Don't spill the Curry!

It was a beautiful sunny day in Gainesville.  We were moving the MH from the house we had been staying at, back to the parking lot at the church.  Shayne was in the van just a little ahead of me and I was in the MH following her.  Before we left the house we had been staying at, Shayne had made a big beautiful pot of curry and we had put it on the bed in the MH so it wouldn’t slide around when we were driving.  I was driving as gingerly as I could when IT happened.  The light went yellow.  At first I thought I was close enough that I could run the yellow, then I realized there was a police car waiting to turn.  I knew if I ran the yellow I would probably be pulled over, I also knew if I slammed on my brakes to stop I would spill the curry all over our bed.  I did the only thing I could think of to do.  I hit my brakes hard.  Not hard enough to spill the curry, but also not hard enough to stop completely on time.  I managed to stop without spilling the curry, but I was about 5 feet past the cross-walk in the intersection.  I looked over to the police car and my heart sank.  His lights were on and he was motioning me to pull over.  So I did.  

As he approached the drivers side window of the MH I could see in the rearview that his hand was on his gun and he looked very serious.  Wow, I thought, here comes a big ticket for sure.  He directed me to step out of the MH and proceeded to explain the hazards of operating a motor vehicle under the influence of alcohol and drugs.  I wholeheartedly agreed with him, and told him so, but he wasn’t so sure that I wasn’t “under the influence”.  He threatened to call the Dog Squad to sniff out Me and the MH so I assured him that was fine with me and that he wouldn’t find anything except a big pot of curry on the bed.  I explained my dilemma of not wanting to brake too fast because of the risk of spilling my wife’s curry, and he explained the dangers of running yellow lights and stopping too slowly.  

The real fun began when they tried to run my license.  As instructed I removed my license from my wallet and passed it to another officer.  By now there were 3 police cars on the scene all with lights flashing.  The officer with my license looked it over, called in my information then turned to me and remarked, “Alberta, where’s that?  Is this a fake license”.  Then he preceded to try to stare me down.  I told him “Alberta is a province in Canada”, “Canada, is that that big country up north” he said. “Yes” I told him and then he received a message from dispatch concerning my license #.  Dispatch wasn’t able to find my license # in their data-base.  He told them it was Canadian, and they said it was going to take them a little while to get that information.  Oh man, this is going to take forever I thought to myself.  Then the first officer came back after inspecting the outside of the MH and the trailer, and overhearing I was from Canada asked me if I was an Oilers fan. No, thank-goodness I’m not an Oilers fan I said, then he began asking me questions about my family, our trip, where we were going, where we’d been and then he said it.  “Wow, 5 kids.  Your a busy guy.  There really must not be anything to do on all those cold winter nights in Canada”.  I know, original right.  

I explained that we were visiting our friends in Gainesville and that my friend was the Bishop of the local Anglican Church.  By that time I think he’d decided that I wasn’t a public menace and motioned to the officer with my license to just forget about running my license # and to let me go.  So I hopped in the MH and drove away.  No tickets, just a warning.  It’s nice to be able to be pulled over and not be afraid.  I remember in the days of my youth I made some decisions I’m not very proud of.  Every time I’d get pulled over by the police there would be fear.  Fear that they would catch us in illegal activities and the like.  I praise God for his saving grace and for the process of sanctification I’ve been on for the last 12 years and that now when the Police think I look suspicious and pull me over I don’t have to worry because I’m not doing anything wrong and have nothing to hide.

Thanks for Journeying with us.

The Schafer’s

I know salt water is salty, but I didn't remember it being that salty...

Today in Gainesville it’s 23 Degrees with 75% humidity.  75% humidity = sweaty.  In the last week we’ve had humidity up to 90%.  Some of you back in cold Canada are thinking how great that wold be right about now.  All I have to say is the warmth is nice, but the humidity is killer.  We were really blessed last week, a fantastic young couple invited us to stay at their house for 4 days while they went away for thanksgiving.  They called it “house-sitting”, we called it a huge blessing.  Being able to do laundry and have regular showers for a few days was really nice.  It made our thanksgiving.  

