Sometimes God changes our plans...
“Make me to know your ways, O Lord; teach me your paths.” Psalm 25:4
What happens when God changes that path?
The day we moved into this house we were bringing things in and a completely random thought came to me: “This is going to be a great house for another family some day…”
What??
Then one day, earlier this year, we were talking about the floor fiasco and how we needed to get it redone and I said out loud to my husband: “Are we getting the floors done now, only to then turn around and sell the house?”
What again??? (Lance said “no way” for the record…)
Why these thoughts came into my mind so randomly only confirms to me that the Lord does make known to us His will and ways… by the Holy Spirit and His guidance… and it comes little by little as we open our hearts to listen.
Yesterday we had a beautiful photo shoot at our house…we are completely exhausted, but we do feel the Lord is changing our plans. Our house will be listed for sale most likely around my birthday next week. So, we will be moving if the Lord sells this house, we just don’t know where yet. (I’ll share their photos once it’s listed, but here are some that Lance and I took:
And here’s a little bit of our story:
We had no intention of moving. (Just like we had no intention of moving out of California 4 years ago) When we went to California this past March we had no thoughts of leaving our new home and state. (although unbeknownst to us, we had people praying for us to want to move back there, but more on that later) Sure, 70 degree weather in March IS nice and seeing green in March IS great. But we have the most beautiful home we have ever owned. It is obviously the biggest home we’ve ever owned and it has lots and lots of land. It was the “dream home”… that we thought we would live out our days in.
But God may have other plans.
So after lots of talking, praying and asking, we have been getting it ready to put up for sale since we got back from Italy last month, and every day I just pray the Lord continues to show us His will and His plans for what is next. Earlier this week as I was driving and praying I asked the Lord again… “Why are we doing this? It’s paid in full, we could live here for the rest of our lives! It’s an incredible home we poured our blood, sweat and tears into and now it’s finally finished… and I was reminded very softly that HE PAID IT IN FULL too. Friends, our lives are in His hands and it is by His grace we have everything and anything at all. Holding everything with an open hand is where He will work things out for our good and His purposes. Even when we don't understand or aren’t sure we are doing the right thing, He is SO faithful!
I want to give a shout out to my hubby for a minute…
He has always loved California. He was born and raised there and truly never wanted to leave (except for the crazy politics there). But, he saw that the Holy Spirit was starting to work in my life 4 years ago to uproot us and so he said yes when I told him I thought we were supposed to move to Colorado. He knew no-one here, he didn’t know what he was going to do here… he just trusted that we were hearing from the Lord to go, and he obeyed. It became a four year process of building this house and learning every aspect of building a home. It became his full time job. He was blessed to be introduced to a strong godly group of men here that have changed his life and he is again open to the Lord moving us, wherever that may be. But here’s the part that brings me to tears today…
He built this for the next family…
In the process of building this house, we specifically created a wrap around porch space for a bed swing. We wanted to sit, talk and enjoy the view of Castle Rock in this space. But now we are selling and he hadn’t had time to build it for us yet with all that we’ve been busy with on this house. So he went and got the wood, bought the saw and all the tools, knowing it will not be for us, but he still wanted it to be here for the next family. ugh… I love that so much. (I’ll share pictures of this when the seat cushion arrives. We had to “stage” it with moving blankets and white canvas for the photos since it didn’t come in time…)
I want you to know we don’t have this all figured out. I still have so many thoughts, fears and questions that I am leaving in God’s hands, but I wanted to share some of those with all of you who have watched this journey, prayed for us and encouraged us these last 4 years as we built a home from the ground up.
I want to share all of this with you because:
#1 You have all been so kind and supportive on our vision for this home, and
#2 Because it’s part of the story God is still writing… and I know it may seem crazy, but He will be magnified in it.
I’ve thought about plans, and changes in plans a lot lately. I’ve read about Paul’s life as a sojourner. He traveled where God lead him to share the gospel and he also had times where God stopped him and changed his plans. Things Paul thought he was going to do didn’t actually turn out to be what God had in mind. Why did God change Paul’s plans? I can’t answer that, I can only say (and trust) that God is sovereign and His plans are best. In a way this gives me peace that these last four years of moving from California, building this house and living here weren’t a mistake. I’ve questioned whether we weren’t in God’s will moving here… because those thoughts creep in… but I know that is not true. Each one of us has been deeply changed by living in Colorado. Each one of us has been hugely blessed by the Lord in our time here. Our lives as a family have been impacted by all that we have done here and all who we have met here. And that time isn’t over yet, because we want to let Isabella finish out her senior year of High School here.
But plans do change, life changes. We’ve all realized that even now more with the pandemic, and how little control we actually have over our lives. The good news is that even though we don’t know what the future looks like, when we have a relationship with Jesus, we can trust Him in the unknowns and He will show us the next set of plans, in His perfect timing. I believe this with everything in me, and I hope you do too. Because God’s plans are always better, even when we can’t see it.
It’s why Proverbs 3:5-6 has been so important in my life, and why I try to walk this out daily. I guess maybe the Lord is putting it to the test again… so here’s those verses for all of us:
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6
One of those plans (or paths) for us may be in Bellagio. You know by now that we love it there and in our hearts we know the Lord brought that little part of Italy into our lives, specifically the people on Lake Como, for His purposes. Yes, one of those purposes is to bring YOU there so you can experience the joy of the Lord in a creative and beautiful way. But we also believe it’s for us to be a part of that community. They have welcomed us with open arms and we have been praying how we can bring the love of Jesus there and serve them in some way. This summer was an amazing time with just our family there, and I had felt since the beginning of the pandemic that if the Lord opened the door for us to go and show them how much we care about them, we would do that. Let me say, it was such a wonderful time of connection with so many people on the lake! We have felt for a while now that we would like to have a place of our own there so we can welcome them into our home as well. So this summer we started looking for a place and we actually found a beautiful little apartment in Bellagio that would fit our needs perfectly. We are currently praying about what that looks like in the future and if that is one of the “next steps” God has for us.
