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i've been thinking a lot about what my life is going to be like in a year. though i don't know for sure, chances are good that we'll be looking at moving back to the mid-west. we'll have been in dallas for almost four years -- longest we've lived in one home since we were married and the longest i'll have lived in any city since i graduated high school.
if i'm honest, i don't want to leave. we've invested in our friendships here for three years now. this next year, i'm going to have the opportunity to spend even more time with some of the moms my age (with kids near luke's age). i'm going to be able to pour into these friendships with even more intentionality and then we're probably going to leave. doesn't sound fun to me.
and, if i'm honest again, the odds are that we won't keep in touch very well with many of our dfw friends. that's just life. sure, there are a few families we will hear from and exchange christmas cards with and share comments on blogs and email. we might even vist them -- or they might visit us. but really, there isn't much to bring us back to the metroplex (aside from suzanne's graduation). it's not hard for me to think about being far from family because they will always be in our life. it is hard to think about leaving new friends.
pouring my heart into relationships only to leave them a year later sounds painful. shannon and i went to a session at the retreat yesterday where we had the chance to "get to know" the wives of our three newest pastors. it was fun to hear them share about their families, but what hit me most was when martha shared about what it was like for her young family to move across the country after her husband finished seminary thirty-odd years ago.
she shared this verse:
jesus said, "truly i say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms, for my sake and for the gospel's sake but that he will receive a hundred times as much now in the present age . . . " (mark 9:29-30)
that doesn't make leaving easier but it is an encouragement to me to remember that God knows. he knows that leaving it tough. and, he promises to take care of me.
