The Big News Blog

Daniel and I in Italy

 

I am moving to Spain after my term here in South Africa is finished!!  That is the big news.  Now I will go ahead and tell you all the story of how it came about. 

 

I guess it was back in September that I finally decided on going to seminary when my term here was over.  I had always kind of thought that is what I would do anyway.  I had really not even begun the process of it all when a good friend of mine, Daniel Pirkle had asked about my plans after my term was over.  When talking to a journeyman it is always required that you ask about future plans, whether you are 2 weeks into your term or almost finished, I think it is a law or something.  Anyway I proceeded to tell him about seminary and all that, exciting stuff.  So I of course in turn questioned him on his plans.  He told me he was considering doing another two year term in either Africa or Europe.  I was like that’s cool and asked him about what kind of jobs he was looking at.  He told me university work, which is what he is currently doing in Tokyo, Japan.  Now, since I have been here I have felt more called to the university type work.  I have enjoyed being able to work with high school here, but I think that through this work God has been showing me my strengths and skills are growing to be more suited to the university level, and college student.  So when Daniel told me that, I thought that was great and we should do it together.  Now at this point I don’t think either one of us had really thought about the possibility of serving together.  And I had in no way ever even considered doing another term.  I have had an AMAZING experience, but had said to myself I don’t think I will serve as a missionary again unless I’m married, it’s kind of hard serving by yourself and being the only single guy around. (Blake Welch is now here serving in Joburg…shout out to Blake)  But I decided to start looking at jobs with Daniel.  Daniel had found two that he was interested in, one in Africa and one in Finland.  This is the point I started praying about this as an option, I really didn’t want to do another term in Africa, I was looking for a whole new type of experience.  But I thought the one in Finland sounded awesome, and I think Daniel was more feeling that one as well.  The issue with the Finland job was that it was only a request for one person but the supervisor there said that he would try and work it out for both of us to come but that he wouldn’t know anything until December.  So we were both good cool with that.  I decided to look at more jobs in Europe, in case this one didn’t work out.   I saw one in Spain that looked amazing and was a request for two guys.  Daniel had seen the same job, but it had said they were looking for people that all ready possessed pretty good Spanish skills.  And well neither of us have those… YET.  I decided to contact the guy in charge there and told him about us and what we were looking for.  He was instantly excited and said that our lack of Spanish skills was not a big deal.  I passed this info on to Daniel and he thought it sounded good as well.  We were both however, still kind of set on the Finland job.  I stayed in contact with Spain, and found more out about the job and even had a phone conversation with our would supervisor there.  I was definitely starting to feel more and more like this was the job.  I gave Daniel this guys Skype address and he was able to talk with him as well.  It wasn’t long before Daniel and I both knew this was the job.   So we began praying about this one, and both felt like this was it.  Now at this point I still wasn’t 100% committed to doing another term.  But we began to go ahead with the process, and the farther we got with it the more excited I became.   So now I am doing it!! I will be back in the U.S for a couple months, then off to Spain sometime in mid July.  I’m quite excited about being able to work with a close friend and be able to university work in Spain.  That is my story!!

 I would ask that you all continue to pray for the remainder of my ministry here and my saying goodbyes in the coming months to the people I work with.  Good byes are very important in African culture! 

 Also pray that the logistics for leaving here, the stuff I need to do in the states for Spain and heading to Spain will all go smoothly.

 And pray that my time back home would be a great, I would be able to share with many my experiences here and that time with family and friends would be great!