Jonny's Schooling

Well, it's amazing how the Lord's hand plays out in our lives. Jonny ended up not being accepted into ASU's Marriage and Family Therapy program (not enough previous experience). So we are off to figuring out what to do next.

One thing that has been really neat is to see how the Lord's hand has been leading us as we go. It started out last October, praying about, and feeling very strongly that the Lord wanted Jonny to become a LDS Chaplain in the military. After that, we discovered that Jonny could graduate sooner than he had planned in order to apply to a new program starting at BYU for Chaplain Candidates. It was hectic applying for it, and we didn't have much time, but we figured it was worth a shot. We didn't think it was coincidence that we prayed about this Chaplain thing in order to find out that Jonny could graduate just in time enough to apply for the Chaplain Candidate program just starting at BYU. However, because his score wasn't high enough on the GRE (Graduate School entrance exam), he wasn't accepted. But still, we moved forward with faith, realizing that the Lord had led us this far, but not knowing what lies ahead.

After this, Jonny was talking to his best friend, Michael Spencer, about the situation and they began to talk about how this situation was like Moses and the house of Israel getting to the Red Sea and having the Egyptians behind them. They moved forward with faith up to this point, and continued trusting in the Lord, but how was He going to free them from the pressing Egyptians with a large sea in their way? As the conversation moved forward, Michael began talking about ASU and how a Marriage and Family Therapy program was just accredited there, and how their application deadline wasn't for another month. For the longest time, I thought that McKenzi and I would not be living in Arizona ever again, but this idea of ASU opened up the possibility of moving to Arizona again. After hearing Michael talk about this, Jonny felt like this was inspired and really felt good about it. So he told Michael, "Thank you, Moses." It was as though the Red Sea had been divided and there was a path again.

So as I said in the beginning, Jonny was not accepted into ASU's program either because he didn't have as much clinical experience as did the other applicants. Up to this point, it has been a push to get into a program so Jonny could continue his schooling. With all the application deadlines having passed, this is not possible for the next year. So the question is what do we do until then. Up untill now our future has been clear and easy, but now we have to figure something else out.

The next thing that has come across our path is (which could be a huge blessing) taking a break for a few years from pursuing the chaplain course, and getting involved with Real Estate. There is a Real Estate school in Arizona that helps people learn good principles of Real Estate investing and helps them get on their own feet. This has the potential to do our family a lot of good, and get us in a position that so that we can do more good for others. As we have been researching out this idea, it has been making more and more sense to do it. We are continuing to pray about it, to see if this would really be best, and would be the next step that would be right for our family. We know the Lord will be with us in this decision and look forward to what lays ahead.

The Lord is truly blessing our little family. Things are not turning out as we have imagined, but as we are striving to do what the Lord would have us do and are striving to come closer to Christ, we are being blessed and led in all aspects of our lives.