As a family we have created a new normal, even though it is still rough at times and we will never be the same after saying good-bye to our Kyra Jean, our family is starting to move forward.

We have decided that we are going to move to Australia, pick up our family and go…

“As for me and my family, we will serve the Lord” Joshua 24:15b NLT

Joel and I met in 2008, during a Discipleship Training School (DTS) with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) in a town called Byron Bay, Australia. After that we always felt that God would lead us back to Byron Bay and shortly after we got married, we returned. However our stay there was cut short as we were pregnant with our eldest son Elijah and we thought that at the time, it was best to come back to Canada to start our parenthood journey. So for the past few years we have wanted to yet again return to Byron Bay but kept feeling like the timing wasn’t right! We felt as though God was telling us to wait.

Through our grief we have really tried to press into God and seek Him and figure out His will on our lives. We knew that God was burning a fire within us and having gone through the toughest year of our lives with Kyra, we feel that it is only the beginning of a new path of the journey we are on! Having Kyra taught us that our lives can be used for so much more if we allow God to show us what that entails…. We are not letting the circumstances on a rainy day change our lives in His sunshine!….. and so for our family it means that we need to return to Australia.

We believe God had put it on our hearts for all these years and it has just been niggling away at both Joel and I, so we feel that now is the time. This has truly not been an easy decision but we really believe that this is where God is leading our family.

We feel that even in our brokenness we can be used!

What does this entail for us? Well we will be returning to join YWAM Byron Bay and are aiming to be there in the first week of July.

-YWAM is an inter-denominational, non-profit Christian, missionary organization. Their main mission statement is “To know God and to make Him known”
Check out the video to know more about YWAM.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NFiDpFT7yc

-Byron Bay has been long known as the spiritual gateway to the nations and with a beautiful lighthouse that is an icon in the town, it is symbolic to one of Jesus’ teaching in the bible.

“You are the light of the world-like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden” Matthew 5:14 NLT

We believe there is a platform in Byron Bay with being situated right at the door step of the middle east and to the rest of the nations.

“Declare His glory among the nations, His marvellous deeds among ALL peoples” 1 Chronicles 16:24

We feel as though this verse is our family’s mission statement. We feel that with YWAM Byron Bay we can answer our calling and share God’s love among the nations by sending teams into the unreached areas.

I know that this news may be hard to grasp for some, some may think that this is a huge leap, some may be excited for us, some scared for us and all sorts of feelings may come in to play with this decision. We feel that life is just too short, there is too many what ifs, regrets, dreams, etc…. We have one focus in mind and that is ETERNITY! What we do on earth matters and we can’t ignore God’s calling on our lives.
God has different callings for ALL of us, no matter what it is…. we pray that you will be able to answer it no matter how big or small it may be!!!

We will be updating this blog regularly with the details of our calling and what it involves. We are also working on a project that God has been giving us details on that we wanted to start in Kyra Jean’s legacy and it will be an active part of this new journey too!

We would love for YOU to be apart of this journey with us, 1 Corinthians 12:27-31 talks about how we are all different parts of the body of Christ and so there are many ways YOU can be a part of this calling:

~Prayer is a huge one!! You can pray for our family, YWAM Byron Bay, the people we will be sharing to, the young students that we hope to guide into their callings, our finances, the “project’ thats underway, etc..
~Partnering with us. Even though this is what we feel called to, it is an unpaid process for us and so if you feel lead to help us financially in this way then there are a few ways you can do this. We will have more details about this on our blog soon.
~Connecting with us! We still want to stay connected with you, we want to pray for you, we want hear about your journeys and be in community with you! We are all God’s children and it takes a village to be a family! And journeying with us means you are our family!

Please share this with those that journeyed with us with Kyra Jean, as we don’t know everyone’s email addresses. Also please feel free to ask us any questions you may have!

We want to thank you again for following our journey and pray blessings upon you ALL!