Hello there and welcome to the Phillips family update!
If you've been wondering if we had fallen off the face of the earth I apologize for leavin' you hanging. Generally I am ahead of myself in making plans so this time I have tried to wait until we had everything truly laid out before giving an update. If you haven't really noticed at all then that's cool, you're getting an update anyway.
Let me begin by glorifying God for all that he is and all that he's done. We have truly seen his sovereignty and grace in every nook and cranny of this entire process. Personally I can say that I have been walked through some necessary discipline in my life that definitely would not have taken place without the context of the last few months. God is good and we give him glory for being patient and kind to us even when we are so undeserving.
Having said that let me share with you what's going on. (this may get lengthy)
Rachel has officially finished working at Laketown Animal Hospital as of last week. For her the next 10 days are going to be full of putting the rest of this house in boxes, preparing to pack it all in a U-Haul to be driven nearly 1000 miles away to our new home. (Speaking of our new home, we found it over the first weekend of April. We were in the Raleigh/Durham area for 5 days and we looked at 20+ houses before finally settling on "THE ONE." It's a beautiful one level, 3 bedroom, 6 year old, former "model-home" in a wonderful neighborhood of S.E. Durham) Of course we couldn't leave Springfield w/o selling our house and that happened on March 20th. We have the closing here in Springfield on Friday, May 4th and the closing in Durham on Monday, May 7th. My family (Dad, Mom, Ryan & maybe Jared) will be here to help us load the U-Haul on May 3rd and then 4 of us - me, Rach, Dad & Ryan will make the trip down to NC over the weekend.
Once in North Carolina we will begin working and getting settled in our new house, neighborhood, city and - basically - new mission field. I'll be working with a house builder and Rachel will be working as a Vet Assistant at another Vetrinary Hospital. We have a church that will become our "home church" for a while as I move through the process of becoming a church planter. We have already gotten to know the pastor as he is a part of the network that we will be planting through. As of this moment we don't know the exact timetable or even location of the new church... these are just a few of the MANY things that will be coming together one at a time through what is sure to be an exciting process. I plan on trying to do much better at emails and updating my blog, etc. to keep people in the loop. So keep your eyes and ears open for more info on that front. (Of course if you're in the myspace universe you can find both Rachel and me there.)
Beyond that I'm really not sure what else to write here. If I've left out any information that you'd like to know please email back and ask.
Thanks so much for taking the time to read this! :)
Grace & Peace