We missed Canadian Thanksgiving this year since we were in Kansas City at the time so American Thanksgiving was really big for us.  Since Shayne had a real kitchen to work in we had Cabbage Rolls, Home-made Pie, Curry and other dishes that are difficult to do in the MH.  It was so much fun.  I’m sure you can imagine how nice it was to actually have walls separating us from the kids at night.  We made the 1.5 hour drive to the Atlantic ocean last Tuesday for ZZ's birthday.  We had a ton of fun.  ZZ ate his cake on the beach, the kids collected shells and splashed in the waves, and Shayne and I frolicked in the deeper waves.  It was a really warm day but overcast so we didn't end up sunburned or over heated.

So far everyone we’ve met at St. Andrews Church have been really friendly and welcoming.  We were invited over for lunch last week by a family with a swimming pool.  It was a beautiful sunny day and the kids had a blast swimming and splashing.  I don’t know what I was expecting St. Andrews to be like.  I grew up Catholic and Lutheran so I think I expected it to be dull and boring like the traditional church’s I grew up in.  I was so wrong.  The presence of the Spirit was so strong yesterday and Ron’s message so powerful.  It is so cool to see the marriage of Liturgy and Tradition with the honest powerful preaching of Gods word and the tangible presence of the Holy Spirit.  St. Andrews church in Gainesville has been a special treat for us that we weren’t expecting.   I have been particularly blessed by the honor they give to Advent, Lent and the Christmas season.  As I begin to understand some of the traditional symbolism and church history, the Liturgical practices take on new meaning and seem to become powerful expressions of faith that I never understood before.  

The kids have been having a blast chasing lizards, of which there are tons everywhere here, and even caught one the other day.  After being held for about half an hour Isaac put him down and he jumped back on his hand.  When he put him down a second time he ran up Isaacs leg to his hand.  We haven’t seen any Alligators yet but we’ve been assured that we will soon and that they are everywhere here.  The great thing about alligators is that they take care of all the stray cats and dogs.  

As Christmas approaches we begin to feel a loneliness setting in.  A loneliness that is not overwhelming but is more the starkness of a reality of spending Christmas away from family and our special friends and church family.  We trust that the Lord will continue to be with us and bless us, and that He will provide everything we need for this time of year.  We are thankful to be in such a great place with such great people, and we are excited to see the Lord moving powerfully in the church here.

Thanks for Journeying with us.

The Schafer’s


Check the Vid of us at the beach for ZZ's Birthday

Where we are and What were Doin'

Greetings to all of our cherished family and friends back home and those that we’ve met along the way.  

In this Blog post I will attempt to update ya’ll as to where were at, what were doin’, and where were goin’.  Time seems to be passing a little slower these days as we head south from Kansas City, some days I wonder if tomorrow will ever come.  We left KC last thursday and travelled to St. Louis where we stayed the night, then in the morning we hit the highway and cruised down to Nashville.  That night in Nashville we met some “interesting” young people.  We pulled into a Wal-Mart parking lot and parked near some other RV’ers, a semi, and a long camo-painted bus.  The camo-painted bus immediately caught my attention, “Wow” I thought “I wonder who’s driving that”.  We soon found out.  We took the puppies out on the grass for some play time and pretty soon we had a crowd gathered (the puppies always draw a crowd).  The folks from the camo bus came to see the pups and we learned they had just come from Gainesville FL.  They had been at a big halloween music festival and now were just traveling around having “fun”, living in the bus.  They were a pretty neat looking bunch, army fatigues, dreadlocks, big piercings, tattoos, rips and tears in their clothes, dirty.  One of the guys told me his dogs name was Jager, fancy that we both had dogs named Jager.  They were modern day hippies, or maybe gypsies, or a cross of them both, and they were very friendly and we of course had no problems from them.  On saturday morning we left Nashville and set our sights on Atlanta.  As we were driving we kept seeing huge signs telling us to make sure and stop and check out this place the signs called “Ruby Falls” so when we got to the turn off we did.  We took the exit and proceeded to head for Ruby Falls.  Half-way up Look-out mountain we found Ruby Falls, a small building on the side of the mountain with a look-out on the roof.  Where’s the falls?  We parked and went in side.  We soon found out that Ruby Falls was one of the largest underground waterfalls in the world, and that to see it we would have to ride a elevator straight down through solid rock for 260 ft. and walk back through a maze of caves and caverns for about 30 minutes to see it.  Well, after giving up my left leg and most of the kids college savings to cover the admission we were on our way down, down in to the darkness.  Well, not really, it was decently lit so you could clearly see where we were going and enjoy all the awesome rock and crystal formations.  It was really pretty cool, and the falls themselves were awesome.  After that we headed for Atlanta again.  

