A Journal of God Sightings!

While we are preparing for this upcoming trip to Africa, God has been doing many neat things in the lives of my family and myself. As I have been sharing some of these stories with others, I have received many questions and many different responses. One reoccurring response is "Are you journaling or writing any of this down?" Until now my response has been, "not really". I have shared many things through this blog but I don't really go into a lot of detail so that I can keep the posts short. So I decided to write down as many of the God sightings that we have had as they relate to our trip to Africa.

I am not sure that what I am about to write is a God sighting related to this trip but it is in my opinion a part of what God is doing. Some may say this is prophecy, I'm not sure that it is, but it is the closest I will ever come to being a prophet. It sure seems a bit prophetic but only God truly knows if it was.

It all started about 16 years ago when I first met Chad & Marnie Butler, we were attending Calvary Baptist Church in Xenia at the time. Chad was a student at Cedarville University and was studying to be a Pastor. He was invited to do his internship at Calvary Baptist, during this time we became very good friends as did our wives. Not long after graduating Chad found a job as an Associate Pastor with a church in Wisconsin. I was excited for them but was sad that they would be moving away. About 6 months into his new position a couple of things happened. I accepted a call to the Mission field and the church that Chad was with had a split. The Pastor that hired Chad left the church and took with him those who supported him. Chad was left to fill the pulpit while the church looked for a new Pastor. Being hired by the Pastor that had just left the church left Chad and Marnie in a less than desirable position. They were let go by the church once a new Pastor was hired. Being their first foray into ministry they were disillusioned and decided to move back to Chad's hometown. It had been over a year since we had seen them so we decided to go and visit them, while we were there I told Chad about my calling to the mission field. I half jokingly, half seriously told Chad that "in light of his experience maybe he should give up on the Pastorate and be a missionary". I said "we could all (all being his family and mine) go to Africa together as missionaries". With a slight chuckle Chad told me that he was not cut out for the missionary thing that he just needed some time to get his head straight and then he would look at the Pastorate again. It was about 4 years later that I got a phone call from Chad our conversation went something like this, (Chad) "Guess what?" (Me) "What?" (C) "I accepted a call to the mission field!" (Me) - "I told you so! Who with and do you know when and where you are going?" (C) - "ABWE (Association of Baptists for World Evangelism), we just started the candidating process but we are looking at Africa." (Me) - "Do you remember our conversation about 4 years ago?" (C) - "Yes" (M)e - "I told you so, I wish we were going with you." (C) - "You should come to, at least for a visit." Well that is the important part of the conversation I won't bore you with the rest. Some say that God has a sense of humor this proves it to me. Like I said I don't know if this can be considered a God sighting but I think it is a cool part of our story. After Chad accepted his call and candidated it took them 41/2 years to raise just half of their support, so ABWE agreed to let them go to Ghana for a couple of years to get some experience. They arrived in Ghana in May of 2009 and are currently there. When they were getting ready to leave they had a huge yard sale of the things they no longer needed. We decided to go and help them with the sale and spend some time with them before they left. While we were there Chad mentioned that there is a huge need for electricians where they are going in Ghana. He said I should consider coming over and visiting them and working as a missionary electrician. I told him once he gets there to let me know if there is still a need and we will see what God can do.

This brings us to the part of the story that we are currently living. About a month ago I was on Facebook when Chad popped in an instant message asking me if I was still considering coming to Africa. To which I replied "Sure! If there is a need for an electrician I would love to come and help?" He said, "We need someone to come and help us finish the construction of a house that is being built, we are supposed to move in it in June and it will not be finished if we don't get some help. You could also run electric to the homes in the villages, the government has installed electric to the power poles but it is up to the villages to hire an electrician to install it to the homes, most cannot afford this so they don't have electric." It was at this time that I started praying and asking God if this was what He wanted me to be do. As much as I wanted to be a missionary I never truly considered using my skills as an electrician or maintenance worker on the mission field before this time. For the past few years I had been trying to find a way to use my photography skills on the field, usually to no avail. When I finally accepted that God wanted me to use my abilities as an electrician and agreed to it, I actually got excited about it. I can look back over my life and the experiences that I have had and can tell that God has been preparing me for this for a long time. But that is a story for another time, I want to share with you some of the things that God has been doing over the past 4 months.

