You know the moment. When God has put something on your heart, but everything in you is trying to talk you out of it. Four weeks into our trip, exhausted, brains spinning from Hebrew studies, and ready for a break from the heat, we were running on empty and we had one of those moments. We had made plans to meet up with Yosef that evening and we knew it would be a late night, with class in the morning. We almost called off the plans, but we sensed an urgency in our hearts to see Yosef that night.

When he showed up at 10 pm with a friend we knew right away that we had made the right call. And the life-changing Gospel conversations we had with those guys that night made it clear that, once again, our steps were guided by our all-knowing God. It would have been worth it to us to make this trip for that conversation alone. And we didn’t know at the time that only three days later we would be on a plane back home. If we had ignored God’s prompting in that moment we would have missed out on perhaps the most important conversation of our trip.

Although our time in Israel was cut shorter than we planned, we know with confidence that God has a plan to use even this most tragic loss of our beloved brother and return from our long anticipated trip. Such tragedy is certainly not His will, but He allows nothing to unfold that He cannot use for good beyond our wildest imaginations. As Joni Ericson Tada wisely said, “God uses things that He hates to accomplish things that He loves.” We are eager to see what incredible goodness He will bring out of this brokenness. And we have no doubt that He will continue the work that He started through us in the conversations we shared with Yosef and his friend, and many others. Please be praying with us for their eyes to be opened; for God to use this great loss for even greater gain to His family; for our broken hearts and the new challenges BJ and I face in our personal lives, family and ministry because of it; and above all for His will to be done in all of this. Thank you for your continued support and encouragement, without which, this trip would not have been possible.

Love,

BJ and Carissa