By the time we got there it was almost dark so we found the nearest Wal-Mart on the GPS and headed there. Surprise, surprise, Wal-Marts in Atlanta don't allow RV'ers to park overnight, and neither do Costco's, or K-Marts.  Heck you can't park anywhere without being towed, we know, we drove to half a dozen different places and got the same message at every one.  We googled truck stops, we weren't near any of those, no campgrounds in the middle of Atlanta, so we decided to start looking just outside of Atlanta.  We finally just decided to park at a wally-mart in a suburb called Riverdale and pray that they wouldn't tow us.  We didn't get towed but we did experience some subtle discrimination when we went in to grab some groceries.  What we discovered was that Riverdale was a mostly Afro-American low income neighbourhood and apparently not many, how do you say, uh, "Caucasian" people shopped there.  The looks we got told us we weren't really welcome, and that we were kind of an oddity.  Oh well, we get that a lot these days.  We shipped out of Riverdale first thing in the morning not sure where we were going but knowing we had to go somewhere.  You see, the Puppies are 8 weeks old this week.  And Atlanta was the only city near our path that had an airport large enough to ship puppies from the US to Canada in the winte,r because the plane has to have a heated Cargo Hold and only the really big, nice planes have those.  So "chuck" fly's out on friday from Atlanta to his new home in Saskatoon with some really great friends of ours the Locke's.  That's why were in Atlanta this week.  We are waiting to fly chuck.  

We did eventually find a place to park in a small city just outside Atlanta called Peachtree City.  Peachtree City is super-rich, super fancy, and super yuppie community designed in such a way that the whole city is Golf-Cart accessible.  Special overpasses for golf-carts to pass underneath, special golf-cart lanes, golf-cart parking stalls, golf-cart trails, everything.  Yesterday we saw the Police out patrolling in their golf-carts, and a family with their kid in a car seat at the local McDonalds.  The cops actually had a golf-cart pulled over and were writing the guy some kind of ticket.  Blows my mind.  

We've been having a lot of fun here.   People look at us funny, I think they can tell were not rich, but were used to people looking at us funny.  We've been facing a lot more challenges lately too.  The kind that stretch your faith and make you really hope the Father's listening.  Finding places to shower, places to dump the MH and to fill up water.  But our God is faithful.  Thats why were here, and thats why were doing what were doing.  Our God is a God who can be trusted and relied upon 110% and is faithful to look after His children when we walk in obedience to Him.  I hope that through our choice to do this trip and to endure the hardships in store for us the world will see that our God is real and that He is mighty to save.  

Please continue to pray for us that God would provide all our needs along the way, and that He would arrange divine appointments for us.  Thank you to all of you for following along with us.  Not a day goes by that we don't think of home.  It was sad to miss the ordination last sunday but we are rejoicing along with you all.

Thanks for Journeying with us.

The Schafer

Not once, not twice, but thrice ..

Hello friends and cherished brothers and sisters.  It is with joy that I write these short updates knowing that through them the Lord is knitting our hearts together in Love.  We know that many of you are praying regularly for us, and I want you to be encouraged that your prayers are being heard in the throne room of God and that He is answering them speedily and mightily for which we are ever thankful and grateful to Him and to you.  I wrote the other day about the sweet lady who brought us juice boxes and 15$.  I’d like to finish that story today and share how later that same day the Lord broke our hearts not once but twice with His love and mercy.  

