New home and family in Seattle
Jesus said, “Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life.”
We serve a God who continues to lavish our family with unexpected and FUN blessings. As we recount the past 7.5 years of marriage, we are in awe of God's daily provisions. Although we may not have what the world deems as a successful life, we would not trade it for anything else because it is exciting to live each day trusting in the Lord for all things. All this to say, God (yet again!) blessed us with an amazing adventure in Seattle. Our dear friends who pastor a Korean-American church there invited Ted to speak at their annual retreat. They graciously invited our entire family out. Knowing us, we love to do things together, so it wasn't hard to say "yes, we'll all be there!".
We were preparing our children that we would be at a Korean church. Isabel especially was most excited to be among her own. We arrived the day before the retreat began, and got settled into our friend's home. Then, Isabel started to ask impatiently, "where are the Koreans?" When we arrived at the retreat site early the next day, Isabel met a new friend. Her first question was, "what's your name? Are you Korean?" We all had a good laugh. This is how Korean-deprived our family is.
The retreat was incredible. People from the church came with such hungry hearts that the preached word fell on prepared and fertile soil. The most exciting thing for us was to hear people committing to family devotions together, going on media fasts, rekindling a desire to pray. The community there was so loving and gracious to us that we felt well received.
After the retreat, we enjoyed the beautiful city of Seattle with its perfect summer weather. Not too hot, not too cold. Then, we made an overnight trip to Vancouver. When we arrived, we were met with a really bad thunderstorm. We got checked into our hotel and prayed for good weather, so our short time would not be wasted. After our afternoon nap, the rain cleared up that we even got to walk around the city. The next day, we got to enjoy more of Vancouver under the beautiful sun.
The biggest FUN gift came through an invitation to join some of the church families to an overnight cabin stay at Lake Cushman. Ted especially fell in love with Seattle as it is filled with lakes and rivers everywhere. We could not miss out on this chance to enjoy the church community and the lake of course. So, we spent the last two days with very special family members of the church. They really took care of us. This was the very first time we prepared absolutely nothing for a cabin trip. They cooked for us delicious meals, took us on a boat ride, fishing, water tubing, water skiing...and the best part was that Abigail and Isabel had so many friends to play with. We hardly saw them during our 2 days there.
As we returned from this trip, our hearts were filled with such gratitude to the church and especially our Abba Father who loves us so much. We told the church that we have a new home in Seattle. With so many friends in ministry all around the world, we claim each of their locations as our second home. How exciting to have fellow coworkers serving God all around the world. We would be able to travel to so many places knowing we have a place to stay and friends to fellowship with.
Lastly, we are thankful to have children who love to travel and meet new people. They had so much fun in Seattle. What a fun life our kids live as they have been to so many places and met so many people. Thank you Jesus for blessing us to live with such exciting testimonies of your wonderful provisions!
August 03, 2008
