The House

It has been our prayer and desire for a while now, to find a place of our own. We have been renting for 10 years now and we figured where best to buy something than in your own home town. We started to pray and dream, all the way along open and prepared for whatever God has in store for us. This temporary house we are in right now has added to our desire to be in a house where you can step out in the morning and see birds instead of city smog. So… we began our quest for a house. The plan was simple: look at affordable houses that have at least a bit of a garden where you can have some green grass. This was the criteria. The overall drive behind it was also to be able to use it for ministry. We knew we have 6 months to be in the house we are in right now, so the prayer was for God to help us find something in between.

Well, He did. Or… we did. We are praying so hard about that right now. All the possible doors are opening for this one piece of land that has two older houses and a barn on it. They are all in need or renovations, but to make an apartment inside livable, well, they said it would probably take about 4-5 months. Ha, this is exactly how much time we have on our hands. The Lord has been opening amazing doors all the way along. The owner lowered the price of an already cheap deal, we have been granted a personal loan, and the greater dreams of using this place for ministry have already begun to overflow. We can just see church camps, youth gatherings and other social activities happening on the land. We can just imagine friends of our children stopping by at our house on their way home from school. We can just envision a barn turned into a fairyland for children and used as daycare or simply fun place to come to. We can hardly anticipate the guest house to be filled with visitors from all over the world, wanting to hear of all that God is doing in this wonderful country many haven’t even heard of.

However, this situation is not without drawbacks and for this reason, we need God to speak clearly to us. The main drawback is the fact that this property is 20 minutes away from Maribor. It is out in a village close to Maribor and this would mean that our children would go to kindergarten and school in the village, and not in the city. The high-schoolers would most likely not be able to just drop by at our house and the main focus for the youth work would become the youth center in the city, not so much our home. Another issue we are dealing with is my personal ministry (Nina writing this). I would certainly be more housebound than right in the city and would most likely be less active in the city center, since I would need to stay home with the children. Of course not always, however, most likely many times.

I think if we do this our minds needs to shift from one way of looking at ministry, to another. Our lives would certainly be different out in the village. The focus of the ministry would shift to youth center and church planting within the city on neutral territory and not as a house group concept. We can se benefits and drawbacks in both approaches. Thus we believe both can be successful.

Pray with us… ask God to specifically show us how he wants us to respond to this challenge before us, to open or close doors and to reveal Himself to us. Thank you!

Here are some pictures of the place:

The house where we would renovate the apartment