After being visited and blessed with juice boxes and 15$ we decided to take the kids out to play and to splurge on them.  It was raining very heavily that afternoon so we hit up the McDonalds down the street to let the kids stretch their legs and get out some energy at the play-center.  What we didn’t know was that we were walking into a divine appointment.  We hadn’t been there long when in walked a young couple with two kids.  They took one look at us and said “Are you the family traveling around in the MotorHome”.  “Yes” I replied, and to my utter joy and amazement they said “So are We!”  Wow, now that is wild.  

We soon learned their names were Chad and Tamara, that they had 3 children, and that some time back the Lord had begun to convict their hearts about being radical for Him.  They had followed his leading and put their house up for sale, which sold in a day.  They had sold their business and most of their stuff, and were now following the Lord on their own Journey of Faith wherever He might lead them, and they too were in Kansas City visiting IHOP and had heard of us from someone who we had met briefly a week earlier.  We shared our story, they shared theirs and It blew my mind.  

After a while we learned that they were parked at a friends place and they invited us to come over to shower and hang out for the rest of the evening.  They told us that they would introduce us to another couple, Matt and Carol, who were staying with them, who had also just sold everything days before to pursue the call of God to start a House of Prayer at Keystone near Mount Rushmore.  We were so stoked.  As we sat around the table, sharing our lives and experiences, eating chocolate, and encouraging each other, I couldn’t help but wonder... What is the Lord doing on the earth right now.  They even knew of others who, right now, were in the process of giving up everything and turning their lives upside down to follow the call of the Lord on their lives.  As the night got late, and as the conversation around the table got deeper and deeper, Matt said something that I haven’t been able to get out of my head since.  He described a vision or dream that he had had where the Lord showed him what he described as “A whole movement of nomadic, prophetic, apostolic, love sick followers of Jesus who would radically give up everything that this world holds dear to relentlessly pursue the glory of the Lord”.  This has been burning in my heart and burning in my soul ever since that moment.  I cant shake it.  Something in my spirit resonates with his words and I somehow know that the Lord was speaking to us through Him.  

I must also quickly mention that we met a very dear lady named Charlotte that night at Chad and Tamara’s who I will introduce you to in a later post because I must get on with the story of that day.  

After bidding farewell to our new friends we returned home to find another surprise.  As we pulled up to the MH we could see, through the heavy rain, bags and bags of stuff piled up outside the door waiting for us.  Someone had anonymously left bags and bags of groceries for us.  But not just groceries.  They had left jugs of water, blankets, batteries, candy, coloring books, crayons, and toys for the kids.  Praise the Lord.  In the bag of toys we discovered the gift that would bring us to our knees in praise of our Lord.  Our anonymous donor had bought children’s flashlights, you know the kind they sell on halloween for kids to help light their way along the streets, and they had bought 5 of them.  Our kids were ecstatic.  They love flashlights and have begged many many times for us to buy them their own flashlights, and now the Lord had given them flashlights and the exact amount we needed for our 5 children.  

We are so humbled and blessed by the love and ongoing supernatural provision of our Lord and Savior that it brings me to tears.  I have said right from the beginning that our God is a God who is Faithful.  Not is only is He able, but it is His joy to meet all the needs of His children who walk in humble obedience to Him.  Whatever being a radical follower of Jesus looks like for you, Do it.  Don’t delay and don’t hold back, the time is short.  At the very least, pray fervently for and support those in your circle who are following the call of the Lord on their lives and are seeking to advance His purposes on the earth.  Join with us and together lets prove to this unbelieving world that Our God is Mighty to Save.

Thanks for Journeying with us,

The Schafer’s

Ministry on the road

      Shayne here, normally it is Markus that does the blog posts, but today I feel compelled.  I have to admit that the last month has not been at all what I expected.  I’m not sure what I should have expected in the first place, we are on a journey of faith.  So far I have selfishly focused on myself, my wants, my needs, what I want to do and so on.  I have had some amazing times in the prayer room, meeting with my Lord, and savior.  But thats the problem, it has all been about me.  When am I going to start focusing on what God is doing and how I can participate. 

