We’ve been so busy with moving and travelling that we haven’t had time to update in a while, but we’re now in Arizona and have a place to stay for the next week and a half or so.   We’re incredibly thankful for the Lord’s provision and the generosity of so many that we’ve experienced already.

Last Sunday (just a week ago—hard to believe!) was our last service at Grace.  After the evening service, we were grateful that many of our friends there stayed to say goodbye.  We were humbled to be the recipients of generous gifts from several—in fact, the amount we were given ended up being nearly enough to cover all of our fuel costs for our travels!

On Monday morning, my family and several friends from church came over to help us finish packing and load the moving truck.  Packing went even more quickly than I thought, and it turned out we were basically ready to go by 1 pm.  We were temporarily stymied by a couple of problems with our car dolly, but a quick fix (thanks, Melvin!) allowed us to get on the road by 2.

After spending about 8 hours on the road and covering about 400 miles our first day, we spent a comfortable night at a Best Western in Rolla, Missouri.

It was neat to see the scenery begin to change the second day as we left Missouri, crossed Oklahoma, and began across the Texas panhandle.  The route we were following, down I-44 to Oklahoma City and then via I-40 to Flagstaff, follows old Route 66, so even though we didn’t really take time off for sightseeing, it was interesting to see the various historic memorabilia along the highway.   Perhaps someday we’ll have a chance to travel that route again and spend more time taking in the nostalgia, but for now we’ll have to settle for watching Cars again.  🙂

We spent Tuesday night at a fairly seedy (but really cheap!) little motel in Amarillo, TX.  In the morning, we took off across New Mexico.  I was surprised to encounter periodic thunderstorms along the route nearly the entire way.  We entered Arizona mid-afternoon, and by early evening we were in Flagstaff, where we turned south the follow I-17 down to Phoenix.

It quickly got dark, and the steep descent from Flagstaff to Phoenix (almost 6,ooo’) and several construction zones made this part the most challenging driving of the entire trip.  We arrived at our destination at the Horkavy’s in Buckeye, AZ (in the far-west suburbs of Phoenix) about 10:45 that night after driving about 780 miles.

Thursday morning, some guys from Crossroad came over and helped us unload our belongings into the Horkavy’s garage.  It all fit!  We’re really thankful to have a place to store our things indefinitely while we continue to look for more permanent housing.

Friday we moved in to the house where we’ll be house-sitting for the next 10 days and then went to drop our moving truck off at the nearby Penske store.  Unfortunately while returning the truck our car had some problems with overheating, so we need to take it to a garage first thing Monday and get it checked out.  We’re once again grateful to the Horkavys for lending us their van to drive while we work on getting the car fixed.

On Sunday we attended our new church for the first time.  After the morning service, we were presented for membership and joined the church.   It was exciting to finally become a part of the ministry the Lord has called us to, both officially and in participating in the fellowship and worship together.

This week our immediate priorities are to get the car fixed and begin looking for housing, preferably an apartment or house that we can rent month-to-month.  I’ve got a lot of information out and some promising leads on jobs, so I’m hoping to hear back regarding some prospective interviews soon.  We’re praying not just that the Lord will meet our needs for transportation, housing, and employment, but especially that He will help us to be a good example of living by faith to our fellow believers here.  We would appreciate your prayers!