Love From Afar, Part II
Big decisions to make?
The Lord makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him; though he (or she!) may stumble he will not fall, for the Lord upholds him with His hand. (Psalm 37:23-24).
My husband Chris and I have faced a lot of “big” decisions over the past few years, including multiple job changes and cross-country moves. Last week I talked a little about how we deal with our current situation, this week I want to share some of how we ended up here.
It all started around 2006. Chris and I had been settled in Dallas for many years, but Chris’ family lives in Canada and mine is in Oregon. We started thinking about trying to relocate (or at least spend a lot more time) nearer to the Pacific Northwest. We eventually settled on Portland and bought property there. We waited and prayed for the right time to start shifting our “base of operations” west.
But God had some other plans. My oldest son needed me back in Dallas. I took some time away from work to help him get on track and through his Senior year of high school (we now laughingly refer to this time as “Mom’s Boot Camp!”).
Over the next two years, I left my job in Dallas and went to work (commuting) for a company headquartered in Denver, then ended work with that company and started looking for new challenges (a story for another blog!). This all served to lessen our ties to Dallas, so in 2008, we finally started construction/remodeling of the house in Portland, but we still didn’t know when or if God would take us there more permanently. We prayed that God would guide our steps and we knew that He would show us when the time was right.
Now about Chris’s job. I won’t spend too much time on the details of my husband’s career, what’s important here is that at this point in our marriage, I had never seen Chris truly professionally satisfied. He has always prioritized his family and his kids in considering his career decisions, and I know he doesn’t regret that, but still it was hard to see him dissatisfied with that area of his life. I knew that it was important to our marriage for him to get to a more professionally satisfying place.
That’s when we got the call.
We were driving in Colorado for my son’s college parents weekend when Chris got a call from a headhunter with the “perfect job.” And the job did sound perfect. But it was in Tacoma, Washington. PRAYER TIME! Tacoma is only a few hours from our house in Portland, was it time to make the move? All of the kids were doing well, three were either in college or about to start and the youngest (Chris’s son) was at least not opposed to a Tacoma move. I was pursuing some flexible consulting and corporate board work, so I could feasibly shift my home base to Portland. We knew that the hard part would be for Chris and me. We weren’t exactly thrilled about the prospect of a “weekend marriage,” but after many many prayers, we felt that God was calling us to make the move, and God gave me a peace that we could do this.
So we did. Now, over a year later, Chris loves his job. I love seeing him love his job. Through God’s grace and provision our relationship is thriving, and God is using this time to grow us individually too. As we move forward, I trust in the promise of Psalm 91: that those who take refuge in the Lord will be lifted by His angels and thus have nothing to fear.
If you say, The Lord is my refuge,” and you make the Most High your dwelling, no harm will overtake you, no disaster will come near your tent. For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent. (v. 9-13)