a wonderful house. We have friends, our sons have friends, we feel very accepted and knit into the Betel community and church. God is always faithful and provides not only our needs but our wants. We lack nothing. It has been very hard, this moving across the ocean. Very amazing and humbling to see God's hand working in our hearts, individually and as a family. Scott and I have argued and talked about everything from money to our spiritual life, and we are now closer than we have ever been. It has been worth it.
Now, the question is - do we get to stay? Will our visa extension go through? Or will we be denied? We are about half way through the normal waiting time, we have three more weeks to go. We shall see.............................