On one of our regular outings to the local wal-mart, just needing to grab a couple of things, expecting that we were going to go in and out without a second thought. Easy right! Go in, get what you need, and leave.  All was going well, we found what we needed, did a bit of browsing, and headed to the checkout.  We were almost out the door, another successful trip with no complications, just one person left and then our turn. As we got to the front the cashier held her stomach and moaned.  I ask “are you okay?”, she returns with “I’m ok, my stomach just hurts, but I only have to work until ten.”  Until ten, I think to myself, thats still 2 hours away.  And then it started, you know that feeling you get when you know that you are supposed to do something, the butterflies that just wont go away unless you heed what it is you know the Lord is saying.  So now here I am standing there, one item scanned and now a second, and a third, time is running out and the butterflies begin to intensify.  Do I obey and pray for her or do I leave and pretend that it never happened?  It’s not like I have much to offer, or do I?  Is Jesus sufficient?  Will He be with me, will he answer my prayer?  All this is running through my mind in the few moments that we are standing there.  And then, the last item was scanned, this is it, if I don’t do it now, I wont at all.  A scream comes from within and I manage to utter the words,  “I am a christian, and I believe that Jesus heals, can I pray for you”.  To my delight and terror, because there in another person behind me waiting to be rung through, she says yes, so I hold out my hands, she also reaches out and I say a short prayer, “Jesus you are a God that heals, so Holy Spirit I pray that you would come and touch her tummy and that the pain would go away, in Jesus Name, Amen.”  Immediately after I finish, through a little giggle she says, “wow I feel better already.”  I smile and then turn to walk away.  Inside I feel a mass of emotion, ranging from excitement because God had really touched her, to complete horror at what I had just done knowing that the people behind had watched the whole thing and that I was completely vulnerable. But I did it, I was obedient and I knew that God was pleased.  And it shouldn’t matter what others think anyway.

Today in the prayer room I felt God speak to my heart, why are you doing this trip, is it to do my will, what I have purposed, or just for you to do your own thing.  Ouch, that hit me hard, because up to this point, as I mentioned earlier, it has been all about me.  I had to make a choice, was I going to heed His quiet leadings or was I going to continue on with my own agenda.  A relatively easy choice, I have to admit, I would choose to be open to what He would want to use me for. So I declared to Him, “Lord I will be obedient!”  I thought it was an easy choice, cause what would he ask me to do anyway. But would it really be that easy?  It is one thing to say that you will, it is another thing when you are faced with a situation that requires you to come out of your comfort zone and actually step out.  And besides how often would I have to “respond”.  And then it happened again, that famous feeling, butterflies!  Not more than an hour after returning home from the prayer room, after making that bold statement, we decided to take the kids to McDonalds play center (it has been a rainy day here, and too cold to play outside). There was a woman sitting not far off with her son, a sweet little boy about Ezekiel’s age, and God said, “she needs to be encouraged”.  “What” I reply, “right now, but we are just hanging out with the kids, and I am not prepared, I haven’t planned to speak to anyone, are you sure?” And He simply says “yes, right now.”  So now, knowing that God wants to use me, I take a moment to ask Him a few questions about her, where she is at in her life and what he wants to say?  He leads me in what I am to say, but now what.  Do I just walk up to her and tell her, do I strike up a conversation and then just slide it in with out actually coming right out and saying “God wants you to know.”  And now I start to feel an urgency, for all I know she could leave at any moment.  I better act fast, or at least try, all the while feeling just as nervous and anxious as the last time.  So I go and begin to play with the kids, hoping that through some working of the Lord that he would work out a way for me to talk to her.  Praise the Lord that He is always faithful.  The time is right, so I go for it, I dive right in with, “Hi, I’m Shayne, I’m a Christian, and I believe that Jesus speaks today and I believe that he wants you to know that he sees you and all your hard work and that you are a good mom”, and so on. She smiles, lets out a little sigh, and says “thanks”, I could tell that those few words were just what she needed to hear. Praise the Lord that he knows so much better than I. Something so small can have a huge impact.  

