Restless Pilgrims

Its been a bit of a whirlwind of a few months. Those of you who know us well will know that we gave birth to a baby girl, Kora Joy a few months ago! Its been been an amazing and bewildering time adjusting to being full time parents, we are loving being a family! In other news, Mark left his position with the Boaz Trust last week. He doesn't have another job to step into at the moment, but we believe that God has been preparing us for this for some time - whilst a very rewarding job with a truly gospel centred organisation, we have been sensing Gods preparation for a release from this position for almost a year. So we have taken a leap of faith! At the moment that means taking a temporary position for a year and taking some time out to discern where God might be leading.

We continue to feel a senses of restlessness, a dissatisfaction with the status quo. It does feel like God has been and is continuing to prepare us for a major shift in our ministry focus over the last few years. So we have taken an intentional step to take some time out to really discern what this might look. Although these feelings of restlesness can be deeply frustrating, we have come to realise that there is such a thing as a holy restlesness, an uneasiness if you like with just accepting how things seem to be. It can also redeeming though. It takes you to a place of non-conformity and non-complacency, keeps you on edge... it helps you search for something deeper and more true. God has already revealed a lot to us over the past few years of this journey.There are no magic answers, just as we step out in faith each time the Lord reveals a little more to us!

To be honest, we're not completely sure where God is leading. We have some ideas but nothing concrete at the moment. As St. Augustine once said ' Our heart is restless until it rests in you Lord.' The idea is to be quite serious over the next few months about doing some things that will help draw us closer to God and continue to discern his will and really discover why God might be trying so hard to get our attention. Please continue to pray for us as the Lord leads us on this journey. it feels like an exciting time for our little family right now!

Life without papers

I thought i'd signpost you to a great blog about some of the people i work with every day, its called http://www.lifewithoutpapers.co.uk/ This blog is not an easy read, it tells the stories about the daily struggles and vulnerabilities of this often forgotten and neglected group

Undocumented migrants have nothing. They are not allowed to work. They have no right to state benefits nor to a place to live. They are unseen and potentially the most vulnerable group in the UK today.

Undocumented (or irregular) migrants include those trafficked into the sex trade or for domestic servitude; they include visa overstayers; those whose asylum applications have been refused and others who have been subject to failures in the immigration system. All of these may originally have come to the UK legally.

‘Illegal immigrants’ – those imagined to have entered the country in the backs of lorries – make up a small proportion of the undocumented.

Indeed some sources suggest that half the estimated 120,000 undocumented children in the UK were actually born here to undocumented parents. These children are disadvantaged from birth, solely by their immigration status. Written by photographer and writer Len Grant, the subjects of the stories have been introduced through agencies or charities that work with destitute migrants.

....and 2 years later!

Well its been some time since we updated this site...and the past couple of years have been full of adventure! We have loved the first few years of marriage, have experienced the ups and downs of working for 2 growing charities, not to mention moved to a new church and established ourselves in a new community. 

The last time we posted, we talked about how God was working in our lives through the many changes we were experiencing, that we felt a deep desire to experience God more deeply and connect with those around us, there was a strange kind of restlesness driving us! 

This feeling has continued to shape our spiritual lives over the past few years. Our work has opened our eyes to many new things, working along rejected and marginalised asylum seekers and helping the church to engage with their wider communities across the UK. We felt compelled to leave our church and move to a new plant within a social housing estate in Manchester. The church plant is within a more deprived area of the city, and the church has grown quickly to total about 60 people. 

This same restlesness continues to drive us though, and we are continuing to feel God drawing us to new things. Trendy words that are often thrown around in Christian circles include incarnational, church planting, justice, mission. Thoughts around some of these issues are shaping our thoughts about our future. Thats all i'll say for now but im sure there will be more to come in the near future...watch this space

When the Holy Spirit moves

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kG827sCz-v4

Check this guy out, Francis Chan. He was the senior pastor at a mega church in California until he decided to step down from his role in July this year. I can empathise with this guys story. His obedience to the Lord and the move of the Holy Spirit in his life is quite inspiriational. Francis Chan also wrote the book Crazy Love, which is really about how the American church today differs so much from the Early church and what Jesus called us to as his disciples. Well, if thats true for the Amercian church, its true for the church in the UK as well. the idea of the church as a movement of people, built on relationships, that breaks people tradtional viw of what the church is,  now thats appealing to me. 

Final Ella update

SO SO much to share but long story really short (I’ll try), Ella and her lawyer, Hanan, and I bus-tripped 4 hrs south to Aqaba (city on the Red Sea where Ella worked before) last Saturday to meet with the police there.  It was the last step she had to take before being released to fly back to Manila on the 15th.  Once in the police station, though, Ella’s previous employer was notified and came to meet with us (the same man who raped her repeatedly, he AND his son) and it was decided that since Ella was a run-away and now illegal (work permit had expired) the law said she needed to be taken into custody until she could be returned to the Philippines.  Hanan fought it and fought it…Ella had one more week of work, hadn’t said goodbye to anyone, we weren’t prepared for this at all, I asked them to make me her guardian til the 15th promising to deliver her at risk of being deported myself…NO.  It was the law.  So Hanan and I went with her employer to the airline office to change her ticket to the following night…

Second Sunday of Advent – December 5

An excerpt from iGracias! by Henri J.M. Nouwen

"A shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom. The spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him . . ." (Isa.11:1-2).

