What a whirlwind 2021 has been! While I’ve shared this around on various social media posts, as well as individually, I wanted to share more about the transition our family is making. This will likely be broken up into several posts.
About a year and half ago, the Lord began stirring our hearts. I was editing a podcast for my Dad and he was interviewing a First Nations pastor. While I was working on that podcast my heart began to ache for the First Nations and I felt God say to me “Go to the Natives.” Generally, when I feel the Lord speaking to me, it’s more through feelings and impressions and not specific phrases. But this was a distinct phrase, a distinct call. I shared it with Luis how I felt God say “go to the Natives” and he chuckled – not in a dismissive way but more in a “well, I better buckle up” way.
Though it felt like a specific call and direction, it was actually a very nondescript call. I asked God to be a little more specific, as “Native” could mean anything from Alaska down to South America… even beyond that really.
You know when you’re making a slow cooked stew or soup and you just prep everything, throw it in the pot, then let it stew forever? It’s actually really easy and hands off. You don’t really do anything really, just let the low heat meld the flavors, break down the meat, soften the vegetables. Towards the end you’ll start adding salt and other seasoning to get it to just the perfect flavor. You taste, add, taste add. Then that final pinch of salt just brings it perfectly together. This is exactly what happened.
We sat with it. Occasionally bringing it up in conversations. A few places popped up for us to go, but it didn’t feel quite right. One day out the blue, I get a call from my Dad who had just been in a meeting and asked us if we’d considered Yakima. We hadn’t really considered it – only because work out there is tough to come by and Luis could not transfer. Even so, we connected with several people out there just to see. We went out in May 2021 to meet face-to-face. We knew at the end of that meeting we just experienced that final pinch of salt that had perfected the meal. We knew God wanted us with the Yakama Nation.
Elizabeth Horn 