We’re 99.9% sure we will be on the plane today (), and we are as ready as we’ll ever be. These past few weeks have been a great blessing, full of rest, great friends and amazing food. God has answered our prayers that we wouldn’t take our break-neck pace with us to South Africa by slowing things down a bit. We visited family, starting with my sister in Little Rock and my dad who joined us there from Mexico. Next we had great fun in Dallas with Rebecca’s sister, our newest nephew Robert and toddler Roy who is a blast. We left our car with Rebecca’s parents in Birmingham and visited her extended family in Troy before being dropped off at teammate Will Brown’s in Atlanta to fly out.

Throughout this month we’ve had wonderful opportunities to share about what we’re doing and why, and have handed out our little cards with the link to this blog to all kinds of excited strangers, including cashiers, waitresses and friends of friends of friends. I also hung prints from my master’s thesis exhibit, "Facing the Future," at a coffee shop in Carrboro where it will be until November. Our church gave us a wonderful send-off service, where the congregation laid hands on us, praying and giving thanks. In that service we also took the opportunity to give God due credit for all the many unknowns He provided for to prepare us for this journey: for providing renters for our house and a cat-sitter for Pippy and Champ; for the fact that leaving our jobs and explaining our vision for this next year to our co-workers went really well; for providing the financial resources—as of yesterday we have raised 100% of our budget (though any future donations will continue to be put to good use!); for preparing our hearts, by forcing us to relinquish control over so many details; and for so many other things that just made it really clear to us we’re doing what we’re supposed to be doing. Sunday night here with Will, we joined him at a prayer meeting held at his pastor’s house. Fittingly, the theme was thankfulness.

It’s a great feeling to embark on something we’ve prepared for so extensively. Yet I know that most of the preparations just served to tidy things up here at home so we won’t have to worry about them once there. Much of what we’ve blogged about so far has involved you in all those details—thanks for reading along and for all the prayers that we have felt. Now we look forward to sharing how God is working in us, and in the lives of the people where we are serving. We look forward to sharing about deep relationships formed, lots about learning how to live by faith and of course a lot of photos! I am actually very excited for the chance to photograph for more than just a few weeks in a place where I feel like I was most at home as a photographer . I am also looking forward to trying my hand at some video, and I know Rebecca’s eager to put her audio kit to good use. We hope the blog won’t be a one-way street, and that you’ll feel welcome to comment on our posts, make requests, critiques, share insights, etc. We hope you’ll feel as much a part of our community as possible.

Now I’m going to change this shirt I’ve been wearing for three days and get ready to head to the airport! See you on the other side.

Related posts:

1. Bright, Shining Faces: An HIV Stories Reunion Since our arrival, I've been intent on visiting the people...
2. Facing The Future - By The Gate To start off this blog, I am going to...
3. Waiting Expectantly At long last, the day is here. We're here in...

Filed under: General by Nathan on August 5th, 2008