These words from last night's liturgy have stayed with me during the day. Our salvation comes from something small, tender, and vulnerable, something hardly noticeable. God, who is the Creator of the Universe, comes to us in smallness, weakness, and hiddenness.

I find this a hopeful message. Somehow, I keep expecting loud and impressive events to convince me and others of God's saving power; but over and over again I am reminded that spectacles, power plays, and big events are the ways of the world. Our temptation is to be distracted by them and made blind to the "shoot that shall sprout from the stump."

When I have no eyes for the small signs of God's presence - the smile of a baby, the carefree play of children, the words of encouragement and gestures of love offered by friends - I will always remain tempted to despair.

The small child of Bethlehem, the unknown young man of Nazareth, the rejected preacher, the naked man on the cross, he asks for my full attention. The work of our salvation takes place in the midst of a world that continues to shout, scream, and overwhelm us with its claims and promises. But the promise is hidden in the shoot that sprouts from the stump, a shoot that hardly anyone notices.

iGracias! - A Latin American Journal (December 2, 1981) © Henri J.M. Nouwen. Published by HarperCollins. Reprinted with publisher's kind permission. Photo by K. Smith.

Ella update 2 & 3

So guess WHAT??  Since I wrote last, Ella’s former employer AGREED!!!  He’ll return her paperwork/passport and will drop all charges against her, without compensation, if she agrees not to take him to court.  Can you believe it??  Our Daddy is SO good.  Truly a miracle.  I still can’t believe it.  Bless you all for praying…I called Ella straight away and told her the news and she just cried and cried…soooo thankful to all who have given and been praying through this…and wanted to make sure I thank you for her.  Man what a privilege it’s been to watch God remind one of his children how dearly loved she is and how bright the future is with him THROUGH his people on earth rallying around her and giving and praying and fighting for her!  Beautiful.

So keep praying…I dropped off a copy of Ella’s ticket back to Manila yesterday with her lawyer, and once they have that, her papers should be returned quickly, hopefully early this next week.  Pray for the details of that, for her employer’s heart in all this, for wisdom for Ella’s lawyer in making sure all the little details are covered (visa expenses and police reports, etc) between now and the 15th so she can get on that plane and fly out without any hangups.  And pray for Ella and I as we talk and dream about the future for her and her family, for God to “take us by the hand and lead us in the path of life” for them, for direction in how to best use the money that’s come in (and still is…there’s time if you still want to!).  About $1250 has come in so far over and above what was used to buy her ticket, and right now her dreams are to use ~$500 of it to pay off an outstanding debt from her previous job in Hong Kong and the rest of it to start a small business in Manila so that she can stay close to her family.  I have a few contacts in Manila I’m writing that might be able to help in her transition and know of one microcredit NGO working there, but if you have any ideas or know of anyone who could help, pls let us know!!

Follow up...

Quick Ella update:  Found out this week that she needs to present herself in person at the police department in Aqaba (4 hrs south of Amman on the Red Sea) before they’ll drop the charges that were filed against her by her employer when she ran away. I called Ella after talking to her lawyer to tell her…she was instantly in tears, so so scared, wondering why and if her employer would be there, etc.  I was on the other end just exhausted, wanting all this to be over, not knowing what to say or how to support her.  I was on a break from class and had to get back so told her I’d call her lawyer again to get more details and then call her back after class finished.

Two hours later I called her back, and she answers with “Oh hi Ate (big sister), I’m fine now!”  WHAT?  I asked her, what happened?  “Well, I just did what you and Pete & Layne (my two friends who just left after visiting me and who got to meet and pray with Ella while they were here) told me to do.  After we hung up, I went into the bathroom and locked myself in the stall (her only place of peace and quiet in the gym where she works, she spends alot of time there!) and sat on the toilet and asked God what He thought I should do.  And he told me that I didn’t need to be afraid.  That actually, my employer was afraid of ME.  And that he is with me wherever I go.  So I’m ready Ate, let’s go to Aqaba!” 

AMAZING.  I was laughing and crying on the other end, she was like a totally different person than the one I knew even a few months ago…amazing and beautiful to watch her change as it sinks in how MUCH God loves her and how he longs to walk with her, in confidence and truth and boldness.  LOVE IT!  The Spirit of God at work, isn’t he amazing?

I was wondering how this trip would happen…two foreign gals-one with some basic Arabic, showing up at the police department in Aqaba and hoping for the best, but if they weren’t there or the right paperwork wasn’t signed, the time is so short before she flies I wanted to make sure we knew what to do and who to talk to…so today I went to her lawyer’s office before class with some cookies and a card Ella made her over the weekend and before I said ANYTHING, the lawyer volunteered to come with us.  YAY!!  So this Saturday the 3 of us are taking a bus trip there and back, and insha’allah everything should be set after that for Ella to fly back to Manila on the 15th.  So keep praying!!!