As I said I wasn't really excited about using my skills as an electrician on the mission field but after praying about it God gave me and excitement for it. My wife on the other hand is a different story, she was not as excited about the idea of this trip as I was. I knew that she didn't feel the same way as I did but I was sure that this was what God wanted me to be doing. Then one night while discussing the trip with Kelly, she told me how she really felt. She told me that she did not think this was what God wanted us to be doing. She said she thinks this is what Gary wants to do and that Gary has a way of making things happen when he wants them. She asked me to not talk about the trip in front of the girls anymore as she didn't want them to get excited about a trip that wasn't going to happen. She then said that she didn't want to go and that she wasn't going to go. All I could say was WOW, she really let me know what she thought about me! The problem was I began to wonder if she was right and I was wrong, I did want to go to Africa and have wanted to go to Africa since I was boy. I do have a way of making things that I want, happen. So that night I prayed, I said God, I really believed until now that this trip was your will after hearing Kelly I am not so sure. I don't want to make this trip happen if it is not your will. If it is your will, I know that I cannot change Kelly's heart I will leave that to You. I will continue to quietly step through doors that I see you open and I as I do please let Kelly see you at work and not me. Allow her to get excited about this trip as you have allowed me to. Over the next week God did just that, She went from "I am not going!" to "I am not saying we are going to Africa, but if we go we need too...." to "If we go to Africa we need to get...." to "Now Lyndsey, when we get to Africa you will still have to do dishes!" After this comment I knew that God was changing her heart so I went to visit one of our Pastors at church and share with him about our trip. This turned out to be another God sighting to me another confirmation that this is what God wanted me to be doing. When I told him about our possible trip, he got excited and said this is great. We (the Elders) have just been having discussions with Sharon Rahily in Togo and we want to send some folks to Togo this summer to visit her ministry. If you are going to be in Ghana you will be right next door, why don't you just stay while longer and be our representatives? I said o.k. what do we need to do? He then said go home send an email to Sharon (to see if there is a need for us to come during the time frame we will already be there), make up a rough budget for the trip and get back with me. When I got home that night I was excited the trip had just gone from 3 months to 6 months. I wasn't sure how Kelly would take it but I knew that God was working on her so I left it up to Him. That night I wrote an email to Sharon explaining who we were and what we were planning and asked if we could be of use in Togo for 3 months following our stay in Ghana. I also made a rough budget based on being gone for 6 months. When I asked Kelly to look over them she did and when she finished she promptly stood up, put her hands on her hips and proceeded to put me in my place. She said Gary I have never talked about a 6 month trip, I have only agreed to 3 months, I am going to bed! As she walked away feeling like she had made her point clear, I was ecstatic. I was quietly pumping my fist in the air (while hoping that she didn't turn around) and praising God saying Yes God we are going for 3 months! She had never once agreed to going for any length of time prior to that moment. After that she had accepted in her own mind that we were going to go for 3 months. It was about a week later that she decided that she could go for 6 months if all of the girls were going. Our son is 18 and she said she could allow him to stay home as she knew he would prefer that (though she would prefer him to go if she could have her way). This all took place over a period of just two weeks.

For a long time this was the biggest confirmation to me that this trip was of God. There have been many smaller confirmations and recently some more larger ones. Before I share the larger ones I want to document some of the smaller ones. - My employer (Legacy Ministries International) is in a financial pinch and needed employees to take unpaid leave, this trip will help the overall budget as I take 6 months unpaid leave. - The huge need for an electrician in Ghana and maintenance/construction projects in Togo. All of which God has been preparing me for over the past years in my career. - The open invitation to come to both countries and limitless possibilities to serve. - The fact that I want to do this type of missions work. - The many contacts that God has brought into my life who are helping us financially.

There have been other smaller confirmations that I cannot think of but will add them as I remember them.

Let me share with you another of the big confirmations God has given me, this is by far the most humbling thing that God has allowed me to be a part of.

To be continued........