We are free to make plans and to pursue them. For over a decade, Karen and I have carefully formated our ministry plans for you in newsletters and tidy powerpoint presentations. This type of media can communicate an exaggerated sense of control. Proverbs 19:21 is a better guide to free and flexible decision making: Free to move forward in faith and flexible to accept divine redirection. Printed on our wedding program and framed on our bedroom door, this verse reminds us to whom the future belongs. We are still learning that what we do not plan, the purpose of the Lord, is the truest index of our real situation. As much as I like to use the future perfect tense (or the glorified past), God gets our attention best in the unexpected present. He’s got our attention now.
What didn’t we expect? Well, for the 13 years that I have served with WorldVenture, we have usually been financially over-supported. Not to glorify the past, it’s just that we’ve always had enough to get the job done. Surprisingly, to us, that has changed. Please don’t stop reading, I’m not about to ask you for money. I also don’t want you to be alarmed. We are not suffering. We don’t even have any debts (or assets) “except to love one another” (Rom 13:8). But we do have some difficult decisions to make and we’d like to include you in the process.
Our financial situation helps bring into focus other challenges associated with living between two worlds: two economies, passports, cultures, languages, governments, etc. What I’d like to do in this letter is to be fully transparent about our present circumstances. I hope what follows will help you pray more intelligently for the French Finleys as we walk into God’s future together. Thank you for walking with us as we confidently seek out the good that God has already prepared for us to do.
