Relief!

I didn't know it, but I needed the Lord to refresh my vision in moving to Alaska and our need to be in Port Alsworth.  We have a place to contribute to the community and a role in the outreach to other Native Alaskan villages.

It was refreshing to be with friends. It was encouraging to have them share and enter into the process of helping us find housing. We are sad to be leaving our great community in College Station but we are going to great community and friendships in Port Alsworth.  We belong there...

The house we have been spending or summers in is perfect for our Biblical Outdoor Leadership Adventures. It is across 3 miles of water from the village of Port Alsworth and offers solitude which is perfect for the leadership trips. But we have been looking for a place that would allow us to be part of the village community during fall and winter months when life slows and people have time and energy to connect.  Durring the late fall and winter crossing the 3 miles of lake can be a tenuous commute at best, and impossible at worst. Some parts of the year you can cross in a boat; some on a snow machine; sometimes neither. Thus, the need for a second option during the winter.

Housing options tend to be slim in the bush. Building is so expensive off the road system that if you build a house it is probably one you will live in year-around; or it is built as a fishing/hunting cabin not usually built for the deep Alaskan winters.

Our dog Kodiak, in Anchorage the day before he

got “tutored”…hope he can forgive me some day!

On Wednesday afternoon I flew back to Anchorage from the bush and that evening I began to call through the short list of “hey, you should call so and so…they may rent”. I got to the last name on my list and left a message...the next morning as I sat in Starbucks reading Ephesians I got a call back from that last contact and heard "yes we would love to rent you our house in the winter." I was sitting there with tears of thanksgiving filling my eyes trying unsuccessfully to look innocuous...especially when I called Julie and told her the news.  Relief.  Thanksgiving.  Gratitude.  Did I say relief…?

The family we will be renting from is a really cool Christian family who is going to Botswana, Africa for a couple of years to fly medical evac from bush villages to the city. What a great blessing! Julie and I are so relieved! The kids will have the opportunity to go to the Port Alsworth school and we can begin to put deeper roots into the community.

The Gospel needs to go out to SW Alaska, how privileged that we might come alongside and play a role in helping...

Thank you for praying! This is truly an adventure and we are so grateful to have people praying with us.

I got home on Saturday afternoon in time to help Josh and Sam tie their ties for a dinner banquet and dance.  They took a cotillion class this winter and the ball was this past weekend.  They are studdly men!