Meet the Pauls

We met the Pauls in April of 2008 at our interview conference.  They were pure-bred Californians deciding whether to serve in Indonesia or Finland.  Since our church was doing work in Indonesia, I tried to persuade them to go to there.  They decided Finland.  We went back to our separate coasts, packed up our lives, rented out our homes, and reunited in August in Richmond at our training center.  For 9 weeks we shared meals together, sat together every day for our sessions, and bonded through the whole experience.  We said goodbye in October never thinking our lives would intersect again.  However, our surprise trip to Greece allowed us to spend a week together, and there we decided the contingency plan of going to their town in Finland if we didn’t get VISAs.  Here we are.  It has been a wonderful month of doing life together here.  The whole first week, Heather and I just kept repeating, “I can’t believe we’re here;  this is so surreal.”  Their four-year old girl, Delaney and the girls have had a blast together.  She is into princesses and ponies, so what could be better?  This has been a rich blessing to be together and we’re thankful to God for this opportunity.