The other path may be back to California. Both my husband’s family and my mom are in California. We moved my mom back out to California last month as the weather in Colorado was too hard for her and the cost of living was actually higher for her here with the senior community she lived in. So she is back in Cali and doing great where she lived for many years before and is very happy in the warmer weather. Lance’s mom has had some health issues I’ve mentioned in the past, so with both our parents in California, we do feel it is time to be close to them as they get older. California is a bit crazy, so it does feel like we’d be moving back into the “lions den” and it is why I’m getting some anxiety and fear over this, but it also is home to us. We both grew up by the beach, we miss the ocean, we miss family and our two youngest daughters miss their friends and lives they had back there. Isabella is going to pursue acting (in the Christian film world) and Rebecca switched to Liberty University online so she could transfer her Masters to California much easier than staying at Denver Seminary. Yes California is a hard place to live these days, but sin and darkness are everywhere and God calls us to share the light in the darkness… not live in safe bubbles.
So we are waiting, doing lots of praying, working very hard and trusting that we have done what we can do and the Lord will provide the next steps. Yes, we built this home to gather people. We really thought this was going to be so much land for the perfect gathering space.. and maybe it will be, for the next family. Sometimes we build, others plant and still others sow, right? I am praying for a family to come here and feel the presence of the Lord from the beams we wrote scripture on, to the four corners we put faith words into the foundation!
In the meantime, with so many changes in our world and in our own lives, I think it’s opened all of our eyes and given us a chance to re-evaluate things and ask ourselves some hard questions. These are the one’s I’ve been asking myself lately. If you’d like to add them to your Friday Journaling Prompt this week, here they are:
1. How do we live out our lives for the Lord in a world that is changing daily before our very eyes?
2. What does living boldly for the Lord look like in these days? Because it’s going to take boldness in all of us to live out God’s truths in a world that is turning against God more and more.
3. How do we live out “Love your neighbor as yourself” in a time where the enemy is seeking to divide us?
Our hearts are very much still to gather, connect and be a light. What that looks like going forward… I don’t know yet. But I’d like to finish this post with what the Lord has been showing me lately and maybe it will resonate with you too.
A while back I woke up one morning and the words “street ministry” were in my head as clear as the morning sun. I immediately thought of Bellagio. The way we walk down the street in Bellagio and say Ciao back and forth to everyone as we go. We know the people at each cafe, fruit market, leather shop, gelato shop, restaurant, etc… You connect with people every day, many times a day. You meet for apertivo or coffee with them… and I realized that IS street ministry. But then I also thought of neighborhoods we’ve lived in. People we gathered with in our culdesac, or chatted with when we got out of our cars at night… That IS sharing your life, your light and your heart with others...a.k.a. street ministry! When you have the Light of Jesus inside you, you miss that connection because we are all made for this. So we are praying for this kind of life in California as well.
We know many people dream of the house on lots of land, no neighbors to bug you… and I get that, because we did too! We were definitely blessed to have the opportunity to live this way for a time. But I think Bellagio, and this experience, have reminded us what connection and community looks like. Yes, living in close proximity to others can be messy and beautiful and hard, but maybe that’s what God intended. We’ve all seen the video’s during Covid of the Italians singing out their windows, sharing food across their balconies and coming out to chat with each other come “apertivo hour” each night. In a way that IS loving your neighbor. It’s not perfect, and don’t think those Italians all get along every second or don’t yell across the balcony to shut up sometimes… hahaha, but there is grace in it! There is redemption and love and working things out with neighbors IN the mess. And it’s important to realize God wants us to engage with others who may not agree with everything we like or do.
We were made for connection SO THAT God can be shown THROUGH it, change us IN it, and He is glorified BECAUSE of it.
~ Is it getting harder to love thy neighbor, make meaningful God-centered connections and live boldly for the Lord? Yes.
~ Do we know as the time draws nearer to the Lord’s return, it will get harder and harder? Yes.
~ Do we see by now that the enemy wants to isolate us and is working very hard to divide us? 100% Yes.
But God has other plans for us friends!
I had a phone call with a dear woman of god who has an amazing company that is doing great things for the Lord. She told me the words “street ministry” were actually words a lot of people have been hearing lately! WOW…
I also listened to a GREAT podcast from Allie Beth Stuckey on anxiety, connection and encouragement HERE. She is a great resource of Biblically sound encouragement.
Let me gently remind us all… We were put on this earth to do the will of God and we know that is to share His truth, in love, to a world that needs to see Jesus through His people. Why God decided to use people to share His story of hope and redemption… I don’t know. He could very easily part the clouds and show us His glory and it would be much more convincing that my testimony or yours. But none-the-less, He is looking for us to willingly be that light in this dark world.
So we will seek the Lord and trust Him to show us what’s next. We will RELEASE (another word that’s been floating around in my head lately) this house and open our hearts to be a part of a community/neighborhood in Italy, California or wherever God moves us. And we will keep moving forward each day, praying for the Lord to teach us His ways and show us His path.
Thank you to everyone who has prayed for us, we appreciate it SO much! If I can pray for you, please let me know. I would love to pray for you too. We are all in this together and I know it’s not easy navigating our lives in a world that is getting darker by the day. I’ll leave you with a couple verses that I hope will bring you peace and joy in your unknowns as well.
“You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” Jeremiah 29:13
“And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28
I pray we all seek Jesus first, and have confidence that God loves His children and does all things for our good and His ultimate purposes!
Hugs to all,
Laura McCollough