HUGE CHANGES AHEAD!!! Haiti 30 Day Prayer Challenge and Answered Prayers.
All, as many of you know, one of my favorite phrases is that "excitement is a combination of fun & fear". Well, I have some very EXCITING news to share with all of you.
I've made a some comments recently referring to the 30 day prayer challenge that was given to the team on our last night in Grand Goave, Haiti by the Lifeline Christian Missions staff. We were asked to pray for 30 days asking God what He wanted us to do with all that we had experienced during our 10 days in Haiti. Well, I can tell you without any hesitation that God answered that prayer for me in a very definite way and it didn't take 30 days to hear an answer. In fact, it didn't even take 30 hours.
Here's a little back-story...During the course of the past 18 months and thru my recent disaster recovery mission work in Holton, IN from the March 2011 tornado outbreak, I had come to the realization that the path that I have been on for 25+ years was coming to a fork in the road and it was time for me to make some major, life-changing decisions. My technology consulting business had definitely become a "job" and I no longer felt any passion for it. The technology world is easy for me to understand and operate in and is certainly a gift, but it had become stale and I realized that I was just going thru the paces each day. The recovery project in Holton had given me a brand new set of experiences and allowed me to feel like I was actually making a difference and changing other's lives for the better. The project management / construction management portion of my work allowed me to use some of the other gifts that God had given me and definitely lit a fire within my being. It was hard for me to believe that God would have brought me to this work and provide me with a new 18 month "baptism by fire" education in a different field and NOT expect me to do something with the experiences & knowledge.
So, I started praying every morning..for direction, for knowledge and wisdom, for discernment, for patience, and for Him to open doors and slam doors in my face. I asked that He illuminate the path that He wanted me to take and that I would have the strength and the faith to obey Him...even if it meant turning my world upside down. This had started a month or so before our Haiti trip and I definitely felt that I was not supposed to do anything until I returned. So, I waited. Not always patiently but still, I waited.
It was my goal to develop a plan of action, while I was gone, to take upon my return to reach out into the disaster response world to see if anyone had any openings or any projects that would be a good fit for me and my recent new set of skills. There was such a sense of peace and clarity over me during the 10 days in Haiti that I didn't make ANY plans. I took in every experience and gave our mission work 100% of my focus and attention...and I am so glad that I did. Sitting in the airport in Port Au Prince on our final day, waiting for our flight back to Miami, I started to contemplate what I was going to do when I got back home but, again had that feeling that I should just continue to CHILL. So, I did. After a long wait at the airport and a 2 hour flight north, we were finally back on US soil...THEN IT HAPPENED.
I had been 10 days without cell phone, without Internet, without email so, as soon as the Pilot announced that we could turn on our electronic devices I powered up my iPhone. As it came on and loaded, it suddenly started blowing up with text message notifications. My initial reaction was one of "Oh no, I wonder what's wrong". But, when I opened the first of several messages from a certain person, I realized that there wasn't anything "wrong". The texts were from someone that I had met and worked with thru the Holton project and is a Disaster Response Coordinator for IDES (International Disaster Emergency Services), which is an international disaster response mission organization that is associated with the non-denominational Christian churches and based in Kempton, IN just south of Kokomo. The messages basically said, "Hey, we see that you are in the final stages of work in Holton. What are your future plans and availability? We need you in New Jersey and Oklahoma." Needless to say, I was speechless.
I read the messages a couple of more times to make sure I was understanding them correctly and then handed the phone to Beth, so she could read it, and she said, "I guess we're already getting answers to the 30 day prayer challenge". I sent a return message explaining that we had just landed, that I was totally blown away by the information, and that I would call later to talk in greater detail. As much as I wanted to share this information with others right away, I kept quiet wanting to have some further discussions before I said anything else to anyone else.
Over the last few weeks, I have had multiple conversations and meetings with the folks at IDES, as well as a couple of other Christian mIssions groups that work in the disaster world. I'll boil all of that down to the following...I have accepted the position of Disaster Response Coordinator with IDES and begin my new career with them in August. At the moment, it sounds like I will be deployed to be "boots on the ground" for a couple of months assisting in completing a current disaster recovery project at the South Nassau Christian Church in Baldwin, New Jersey. The church was heavily damaged by Superstorm Sandy in October and they need someone fresh to come in and push it to completion. After that, I'll come home for a bit and then be deployed, for an undetermined period of time, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma to aid in the recovery efforts from the recent tornadoes. From there, your guess is as good as mine. IDES does work all over the globe, with long time relationships in Kenya and Haiti, and we discussed the length of time that my recently renewed passport will be active. So, who knows. When you ask God to answer your prayers, I've learned that you don't question or get in His way when He gives you such a definite answer...you just say "Send me Lord, I will go, I will serve".
The first question that the few people we have told about this have asked has been, "How does Beth feel about this and you being gone for months at a time?" Well, her answer has been one of faithfulness stating, "If God brought this to us, who am I to stand in His way? We will be faithful and figure it out." So, we are figuring it all out. We hope that we will be able to spend some long weekends together on a fairly regular basis, whether it is me traveling back home or her flying to wherever I am. If anyone has frequent flyer miles they want to donate, to offset the expense of these upcoming trips, we would be most appreciative and gladly accept them.
The next few weeks will be busy with tying up some final loose ends in Holton (if you didn't know it, we finished our final home rebuild on Thursday), beginning the process of moth-balling Kroger Consulting, and completing some "honey-do" projects around The Kroger Ranch.
It will also be busy with me getting into a new mindset of working for a non-profit missions group and learning their organization, procedures, and staff.
In closing, I won't bore you with any more details. Suffice it to say that we are "excited" and are looking forward with cautious optimism to see what God has in store for our future. Keep checking Facebook as I'm sure I'll be posting pictures and stories from wherever I happen to be.
Please pray for Beth and I, most especially to bulletproof and protect our marriage as we embark on this new path and spend lengthy times apart.
Much love to all y'all!!!
Only thru Him,
Darin - "God's newest missionary"