I am so humbled and blessed to be a servant and daughter of the most high. He knows so much better than I and I am excited to see what else he will ask me to do, even if it involves all the crazy emotions that always seem to come with it.  Here’s to being obedient and heeding those gentle nudges.  I only pray that I will bring honor to my God and King, whom I love dearly.  

Thanks for Journeying with us,

The Schafers

The Surprise ..

Have you ever been surprised by how long it is sometimes possible to go without having any spiritual thoughts at all.  Have you ever had one of those days when you wake up with a list of things to do a mile long and your minds going a mile a minute with all the duties of the day right out of the gate.  Have you ever gone all day, or maybe all morning without thinking of anything spiritual, without thinking about God, without praying?  For most of us, I imagine, our relationship with God is pretty forefront in our minds most of the time.  Many of us even waking early with the express purpose of seeking Him.  But sometimes, (I hope I’m not the only one) sometimes I catch myself part way through my day remembering “hey, I’m not the only one who exists in my small universe, hello God, uh sorry for not thinking of you sooner”. Or maybe I put in my morning Devo time and totally forget I’m a follower of Jesus until part way through the afternoon or maybe until grace at lunch time, “uh, hi God, how are ya.  I forgot you were standing there”.  Sometimes on those days I’m surprised at my apparent lack of spirituality,

But today, God surprised me.

Me and Isaac spent a couple of hours at the prayer room this morning and it was a really rich time of fellowship and intimacy with the Lord, then we went back to the MH and Shayne and Carsyn took off to the prayer room.  In the hours that followed I home schooled with the kids, took the puppies out to potty, studied my new book “Humility” by Andrew Murray, and made lunch.  But, right before I was about to make lunch we heard...

A knock at the MH door.

Gods surprise had arrived.  I opened the door to find a middle-aged women standing there with a case of juice boxes.  “Do you guys need some juice boxes” she asked me.  I was just beginning to wonder if juice boxes were a need when Judah yelled “Ya we do”.  So the lady handed me over the juice boxes, and then she reached into her pocket and pulled out a handful of what I instantly knew was money. (pause)

You know that moment, when you realize someone is going to give you some money.  You see the bills but you can’t tell how much.  Your heart jumps, your mind races. ‘Maybe its enough to do a tune-up on the van, maybe its enough for that new baseball cap I saw at the mall last week, maybe its enough to fly the puppies we’ve sold back to Canada, maybe its enough to take an all expenses paid vacation to Disneyland, and maybe they’ll be enough for a coffee and some cigars left over afterwards’  (un-pause)

The lady handed me 15$.  (pause)

‘15 bucks, thats it.  I mean, 15 bucks thats awesome, thanks God.  I repent of my un-thank-fullness of heart.  15$ is great.  Um, and I also repent of all that materialistic coveting I was doing a minute ago.  You know of course if it was a large sum of money, I would of spent it all advancing your kingdom and blessing others and not on myself.  I repent for that moment of ungratefulness, please don’t hit me with lightning’ (un-pause)

“Thank-You so much” I said “your being here today and giving us these gifts is an answer to our prayers.  This is such a blessing for us today.  We are on a 1 year journey of faith and we are traveling all around North America trusting God to look after us, so, thank you so much”.  She smiled kindly at me, and turning to leave said “I’m glad I could bless you, I wish I could do more but...” and her words hung in the air for a moment before I responded “This is amazing.  Thank you so much.  You are an answer to our prayers today”.  She smiled as she walked to her vehicle and drove away.

Jesus, Thank You for providing for us today.  Thank You for proving over and over that you are a God that is Faithful and can be trusted.  Thank You for the privilege of being able to be a part of something so wonderful as this Journey of Faith.  

You would think that trusting God for everything, everyday, would be something that would be front and foremost in our minds all the time.  And I confess that sometimes it is, but today it wasn’t.  Today God said “Surprise”, and we were able to humbly bow our lives before Him, thankful to serve such an amazing Saviour.

Thanks for Journeying with us,

The Schafers