Leaving my ‘perfect’ life. Part 2

Darin’s Move to Montana

We started the process of Darin getting ready to move to Montana. I started looking for churches in the area I thought Darin might be working in. Looking on the internet. Never realized how important Web sites were until I started looking for a church from a distance. Darin was to arrive in Montana, work for two weeks to get situated and then go to Florida for training for four months. After training and once he got back to Montana Macy and I would possibly pick up everything and move. All this was totally up in the air at this point. Darin had little hope that I would leave my ‘perfect-safe’ life and I had little desire to do it. It was quite a predicament to be in. I can say now in looking back we were both in the center of God’s will. God was orchestrating everything. One thing I have learned in my years of gaining understanding about life and God’s ways is two people can be right but have two different views on a situation. It is very hard to understand this. This was the case with Darin and I. I had very good reasons for wanting to stay and most importantly God had not told me to go yet. Later on I will tell you the cool way God told me to pack up and move but up to this point it was God’s perfect will for me to stay in Oregon. Darin on the other hand was being directed by God to leave and start this new job. God began to move on Darin’s behalf and bless his actions. You will see as I continue to tell you this story how it was all very providential.

This reminds me of the story of Jesus with the Pharisee’s and the Prostitute in Luke 7

When one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, he went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. A woman in that town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume. As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.

When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.”Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.”“Tell me, teacher,” he said.

“Two people owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?” Simon replied, “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt forgiven.”

“You have judged correctly,” Jesus said.

Then he turned toward the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet.  Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little.”

Then Jesus said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” The other guests began to say among themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?”Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

Me the Pharisee

In this story I was Simon the Pharisee.  Truthfully I have been forgiven less. Darin and I are raising Macy Mae in hopes that like me she too will look back at her life and be able to say I have been forgiven little. If this prostitute was Macy in this story it would not change my love for her but I would not be happy. My heart would be absolutely breaking for her. Yet as you read this story you would rather be the prostitute than Simon the Pharisee. Not because you want to be a prostitute but you want to have Jesus point to you and say how great is your love for me.

I had a tendency toward being self-righteous. God began to change me in this area and is still changing me. I had always assumed that if someone was sinning more than me they loved God less. This is not always the case. I am grateful that God gave me brief glimpses into Darin’s true heart not the heart that everyone was seeing but the heart that only God could see. It was those moments that gave me courage to keep believing a miracle was possible.

Another Miracle!

Darin’s job in Montana was in the far east corner next to Canada in a very remote area. Very isolated so isolated that he did not think in his heart I could handle living there. The stress of this move and all it was to entail gave Darin shingles. He drove from Montana to his training in Florida with shingles in his right eye.

One of the verses I continually reminded the Lord about was in Proverbs the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord and he turns it like a watercourse where ever he pleases. I believed Darin was the King of our home so I would pray this verse often. Turn his heart like a watercourse! Let it be Let it be! God was definitely turning His heart like a watercourse but it was not in the way I ever expected.

The only full weekend Darin was in Montana something happened that filled me with hope. It made it very clear that God was in charge.  Darin decided to go visit Canada because there was absolutely nothing to do where he was staying. It was two hours away in Saskatchewan. He stayed at a hostel. At the hostel he met this guy and they visited and decided to go have dinner. At dinner this guy started pouring out his heart to Darin telling him his story. It was almost identical to our story. He had recently separated from his wife. He too was a Christian and loved God but had some real struggles. Darin saw himself in this guy. Darin told me they both sat in his car in a Rite Aide parking lot and listened to worship music. One difference between Darin and this guy was he drank a lot. He drank quite a lot that night at dinner and started drinking in the morning when they awoke. He was a tormented soul. I think seeing this scared Darin.

The next day when Darin called me and told me this story. I thought to myself if God can bring someone like this across Darin’s path in a remote part of Canada that has a similar story that we had He can do anything He wants. Many things happened in our life during those years that only God could orchestrate. This was one of them.