So if you’ve been wondering how in the world we got where we are…

…then don’t worry! It is a crazy cool God story, and we love to share it!

Everywhere we go we get to share with people about how God led us to Wycliffe Bible Translators and the Solomon Islands.  But so far, we’ve only shared this story in person, which made me think of our blog readers: how many of our friends don’t know this part of the story?  And for those who’ve heard our story during a formal presentation, you’ll want to continue reading as well.  Due to time limits, we normally have to cut out a lot of the details. But here, together, we’ve added them back in, and you have the ability to ask questions!

Both Josh and I felt called to missions at the age of 16 but in different ways.  God used a missionary who forgot a word in English to grab his attention, and a missions trip to Canada to get mine.  We both ended up at Grace University in Omaha, NE, where we received our degrees in Bible and Intercultural Studies.  We married in 2003 and we were ready to head overseas as soon as possible, but that’s when the obstacles began.

First, we had “planned” debt (bad idea, we know). We had taken out a significant amount of student loans for college, so we got to work paying them off.  Then marriage quickly brought an “unplanned” surprise, pregnancy.  My mom offered me a job through her company where I could work from home.  This seemed like a great plan, so we moved from Omaha to Ludington, Michigan.  Coming from job-rich Omaha, we figured Josh could easily find employment while I worked from home–and with steady jobs, we could pay off our debts quickly and be ready to serve where ever God directed. Secretly, we each wondered if perhaps God might send a check in the mail that would pay off our student loans.

Second, instead of a miracle check, what came in the mail were the bills. Hospital bills, a car payment, the gas card, utilities and rent. We quickly realized that this wasn’t going to be as easy as we thought.  Accepting that we were financially years from the missions field and not months, we decided to buy a house instead of throwing away money on rent.  The general wisdom was that property always increases in value, and that we could fix up an old house and sell it a few years later, using the increase of its equity to pay off our loans.  We prayed about this big step, and moved forward when God gave us peace about it.

Third, we were directly affected by both the economic recession and the housing bubble burst.  By 2008, God had blessed us with two more children, and I became a stay-at-home mom while Josh took over my position with my mom’s company. We had made many repairs and renovations to our home to improve its value, but with the collapse of the housing market, our equity was quickly burned up and our home’s salable value dropped below our mortgage balance.  The recession froze up all business for the company, and Josh was laid off indefinitely.  We were afraid that we might lose our house, but God provided.  Through various forms of government assistance and three jobs that Josh worked at for 70-80 hours per week, we carried on for about a year and a half, not really knowing what God was doing, or what we could do to escape the chaos.  But God showed Himself to be mighty and awesome in many ways through all those experiences. In his seasonal job with Walmart, Josh was asked by a manager to apply for a salaried management position with Walmart. He was accepted, and in the Summer of 2010, we moved to Houghton in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (affectionately known as the U.P.) where Josh became an Assistant Store Manager. And with the housing market still in a selling slump, God brought along renters for our house.

The fourth and final obstacle was that we began to prosper.  Yes, you read that right, let me explain. One of the potential career paths available to Josh in his new position was working overseas with Walmart International, and we began to dream of missions opportunities that might be available to us if we were tentmakers, like the Apostle Paul. Realizing that, once again, we were years away from this goal, we purchased another fixer-upper house and completely remodeled it.  At Walmart, Josh learned much, worked hard and received a promotion to Co-Manager.  At home, God blessed us with two more children, and due to educational needs, we began homeschooling.  Also, some of our children had severe food allergies, that our doctor determined were immune system issues. She had us work through an intense, multi-year elimination diet to “heal & seal” their guts.  Within a decade of thinking everything was falling apart, we found ourselves with a career that dramatically improved our finances, student loans repaid, two homes in communities that felt like home, and a tight-knit family full of five happy and healthy children.  We were living the American dream, yet all the while, we were dreaming of the mission field. But God was working, even with this longing in our hearts.

The change in our hearts was equally great, although a little less dramatic. Over the course of those ten years, we continued to ask God to guide us and to empower us to do His will.  We could not deny events that occurred in our lives which were clearly His provision and/or intervention.  The concept that we use to best visualize what God was doing in our lives at that time is the opening and closing of doors.  As we submitted to what we realized were His sovereign plans, we recognized His capable and amazing hands all over our lives.  He gently showed us that He wanted us to be missionaries where ever He had us, not just where our narrowed focus could envision.  And while we were content and joyful with where God had brought us, we still did not understand the why behind His “calling” of us all those years ago, nor why He had used so many obstacles to teach us obedience in the here and now.  Which catches us up to the present.

So by February of 2018, Josh had been in his Co-Manager position long enough to begin applying for Store Manager positions around the country. With his career path in mind, the goal was to promote to that level, successfully run a store for a year or two, and then apply for a transfer to Walmart International.  But with less than a month to go, Walmart announced a company-wide management restructure.  Being nervous from previous restructures, Josh was concerned about the possibility of having to step down a level within the store or being asked to relocate to keep his current position (classic Walmart moves). That night, staring up into the pitch black, Josh was praying for God’s direction in this stressful situation.  And right before his eyes, he saw a vision of a door cracking opening, with bright light spilling in around the edges.  It disappeared moments later, and when he asked God what that meant, no indication or explanation was given.  Two weeks later, Walmart eliminated 3,500 Co-Manager positions, Josh’s included.  In a meeting with leaders (that Josh later learned were misinformed), he was given a few options: accept one of the hourly positions currently available in the store, apply and interview for a demotion to Assistant in a yet-undetermined store within the Region, or take an acceptable severance package.  We were a little shocked by Walmart’s abnormal move, but over the past 15 years, we had learned that above all else, God is always in control.  So we prayed.  He reminded us of the vision of the opening door, and gave us peace about walking away from Walmart.

