We’re hours away from getting on a plane here in Columbus, and excited to see what God already has in store. We’ll be stopping through Dallas, San Francisco and Taipei before landing in Phnom Penh, Cambodia (28 hours and 10,269 miles after leaving Columbus)!

All of this would be impossible without the prayer and financial support of many friends and family members. We were supported as a “missionary family” to work for 1-2 years for a church camp here in Ohio. That support helped me start out as a self-employed web designer over 4 years ago. I’ve now taken a full-time position outside the home, but this missions trip is a great reminder of how God provided when we took that step a few years ago. Reminding me how much people actually care and want God’s work to take place. It wasn’t very easy for me to take the step this time, but I knew it was what God wanted.

Marla and I will be tweeting while we’re on the way there, but I’m excited to partially unplug and connect to things that God wants to do with our hands and our hearts. Have you ever stepped out into a unfamiliar situation / location / circumstance where you were uncertain what God had in store? I’d love to hear about it.

I’ve been surrounded lately by stories. Real stories from real lives. Real lives that are struggling with chasing after wrong desires. God’s been opening our eyes to stories of sex trafficking, stories of immorality, stories of objects in the world being sought after first. And so on, and so on. You and I have stories like these, there’s no getting around that.

Life really is a story. The way we live it mirrors how we tell our stories. If we know God, there are certain laws and truths that He’s given us to help us build our story. Somehow we start narrating the story / living the life by going down a rabbit trail that doesn’t match how He desires for our story to continue. He’s given us the pen, knowing very well how our story should be told, but letting us figure out a way to screw it up. Rabbit trail after Captain Me Planet rabbit trail.

Isn’t that what free will is all about? God having the power to keep us on a leash, but somehow He loves us enough to unhook the chain and let us get lost.

The story of Christ (God the Son) is the only story on earth where the pen wasn’t handed over. The story wasn’t screwed up, because God the Father satisfied Himself by covering our messed up stories with the one His Son wrote over the course of 33 years.

Thanks to a discussion going on over on Max vs. Max today, I was blown away by the words of C.S. Lewis. – “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” (Mere Christianity, Bk. III, Chap. 10, “Hope”).

What are 2-3 things that you have found yourself chasing, thinking your craving would be satisfied, but finding the next minute or next morning that it was only another rabbit trail ending in a desire for something more? Were you made for another world?

Too much going on at the moment to share thoughts. Been watching the World Cup with the girls, rooting for the USA of course! They’re ready to get another season started I think. Our 4 year-old has us playing Wavin’ Flag by K’Naan in the van quite a bit. She has the lyrics (from the second video below) memorized, LOL. The first video is a sweet remix for the World Cup that he did with Coca-Cola. Enjoy!!!

It really is amazing to think about the different talents / abilities God’s given us. After seeing this video interview posted by the Lima News with my cousin Luke, I thought I’d share it here. If I were one of the horses, I wouldn’t mess with Luke. Maybe someday I can go hang out with him while he’s working and snap some neat photos – without being “swiped” of course! Do some of your family members do work that falls outside of your abilities?

Sure, they won just today by a score of 3-1 over Australia, but this video shows just how well our team is representing our country off of the field while in South Africa for the World Cup. Thought I would post the video below to remind us (as Americans) that we really do have the opportunity to bring joy to other countries. I’m looking forward to doing that in a few weeks when I travel with Marla to Cambodia! Thanks for the reminder guys!