TA!

"The call" finally came! I was at the grocery store when I received the phone call from our agency - We got our Travel Approval (TA)! This is the last piece of document we need to travel to China. We are ready to go to China!!!!
The next travel group will travel on 12/24 - we could be traveling with them. But after checking the airfare, we(San, actually) have decided to wait to travel with the next group in January. International flight to China in December is about 50% more expensive than in January. Since there are five of us traveling, the cost difference is quite substantial. A big part of me is saying "I don't want to wait any longer, I want to go in December!" It was a hard decision to make. I went back and forth trying to justify my wish going in December. I spent all morning making many phone calls to a number of travel agencies, searching different internet sites, hoping to find cheaper tickets. All my efforts all pointed to the same conclusion - we can't afford to go in December and my wish really doesn't justify the $2500 cost difference in airfare. So I finally, reluctantly, agreed.
The next travel group will travel early or mid January (TBD in a week or two, based on the number of traveling families). If we travel with the January group, we will be celebrating Pearl's first birthday and my birthday in China together.
It has been almost 5 months since we received our referral. The waiting process has been much longer and harder than we anticipated. It seems to me that God has been really training my patience using this circumstance. Patience - it seemed...... but recently I realized, it is more than just patience - it is really my obedience to His way, His plan and His will. It is hard to obey when things and plans don't go my way. I often tell our children that they need to obey their parents(us!) right away, all the way and cheerfully even when they don't like it. I've come to humbly learn that I probably needed this message myself more than my children! Obeying cheerfully is so hard!
In my quiet time, I've been reading the book of Isaiah. I came across this passage last Friday. Isaiah 55:8-13 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. As the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth; It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. You will go out in joy, and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands..."