Well, here goes....my attempt to get everyone caught up on what has been happening in our life the past year. I have decided to just write some now and some later because basically it would be way too much to read at once. Here goes.....
Last December we moved to Little Rock from Cabot and finally felt "settled". We love our house, love the school we are in, I love teaching there and everything was and is going great. However, the whole time in the back of my head I knew there was something more I should be doing. I did what I think a lot of people do and pretty much just prayed every now and then for God to show me what it was and so forth. I never tried to search for it but just wanted it to be revealed with words in the sky or something like that. Well, unfortunately that never happened so I continued on. The school year ended and I decided to take a position teaching 1st grade (I was previously 1/2 day K4). I was excited but knew the whole time that I was doing this and not God. I was doing it for seemingly good reasons...more discount, more money, I'm there all the time anyway so might as well get paid for it, etc. Last summer was terrible. I was wrestling with feelings of unrest, uneasy...basically being out of the will of God and I had no idea because I wasn't searching in the right places. I started journaling throughout all this and I am so thankful I did. My pages generally looked like this...."what am I called to do?" "why do I not feel a peace with this?" then some days they would be..."I am very excited about 1st grade" "I am going to love this age!" See how this could cause some confusion?? Somewhere along this journey I emailed DHS and The Call about information on fostering/adopting. I had always thought one day I would like to adopt but didn't really know what that looked like.
However, that's as far as I got...I emailed about information and even signed up for an informational meeting in May and June but something always came up. Since God hadn't flown a plane overhead with a banner that read "You are called to go to this meeting." I assumed the plans meant I shouldn't go. So I didn't.
Fast forward to the start of the school year and I was/am blessed with a great class. I instantly fell in love with first grade and had Trey right next door and Addison across the hall. Nothing could be better. Except it still wasn't right. The school was right, the people were right, the kids were right but I wasn't. I was totally missing the boat. This is where I think a lot of people continue to miss the boat. I could've stayed along the same path and nothing would've been "wrong" in my life. I would've still had a great job and everything that goes with that. However, I made a decision at that point that I am so grateful for. I quit being lazy and expecting writing in the sky. I started noticing what God had been doing in my heart all along. I journaled and read my Bible and committed myself to doing what God wanted me to no matter the cost. After I fully made that committment I got a phone call very soon after. It was Mary Carol Pederson from The Call (Children of Arkansas Loved for a Lifetime (foster kids) and she left me a voicemall. She had seen my name on some emails and that I had signed up for an informational meeting and wanted to know if I could come to a leadership meeting the next day. Well, I couldn't go because of work but instead of saying "oh man, that would've been great if I could go but oh well"...I took it as my writing in the sky. I knew that God was saying this is what I am asking you to do. It took me a week or so to talk to J.O. because I knew God was calling me to do this all the way. I had NO idea what it looked like or consisted of but I knew I couldn't continue to ignore it. We were on our way to Fayetteville together about a week later and I decided to bring it all up to him. Little did he know I had already signed us up for an informational meeting in October but I figured we could cover that later. I had to first help him realize that a random call from a stranger (at the time) was a signal for me to make some major life changes.........:)
Well, I figure that is long enough for tonight!! I will have Part II very soon!!
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