Over 14 years ago, I started blogging Destiny in the Making. We were living in Roswell, New Mexico, still months away from planting our feet in Jacksonville, Florida. We were fresh from adding a third girl to our quiver, running on angst and excitement and a whole lot of passion. We had a dream but didn’t yet know how it would materialize. We only had one sweet family committed to moving with us. I look back now with the fondest of memories. We didn’t know it then, but we were living what will forever be some of the best days of our lives. Now, we’re there again. I know in the deepest parts of my being that the days we’re living right now will go down in the history of my life as some of the sweetest.
This is Destiny in the Making 2.0.
This coming January will make 14 years since we packed up our family and moved across the country to plant a church in a city where we didn’t know anyone. We were high on the call of God and His constant faithfulness. We were like little kids with our old SUV and 12 foot trailer as we pulled up to our first mobile location. Our first interest meeting boasted 20 people, nine of those were my family. Thirteen showed up the second time. Our high hopes were quickly dashed to the Florida ground. We were ready to stop before we ever got started. Our pastor from New Mexico enlisted his congregation and sent waves of encouragement in the way of over 100 texts saying: You’ve got this. So, we dropped the interest from our meeting and continued on. And we grew every Sunday after until we had to move to a new location. We outgrew that one in a month. That sent us to Regal which has been our home for 13 years.
The last 14 years have grown us in ways we didn’t know we needed to grow… in ways we didn’t want to have to. We’ve been up and we’ve been down. We’ve been sick and we’ve been well. We’ve wrested demons and we’ve won victories. Praise God, we are still fighting and still overcoming.
Even as I’m writing these words, ground is breaking on our new permanent building. Praise God! It’s been a long time coming. That only makes it even sweeter.