Preparing to return . . .

So about the time we got our guardianship order, Mark's assistant quit, sending him into a state of panic about leaving the office for any length of time.  His salary is 100% commission, so if he's not at work - and there's no assistant helping him out with his accounts - we have no income.

Then, we learn from our Ugandan attorneys that the process in getting Maggie out of the country changed somewhat, and would take longer than anticipated.  We even employed the help of our senator's office to see if we could expedite the process, but there was nothing they could do.

Next?  The terrorist attack in Nairobi, Kenya.  Right next door to Kampala.  Watching the news video of that attack gave us chills, as it took place in a mall identical to the one we frequented in Kampala - a touristy/American-ish mall with the exact same grocery store we went to nearly every day.   Unnerving, to say the least.

But God continued to answer our worries and fears, faithfully through His word, as He always does.  Prior to our first trip in June, for some reason I can't really explain, we focused heavily on Psalm 91.  Noah memorized it in it's entirety, and my mom and I started memorizing it as well.  It brought me great peace at that time.  So a week ago, as we were watching the coverage of this terrorist attack and our worries and fears were peaking, I sat down to do my BSF lesson.  We're doing Matthew this year.  But on this particular day - the scripture for this part of the lesson?  Psalm 91.  I couldn't believe it.  Actually, I should, though, shouldn't I?  This is GOD we are talking about. He listens. He speaks.  He cares.  Why should we be surprised when He shows up with exactly what we need?

In the next day or two, God also gave me this, twice in one day, in completely different places: Don't let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me.  John 14:1  :)

So we bought our plane tickets.  We are taking a giant leap of faith, going blindly into a very uncertain and unstable process, but knowing this: Our God is sovereign.  He provides. And His plans are perfect and do not fail.  Ever.  We are exactly where He wants us - utterly and completely dependent on HIM.  Not ourselves, not the Ugandan government, not the U.S. government.  Knowing that it will take 10 different miracles to get Maggie out of Uganda, but knowing HE can do it.

Trusting Him is not always easy - in fact sometimes it's downright hard - and it requires a conscious choice.  Right now we feel like we are looking at scaling  Mount Everest . . . but if our situations and circumstances were easy, and we could accomplish things in our own power, what reason would we have to lean on our God?   We've learned God graciously allows difficulties in our lives to draw us closer to Him, to know Him more intimately.  So we know these steps of faith are for our growth, bonding us closer to our Savior, and following Him makes all the insanity of this process worth it.  He is worth EVERYthing.

And so we are chin-deep in logistics, packing and organizing.  Trying to anticipate anything and everything that we will need - this isn't like packing for a normal trip - if you forget something, you are likely out of luck - you can't just run to the nearest Target or WalMart.  Even Noah was quizzing me tonight about whether or not I had various medicines.  I should just turn the whole show over to him - he'd likely do it better! :)