The First Sign

Folks, sorry it has been so long!  We have bought and sold a house since I last wrote, so it has been busy here!  As I mentioned in the last post, God made it pretty clear we were supposed to ask for a sign.  We prayed and asked Him to give us a sign and that we would be open to seeing it.  We did not know when or how it would come--would it literally be written words or would it be something else?--we didn't know what we were looking for, but we had peace that God would show us a sign when He was ready.  In July my heart wanted it to work so badly here in Waco.  I didn't want to leave Baylor, our church, our friends, or the girls' friends and preschool.  I didn't want to give up the dream of our kids going to elementary school with our friends' kids.  All I knew was that I was willing to move if it meant Scott would be home more and when he was home, he'd have the chance to be involved.  I also knew that Northwest Arkansas had been piquing my curiosity, because I had been following a couple blog friends up there, and I longed to live somewhere with the four seasons like we had in Germany.  It made me so homesick for our life there--the seasons and being able to walk to restaurants, etc.  Somehow I had stumbled on a blog of a family moving from Houston, TX to Franklin, TN.  As I read her story (you can begin it here) I thought, I need to talk to her.  Her husband is a physician as well, and I wanted to hear how they knew God was leading them to go when his practice was going so well.  And once they made that decision to go, how were they able to detach from patients who love him so much?  At Scott's medical school reunion the previous summer, we had met up with 2 friends who had relocated to Franklin, and they had begged us to come out there and check it out.  We kind of put it on the back burner, but then when I started reading about the rolling hills, the 4 seasons, and the historic downtown, I started to wonder if this might be the place for us.  I googled pediatric clinics in Franklin, and Brentwood Children's Clinic appeared first.  I started reading about the physicians and started thinking--Scott would love being in a partnership like this.  Don't get me wrong, he loves his current colleagues, but they are not in control of their clinic; they work ultimately for the hospital.  We also knew people in Northwest Arkansas that have a great private practice there, and with his sister and some close friends just moving there, we were wondering if that was where we were to go.  As I said, at the same time, my heart longed for things to work out in Waco, but we weren't seeing a solution. 
Somewhere later in July, we heard a sermon on Nehemiah and how he fasted and prayed and surveyed the land before he did anything to start rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem.  I decided to give up Coke that week (I love a fountain Coke, and most afternoons I enjoy a Coke at home :) ) One particular day I was very emotionally overwhelmed--things were so hard, and I knew if we were supposed to stay, I would jump in and continuously pray for a miracle for his job demands to change, the hospital's decision to change or some other opportunity that we didn't know about yet.  If we were to go, I wanted to be able to mentally prepare and then let God begin to show us where.  I knew that would be just as big of a miracle--the timing would have to be just right for a clinic to need another pediatrician and for them to choose Scott.  A lot of really good clinics don't use a recruiter, so it's often difficult to find out about positions available.  I knew if we were to go, God would drop an opportunity in our laps like He had done so many other times when I needed a job.
One day I was driving the girls to preschool and just in tears crying out to God--"God please show us.  Are we to stay in Waco or are we to go?"  It was getting overwhelming to plug our lives in here not knowing if it was to work out for us to stay, and it was hard to live a double life.  I looked up, and the street sign said "Brentwood."  I couldn't believe my eyes, and I kind of laughed it off thinking "really God? you're going to show me a literal street sign?"  then the next street said "Brentwood" as if God was proving His point to me.  Apparently the street curves around so the street sign is "Brentwood" 2 streets in a row.  I promise you I have driven by these signs for a year and never noticed them.  When I picked up the girls later that day, I looked for the signs, and they were not easy to see.  I called Nicole and told her about my experience with asking for a sign, literally seeing a sign, and that I would catalogue this away as the first sign.  I didn't know if this meant we were to live in Brentwood (a suburb of Nashville in between Nashville and Franklin) or if Scott would in fact get a job at the Brentwood Children's Clinic or if it just meant "not Waco."  But it seemed to be my first clue that we were not staying.

the Brentwood sign on the left under the tree