Failing Faithfully
I love getting a new calendar. All the crisp blank pages and a fresh slate. I somehow hoodwink myself into thinking THIS will keep me organized in my ambitions for the upcoming year. This year, I decided to go with an academic planner. I love August and back-to-school time because it’s like a fresh start mid-year. Let’s be honest; it also means fall is right around the corner. I love the changing of leaves, fall festivals, pumpkin bread, and, yes, give me all the pumpkin spiced lattes.
I had been wanting to try the Simplified Planner for a long time, so when they had their launch day months ago I went ahead and purchased one. It has been sitting in my kitchen for three months just taunting me as I anxiously waited to use it. With August approaching, I pulled the crisp new planner out of the beautiful pink box Emily Ley ships her planners in. I even ordered colorful new micron pens so the ink wouldn’t leak through my untouched pages. The time had finally come. I opened it to the first week, ready to put my new pens to paper and watch my year unfold. I sat for a few minutes and realized I didn’t have much to “plan.”
Brent has been thinking about getting out of the military for years. Earlier this year, we decided we were ready to take the leap, settle down somewhere, and plant roots. When I purchased my calendar, I envisioned myself sitting down to fill it out in our old house in Tucson. I thought the kids would go back into public school (we had a short-lived year trial of homeschooling), in the same district I had been in ever since the 4th grade, the one some of their cousins attend. I anticipated we would return to our old church and have lunch with family and friends after the service. We would bask in the Arizona Sun and watch the gorgeous sunsets. And I was incredibly excited about my Aunts and Uncle’s annual Christmas Eve get-together, where we continuously try to outdo the others in our White Elephant gift exchange. So much awaited, and I was eager to plan it all out.
As I finally sat down at my kitchen table with my calendar, the only thing I could even jot down besides birthdays was, “The movers come Thursday.” The movers won’t bring our stuff back home to Arizona but will be stopping about halfway in the city known as the Paris of the Plains. I laugh at writing that. I only know Kansas City is called the Paris of the Plains because as things have unfolded the last couple of months, I knew I better research this city where we felt God was leading our family. Brent attended a job conference several weeks ago to interview for jobs nationwide. We planned on ending up in Tucson but also had to go through the motions of interviewing in states we never imagined living in because we wanted to start this new season prepared, with everything in place and all of our ducks in a row. How ironic, considering how post Air Force life is beginning for us.
During Brent’s weeks of interviewing, waiting for phone calls, interviewing some more, and turning down jobs, we slowly began to feel we were supposed to be in Missouri. There isn’t just one thing that brought us to that conclusion. It was after weeks of waiting and praying (sometimes, okay, a lot of times, those prayers were through tears). We are super excited about this move and even have some friends and family in parts of the state. However, it doesn’t make stepping out in faith feel any less burdensome or scary than it can at times.
For us, we are moving at a time when Brent does not yet have a job, when we do not have a house yet (thank goodness for Airbnb)! Because we don’t have a house, we have no address to register the kids for school. When we know Brent will most likely take a 50% pay cut. It means having no idea what the future holds. I have felt like I’m failing in my despair when I call my sisters crying about a new roadblock we have hit along the way. Or snapped at the kids when they aren’t quiet during the many phone calls Brent has had hoping to get a job offer or when I am trying to cancel our existing gym membership (which may be our biggest feat yet)! I have felt I failed when Brent comes home to find me on an emotional rollercoaster when I remember so much about our future, which is still unknown. God knew what he was doing when he created marriage because in these moments, Brent is grounded and knows how to talk me off a ledge, and when the realization of the most humbling process we have ever walked through hits him, I am there to do the same.
Stepping out in faith can be extremely terrifying, yet there have also been times of excitement and pure joy in glimpses of grace. When we have hit another roadblock, I have had to remind myself that if I truly believe God is good, which I do, then I also have to cling to that same belief even in times of confusion. Confusion is something I have felt several times during this process. One morning, doing a bible study in 1st Corinthians, I found this verse. ” For God is not a God of confusion but of peace,” 1st Corinthians 14:33 says. Over the past two years here in Virginia, I have become more aware of my tendency to want to control everything, and God has continued to show me I need to let go of that desire.
I would describe our time here in VA as wrestling, but that’s a topic for another post. When most military folk move, we purge all of our household goods—less to pack, less to unpack. A lyric in Lecrae’s song Boasting says,” I know the Spirit’s purging me of everything that’s hurting me,” vividly portrays how I feel about what has been happening lately. I realize the last time I wrote a post, I excitedly wrote about adoption and how it had been put on our hearts. This wrestling, purging, and becoming aware of my need to control are just some of the reasons that this post is about our upcoming transition and not an adoption update, which I still very much hope God has in store for us in the future. So, when I feel like I’m failing, which is all too common, I hope to fail faithfully.
