God is Faithful

L: I was invited to fly up to Oregon State University to interview for a Food Science graduate program. Omar was one of the graduate students who was assigned to show me around (but instead of checking out the school, I was checking him out). One night, the professor invited me to a dinner with him and his graduate students to get to know the lab and the graduate program. However, everyone (even the professor himself) ended up bailing except Omar and I. So here we were, alone on a pseudo-date. That night was the start of a very lovely friendship.

We've been dating long distance now for about three years. Wow. But God is so faithful! Truthfully, there have been more times than we'd like to admit where we've hurt each other and broken promises, yet God has never left us in the muck. We struggled with anxiety, depression, fear, jealousy and lust, but we learned to be vulnerable about our general mess of life. But as we walked through those painful messes together, we found God's fingerprints all over this relationship- evidence of His redemption, guidance, and love. This relationship has taught us that God truly does His best work in our brokenness. God has brought so much comfort and healing to areas of our relationship that we thought would stay wounded forever. We love that God has given us each other to speak truth into times of intense struggle and to bring joy when we need to be reminded of it. As a couple, our constant prayer is that we can glorify God through our marriage and to sacrificially love each other despite imperfections- to reprove and exhort with patience. Just like Jesus chose us when we were unlovable (we were definitely not marriage material when he knew us), we will joyfully and unwaveringly commit to each other, even when we're less compatible and least deserving of each other's love.

The gospel is the good news that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died for our sins and rose again, so that there is now no condemnation for those who believe, but only everlasting joy. The greatest good of the gospel is not forgiveness, justification, or eternal life — as good as these are. But the highest, fullest, sweetest good of the gospel is that we get to enjoy God himself. And enter into a wonderful, intimate relationship with our Creator who unconditionally loves us SO DARN MUCH! We feel a need to go. To go share this good news among unreached people (where there is no indigenous, evangelizing church), by building relationships, investing in the community and showing tangible love! One of the ways we want to do this is to use our past agricultural/food science skills to disciple people holistically, with a vision to see an entire community transformed by the gospel. We hope to work in Central Asia with a team that aims to incorporate livestock, bio-digesters, greenhouses, and fodder crops into an integrated farming model that is scalable and accessible to rural farmers. We are excited as we plan to serve overseas as full-time missionaries and would love your prayers!