7/15/2025
These National Staff Conferences come around every couple of years, and including travel, take just short of two weeks. And they always seem to cause some inner disruption.
Let me explain…
Heather and I joined staff mid-career just about fifteen years ago. We were going down one pathway that made a lot of sense and included a good job, good service in the local church, and a new house that would be great for raising our three little kids.
But God had other plans for us that included new hopes and dreams. We didn’t really know what we were getting into, but were all in anyway.
Becoming missionaries with Cru was an incredible journey. Though we have seen God do some amazing things, I still feel like an imposter. Why me? I’m clearly not “with it” enough for this to be my occupation. So there is tension between the fact that we are and also still becoming missionaries.
It’s hard to let go of old hopes and dreams. Or maybe they just keep coming back. The world says that we should pursue them. And I do think that there is some creation mandate in that. That we are to be fruitful and multiply. To fill the earth and to steward it. God gave us agency and with that that ability to hope and dream. The problem is when we do that for our own ends and not his.
I have been going along the best I can. Doing my best work and trusting God with the results. And I also want to create Base Camp. That’s hard work too. And it also came about through prayer. I am confident that it is good. Cattle. 4H projects.
I can’t do everything. I know that. And so I do the best I can. Even when my best is not enough.
And then we come to staff conference and the Lord confirms my calling to Cru all over again. Big time. There are hero’s in this outfit that I want to be like. We are missionaries. And missionaries are characterized by the heart posture to go. Wherever and whatever.
And so I am committed to my calling to Cru. And I believe that creating roots and stability in this season for our family is also important.
So we will open handedly trust God in the tension.