Different life events can cause you to reflect a little bit more on life, or at least on certain aspects of it. So having recently "officially" moved to Cape Town, I've done some reflecting related to moving. Which... I've done a fair amount of. It's kind of strange. Everyone in my high school class was like, "I can't wait to graduate and leave Omaha!" My thoughts were, "I love Omaha and all my friends and family are here. I don't want to leave here!" But God had other ideas. He often does. Ideas you'd never begin to dream of or consider on your own. But that's another story.
So I moved to Michigan. Then Texas. Then California. Then Robertson, South Africa. Now Cape Town. When I moved to Texas, I went for the purpose of going to a missions training school, and I didn't know anyone. It was rough -- I was so happy where I was in Michigan (happy where I was in Nebraska, happy where I was in Michigan, happy where I was in California... guess the Lord normally likes to move me when I'm perfectly happy and all is well where I am!) Several months after moving to Texas, in the midst of missing my friends and adjusting, I told the Lord, "I really don't want to move again. Ever. But if you want me to, I'm willing. But please, I need to know at least one person, have one friend there. I can't move to a place if I don't know anyone." And when I moved to California, I did have friends there. (Another long story.)
The journey to Cape Town has been another interesting adventure. Why, when I came to South Africa, didn't I just come here straight away? In August 2014, I started thinking about an idea to have a ministry to, well, people in ministry. It's tough, you know. Many missionaries quit after 2 years, I've written before about the stress that missionaries face, it's easy to feel like your job is to make everyone happy, people don't really understand, etc etc. This isn't coming from out of how I felt -- this was almost 2 years ago. This is what I'd seen. And from that time back almost 2 years ago, I always thought Cape Town was the logical place for it. Always. But I had zero interest in Cape Town. It was too big and too cramped and the roads were too narrow and there were too many cars and I wanted to be in the mountains. (I don't know what I was thinking.) Then at some point I started thinking about Cape Town. And when I was in Omaha (US) in August 2015, as I drove around Omaha, I kept thinking, "I miss driving in Cape Town." Which was weird, first of all because I'd hardly even ever driven in Cape Town. And second of all, for 18 years whenever I'd visited Omaha, one of my favorite things is to drive on the streets of Omaha - and I'd always think how much I loved seeing the city, getting up on a hill and being able to look over large portions of the city. I'd never thought of another city while driving in Omaha. Why was I thinking of this city that I'd rarely been to and didn't even like a year before? God does change our hearts.
Also around that time, I started meeting and even getting to know people in Cape Town. I started feeling like I had a few friends. And just recently, as I was pondering all this, I realized: The Lord completely honored my request to know people, to have friends in the place that I move to. I didn't have that in August 2014 (I knew one person a little). But I did have friends in Robertson. And by the end of 2015, I somehow had a ridiculous number of contacts, connections, and friends, considering the precious little time I'd spent here. So amazing that He'd be so kind and faithful to remember my request from 13/14 years ago and do that for me, even when I forgot about it!
