Let me start back a bit, as in 2013 back...
I was bored.
Samantha and Easton had started preschool, and I was fishing around for a job at the school that I had taught at before the twins came along. More specifically, I was wanting a 1st or 2nd grade teaching position.
I approached the preschool director about my hopes for a position, and I resubmitted my resume, hoping, not-so-secretly, that I would be placed at the top of the pile for potential candidates. My thoughts were something along the lines of teaching five days a week during the 2013-2014 school year, and the kids would go to preschool five days. I figured it would work out just fine. Their first year in preschool, they were going three days a week, and they were school-going champs as far as I was concerned.
At the start of the new year, half-way through the kids first year at preschool, I began a Bible Study at the school that met on Monday mornings. That first semester that I attended, we were doing a study of Exodus. It was interesting, and I enjoyed going and starting my week off in a way that I felt was fresh and uplifting.
About half way through the year, our group leader started suggesting a new Bible Study for the next school year. She explained that it would take the entire school year, and it was about learning how to hear God speak.
I remember thinking, "Wow. That must be like having a super power or something. To hear God speak. That would be so cool."
A few moments later I realized that no one would be offering me a job for the next school year. I was going to be in this Bible Study. I was sure of it.
(I was also sure that Blake was going to do this Bible Study with me, whether he wanted to or not, regardless of the fact that he couldn't attend any of the group meetings on Monday mornings. It just seemed too cool not to include him.)
The summer came and went, and I wasn't offered a position. Actually, no one was. The school cut several jobs instead.
When the school year approached, the head of the school caught me playing with Samantha and Easton on the playground. She asked if I was interested in teaching still, and when I told her that I was, she explained that there was probably going to be a 1st grade position open for the 2015-2016 school year.
"God's plan must have always been for me to do this Bible Study before returning to teaching," I worked over with Blake later. "Amazing, right?"
Over the next few months, Blake and I learned about how to not only how to listen to God's voice and know when it is His voice or my own thoughts, but what to do when I hear Him speaking to me.
As my understanding grew, so did my excitement in what I was learning.
In early November, I specifically remember having a conversation one morning with my sister-in-law, Erica. I told her that I had this feeling that something was coming.
"It could be next week, next month, or next year. Something is coming, and God is preparing us for it." She nodded, noted her goosebumps, and crossed her fingers that the "something" was us moving back of Oklahoma.
A few weeks later, Blake and I sat next to each other at a quiet restaurant discussing the same line of thought that Erica and I had recently chatted about.
"Can't you feel it? Something is coming. I think maybe God was waiting... Waiting for just the right amount of time after my mom left. He knew that I couldn't do anything until I had grieved. Until I could remember her without losing myself to grief." Blake had nodded in agreement. He could sense something was happening, though we had no idea what or when anything would happen.
The week before Thanksgiving, "it" happened.
Blake came home from work on the evening of the Thanksgiving Feast that was being held at the kids' school. He pulled into the driveway with only enough time for the kids and I to load in. As he backed out, he turned to me, "They have asked me if I would like to interview for a position in Melbourne, Australia. I have to let them know by tomorrow."
As we drove, we reveled in knowing that this was what was coming, though much sooner than we had ever anticipated, this was the "something" that we had being feeling.
We couldn't turn the interview down.
How could we, knowing what we did?
Blake, of course, nailed the interview, and called me from Melbourne on the morning of my 30th birthday to tell me that we were moving to Australia.We were moving to Australia in barely two months. Ready, set, go!
From there, everything has become a blur of activity, paperwork, and blind faith.
But you know what... It is all out of our control. We have given up the control, and in turn, it has been smooth sailing. I would have never thought that moving your family of four across the world in less than eight weeks could happen so seamlessly, but it has nothing to do with me or Blake.
We are here.
I'm not sure why we are here, but we are here.
We came because we were asked to.
Now, we just have to keep listening.
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