My Heart for Hawaii (The picture for our move is starting to come together)

It's amazing how quickly we can have our heart worked on when we ask for God to do so. I still want to move to Hawaii for the amazing beaches, tropical breezes, the Aloha Spirit and the delicious pineapple! But lately God's been working on my heart and now I find myself thinking of the people of Hawaii -especially those in poverty and in need.

A little (okay, sorta a lot of) background first:

We were currently in the middle of trying to buy our first house and move away from Southern California. And we actually were really looking into moving to Hawaii. But we got scared by the reports of racism toward "mainlanders." And we were afraid we would never be able to raise a family the way we wanted to -with me staying home with our children. We imagined each working two jobs for an 800 square foot condo in a Hawaiian ghetto. And then there was our debt (probably one of the most ugly four-letter words I know). The book we got about moving to Hawaii insisted that if you had debt you should not move to Hawaii.

So we gave up on Hawaii. We ended up moving to Bakersfield (go ahead and laugh, it really is comical!) and bought our first home.

We found an amazing new church, Life Journey Christian Church, and we fell in love with the people, the style and feel of the services and we were friends with our pastor and his family -it was a spiritual dream come true.

Okay -so I am getting to how all this is relevant:
Our church, Life Journey, was a new church plant through Stadia. Our pastor's family and a handful of others came from Illinois to start this church in Bakersfield. ( I actually found them while searching for churches in Bakersfield before we made our move.) I remember one day in church when our pastor said that one day Life Journey would hopefully be part of another church plant and people from our congregation would leave to help that new church start (or something to that effect). -I remember clearly thinking "I wanna do that!!!" I even thought, "Wouldn't it be cool if it was in Hawaii??!!!"

Then when the opportunity came to help a new church start in Bakersfield (again, not Hawaii) we joined and have loved the process. I am still very connected to Life Journey -in fact I do a weekly Bible study with them. And this summer I co-led the Beth Moore study we did. My dear friend, Barbara (who leads the small group/Bible study group) told me God told her to ask me to help her lead. She said that she's known for a long time that I was "marked" to lead.

How this is relevant:
I feel God has kept my heart for Hawaii all this time -while He has given us training in two new churches and experience in leadership. Shortly after Alex and I moved to Bakersfield he got a job with a wholesale travel company specializing in Hawaiian vacations so he has learned a lot about the islands and we've spent many nights at the dinner table chatting about Hawaii (everything from good travel deals to land development and interesting "little known facts").

Now I am beginning to see how God's been training us to go out and start a new church. I get that goose-bump feeling all over just typing this out. To add to the picture, I found out through facebooking with our previous pastor (who's now the West Coast new church planter director/"over-see-er" -I am not sure of his official title) that he covers Hawaii and that there are some people at our previous church who've told him they want to start a new church in Hawaii.

I realize that this may all be coincidental -but I cannot help but think this is God working here! Maybe He has our hearts for Hawaii right now, but will change them later for another place. But from where I sit today I cannot help but think we will be in Hawaii in 2-5 years helping a new Stadia church plant launch and serve the people of Hawaii. And I think it will be on the Big Island.

I am so excited to see where this adventure will take us. I know amazing things are already happening! I am so glad you're joining me on this adventure.

Aloha!