WE'RE MOVING!...to West Seattle?

Don't you already live in West Seattle? Yeah, we do...This past week has been a whirlwind emotionally and spiritually. On Wednesday we had dinner with our community group leader, Jeremy Allen, to finish the Mars Hill membership process. The final step was to have an interview with him to affirm that we are willing to follow Jesus and abide by our church's doctrine and leadership. All went well with our membership interview, but even more, it was evident as the night progressed that God was actually calling us to move to the Mars Hill West Seattle campus. To be fair, this didn't entirely come out of nowhere. I had told Arthur, my husband, even before we were married that this was on my heart. But instead of pushing the subject, I felt that I needed to quietly pray for him to make the best decision for us. Although we had continued discussion on this idea, months later God used Jeremy to speak into this subject, and by the end of the evening it had been decided that we would leave Ballard for West Seattle starting this Sunday (today). By the way, I don't plan to post in such length too often, so don't quit on us now!

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We have both been at the Ballard campus for nearly five years, so this move is certainly going to be a challenge is some ways. We are leaving our amazing community group (read, family), the friendly faces we would see every Sunday, the uber hip culture, the more than awesome worship music, my Sunday trip to Trader Joe's, and the blessing of watching our preaching pastor live every week. But while are trading in hanging out with dudes that wear skinny jeans all year round to families with white picket fences (maybe a little dramatic?), I know this is exactly where God is calling us to plant our roots. We look forward to getting involved at West Seattle, the church and the community.

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Today was our first day attending West Seattle. I had been praying while I was getting ready that the Lord would specifically put people in our way who could help us get connected this week. It was such a miracle that as we settled in our seats I saw a friendly smile and wave out of the corner of my eye. I recognized the face as someone we had greeted with at Ballard. Her name was Betty and she so graciously came up to me to say hi even though we didn't really know each other. Strangely enough, it felt so wonderful to see a face I recognized, a little piece of home. She ended up being the mother-in-law to one of the campus pastors who is around our age, and we think might be a great connection to get involved. Furthermore, during greeting, Arthur unknowingly ended up approaching the head campus pastor, Pastor David Fairchild. How cool is that? He was able to introduce himself and give him a quick rundown of who we were and why we're there. The Lord totally answered my prayer.

The vibe of West Seattle is very different than Ballard. After today's awesome sermon about investing our earthly lives for eternal gains, Pastor David engaged with the congregation by talking to us, like literally talking! He asked what people got out of this sermon and individual people just spoke up and told the room what stood out. It was so exciting to us and made us feel like we were part of a small community church, which is something I’ve been praying for the past few years.

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This is some heavy change for us, especially since we're trying to figure out the basics of being married. We could really use your prayer over the next month or so as we get connected in our new community. We are also looking for opportunities to get connected with the campus leadership and figure out where the Lord wants us to be using our gifts to serve our new church body, which is still Mars Hill as a whole. We are particularly eager to find a new community group, and would appreciate prayer for direction clarity while we try some out.