Now what!?!?!  No longer being tied down by student loans and looming hospital bills, we felt compelled more than ever to pursue and pray over opportunities to serve in missions.  At that point we felt like we could do just about anything, go just about anywhere.  We began prayerfully researching many agencies and opportunities. We had compassion for just about everything that we read about, but no God-given passion for specifics in ministry, people group, or even location.  People would ask us what our passion was; what was God calling us to?  Our passion was to serve God where ever He wanted us, but as for where and to whom–we didn’t know. So we just kept praying, searching, and seeking God’s will.

Answers began to be revealed to us. God brought to Josh’s remembrance Phyliss Masters, a retired missionary with Regions Beyond Missionary Union, whom he had heard speak at Grace in 2001.  Not remembering all of the details, Josh looked her up online so he could tell me her story.  He was surprised to discover she had gone back to her beloved Kimyal people of West Papua in 2010 to participate in the celebratory dedication of their New Testament. This is the video he found:

Tears of joy streamed down my face as I watched people celebrate and worship God because they had the New Testament in their language!  Josh and I both were touched to our very core, and he was convinced that this was his passion. He said that he felt like God was asking him “do you share My love for My people to have My Word?”  But I was still a little reserved, we weren’t Bible translators or even language specialists–how could God use us in Bible translation?  We could not answer that question, but Josh, trusting what he thought was God’s plan, began researching Bible translation ministries, assembling a list of potential mission agencies who were primarily involved in Bible translation around the world.

The only organization on the list that we had heard of was Wycliffe Bible Translators. Back in 2002, during our college years, Josh had attended a week-long Total-It-Up event ran by Chuck Micheals, a Wycliffe missionary, and got what Wycliffe offered as a “taste of translation.” He loved the experience and walked away from it thinking that Wycliffe was a great organization. While he could totally see himself supporting Bible translation, he didn’t feel like God was calling him to be a Bible translator.  Because of his experience, we decided to look at Wycliffe first.  On their website I found a featured video called Portrait of Bible Translation.  These lines, in particular, got my attention: “You just have to be willing to let God use you. Just the way he created you. There is a place for you in Bible translation.”

Watching this video opened my eyes and grabbed my heart. I cannot fully express in words how I felt, because it wasn’t just my feelings. My whole spirit, heart and soul cried out in tears to God, “Can You really use me to get Your Word into the hearts and minds of people who need it so desperately?”  Never in a thousand years would I have thought God would use me in Bible translation.  I knew I had discovered my passion!  It had been there all along.

Josh ended up speaking with a Wycliffe recruiter, and I love it when he tells this part of the story!  In his version of the phone call, he tells the recruiter about God leading us towards Bible translation and Wycliffe, and she begins to get super excited, so finally Josh spills the beans by saying “yeah, well, I’m a Walmart manager.”  After a brief pause he gives his impersonation of her disenchanted “Oh.” Then another pause, and after what is an amazingly quick recovery, he picks back up in her chipper voice and says “Well… I know a guy, who works with professionals, I’ll have him contact you.”

That guy was none other than Chuck Micheals, who remembered Josh and sent a picture he had of the two of them from 2002 to prove it.  After catching up and getting to know us a bit better, Chuck finally asked “What can I do for you guys?”  Josh told him about God leading us to Bible translation and to Wycliffe, but that God hadn’t given us any other direction. Josh also told him that we were hoping that Chuck could tell us where Wycliffe could best use us.  Chuck’s reply was gentle, but blunt “Josh, we don’t do that.”  We kept our chins up, but our hearts sank.  “But…” Chuck continued hesitantly, “at the beginning of this call, God reminded me of a position that we’ve been unable to fill for years. I was going to let it go, but since you’re asking, let me tell you about the Solomon Islands.” He told us of the urgent need of an Operations Manager which had gone unfilled for 5 years. He began to describe the skills and requirements for the position and our eyes kept getting wider and wider as we looked at each other in astonishment!  Those skills were the very skills Josh had acquired and honed working all those years as a Walmart Manager.  Although we were amazed, Josh knew he wasn’t the only operations guy out there, so he asked Chuck why the position had been so hard to fill.  Chuck said that it was due to same reasons that may very well keep us from considering it–the place is just so remote. It would be a radical life change for any Westerner, let alone a family. We would have to take big things into consideration, for example, we’d most likely have to homeschool our kids. And even the way we ate would change, as we would probably be buying our food from the local open-air market and preparing it without modern American conveniences. He mentioned things like making meals from scratch and baking our own bread (up to this point in our call we had neglected to mention to Chuck our life experiences in those areas and the subsequent lessons we had learned).

But at that moment Josh and I both knew that God had answered our prayer of 15+ years.  He was asking us to go to the Solomon Islands to help translators translate His Word for His people!  Happy tears were shed as we got off the phone with Chuck and we praised God for His faithfulness.  All those years we had no idea what He was doing, but now we could see how He had been preparing us to serve in this specific role in the Solomon Islands. From Josh’s developed professional competencies, to my teaching and culinary skills, God had led us through struggles and difficult times to prepare us for the work that He had called us to.

We’ve been blown away at how God ignited our hearts for the cause of the Bibleless peoples of the world, and how the delays in our plans and obstacles in our path were actually God’s loving-kindness and goodness in how He trained and prepared us to serve in the Solomon Islands. We love our good God, we love His life-giving Word, and we love His people. We feel honored to get to participate in the process of helping others have that opportunity as well!

Might God be asking you to participate as well? One way you could is by partnering with our Wycliffe ministry, would you prayerfully consider it? Join us | Follow us