Miracle Moments
Brought to you by: Community Partner Molly Maid of Birmingham, www.mollymaid.com/birmingham
We were homeschooling our children, had built a great life in Texas and were actively serving a church we loved. But then, one day, God called us to do something really hard for us. He asked us to sell our possessions, drastically uproot, and follow in faith as He was pointing us to Russia and Poland to serve as missionaries.
We pushed our flat screen TV to the donation pile, and it was hard. We set aside the meticulously outlined baseball plans for our sons, and it was hard. We left warm, familiar Texas and landed in bitterly cold, unfamiliar Russia, and it was hard. We didn’t always get it right, but this step in obedience resulted in God working to refine us, and as He did, others were pointed to Him. In 2016, we returned to the US with our three grown children. Our youngest was beginning college and we were balancing pastoring a church in Dallas and a great teaching career through a private, Christian school.
Then, we received a letter. It was a Christmas letter from a children’s home and, penned by one of the girls who lived there, was her response to the question, “What do I want for Christmas?” Her response was, “I want to feel better about myself.” It was then, God pointed us to our next mission field assignment – houseparenting. The refining work He had done in us from Dallas to Russia to Poland, it refined our response to this next step in faith. This time, we had learned how to welcome the fact that it would be hard. We heavily researched over 100 ministries. Out of the piles and piles of information, God brought Big Oak Ranch to the top of our list. We had a desire to serve where the hope of Jesus is the center, where there were individual family homes and support through shared organizational values. So, we sold everything once again, and moved to Ala. We have never been more confident that God has called us in this exact time, to this exact home, with the specific girls we have the honor of raising. He continues to refine us in this mission work and our girls get a front row seat.
The pasts of every child at Big Oak have been hard, to say the least. But we are now able to teach them what God can do through those hard times. He has shown it to us and we get to point them to Christ as He shows it to them too. Seeing our grown biological children, our parents and extended families welcome our girls into the family as well, seeing their relationships unfold in beautiful ways, it’s shown us that, yes following in faith is often hard, but it’s also a sight to behold when obedience meets the miraculous power of God.
-Doyle and Karen Fletcher
Houseparents, Big Oak Ranch
