just one of those days where I don't like very much what I've signed up for

We signed a lease today.

That means this July, we will make our 32nd move in 25 years of marriage. Thankfully several of those were "smaller affairs" back before we had lots of kids. But it will be our fifth move in the last 10 years - and two of those were international.

I'm a little sad. 

Actually, if I'm going to be "authentic," today I'm a lot sad.

I'm also a lot tired, just thinking of all that now has to happen between now and then.

As followers of Jesus, we learn to hold dreams, hopes as well as the people and things we love close to our hearts, but loosely with open hands, offering all back to God. 

Today, I'm wishing that God will let me stop learning that open-handed heart position.

Almost two years ago, when we moved into the rental house where we are presently living, I fell in love. With all those moves, I've lived in quite a few different places. I'm usually pretty content. I've found things to love and enjoy about every house we've ever had. I don't think I've ever been unhappy with any of our living spaces.

This house was different. For me, it has been a head over heels love affair. It's cute. It has personality. It has been well-lived in, with "scars and stretch-marks." There's a pool surrounded by a deck about to collapse. A fireplace. Enough square footage to really stretch out and breath deep. Space to invite friends and family to visit. An older neighborhood with huge trees, great paths to walk, the golf course (or cross-country ski trails, depending on the time of year) right across the street, a cute little "centre-ville" and the St. Lawrence River just down the hill. I love living here. It doesn't just feel like another in a long list of houses. It has felt like home. The day we signed the lease for this however, I knew we'd be moving again, sometime. I forgot to hold this home loosely. During the past 20 months, without really realizing it, I've clenched tightly my metaphorical hand around the idea of staying here, for several more years.

God has been prying my clutching fingers away, one at a time over the past several weeks... and I'm a little sore from clinging too tightly.

It all started when we began praying about the possibility of moving. The church plant project of which we are a part has a community church as its goal. It is much easier to invite people to a community church activity when you actually live in the neighborhood. We started wondering if God might be asking us to move into that area of town. Tim and I told each other we were going to pray about it. Instead of praying for wisdom regarding such a big decision, however, I spent more time asking God to pry my hands back open because the idea of packing everything up just seemed to suck all the energy right out of me.

Then, my desires became a bit of a mute point. We received  notification that the owner of our current home had decided to sell. We could renew our lease, but that means living in a house with regular visits from prospective buyers, potential inspections and probably work that needs to be done as a result. Eventually, we'd be given notice, and we would have a certain period of time during which we would have to find another place to live so we could vacate the property.

So we started to look in earnest. Every morning, every night - I would scrutinize the housing ads on six or seven different web sites. I'd write and find out if renters really didn't want dogs or if they just didn't want big dogs, if rental prices included utilities or not, what neighborhood the house was actually located in, if the house was even still available and if could we arrange a visit. Then came the visits. Last Monday night, neither agent showed up to show us the house, so we uselessly drove around for two-ish hours. The visits are almost always a bit of a let down. The house never looks quite as big or nice as it does in the publicity photos.

Yesterday, we had it narrowed down to two places: one close to the church plant neighborhood, farther from school and work, a lot smaller, less expensive, an indoor parking spot and access to a community pool as part of the deal; the other possibility was a bit farther from the church plant neighborhood but walking distance from the kids' school, an almost new and lovely home with significantly more space, more bathrooms, almost no yard and a steeper rent. 

We talked and prayed. And we decided. I left the school's staff retreat today a little early so I could drive by the first choice above and sign the lease. 

I wanted to cry. Not because I didn't like the choice - our two choices were pretty equal in my mind, each with different positives and negatives. I was just sad that we had had to make the choice. I don't want to move.

Even if it is what I signed up for.

I signed up for this when I promised Jesus as a little girl that I "wanted to be a missionary for him someday, when I grew up."

It is what Tim and I signed up for when we moved to Niger, and then to Quebec.

Part of serving God is counting the cost and this is one of the costs.

I am loath to call it a sacrifice because I will have a roof over my head, our gang of 4 plus 1 (when she gets done with her Bible program this year) will all have a bed and we will be together. We will figure out a way to cram the big kids, my parents or other family in if and when they come to visit. We'll have people over, lots, just because we do that, and we'll be snug and laugh lots. I will choose to be content and I will probably learn to love this new space.

Signing the lease today, however? 

I didn't want to do it, even if I had signed up for it. 

It felt like a heavy, burdensome sacrifice.

It gets old not knowing from one year to the next if we'll be in the same place. It gets old realizing there are still boxes I've not unpacked from the last two moves. It gets old not having the stability of a house we own.

Then I remember one of Paul's prayers for the Ephesians.

"...having the of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe." (from Eph 1) 

This is nothing more than a momentary impression of something that today, feels like a sacrifice. I've an eternal home awaiting me in the future. Once there, I'll never have to move again.