Where Everything Began Again

Our story didn’t start when we had children or built a home.
It started the day we were born again.

Before that, Marie and I lived together and built a life based on our own ideas, our own goals, our own self-achievement, our own plans. We shared interests, we tried to build stability, we did what people usually do… but none of it had anything to do with God.

We didn’t acknowledge Him.
We didn’t live for Him.
We didn’t seek Him.
We simply lived our own way, a life in sin, shaped around ourselves, without realizing how empty it really was.

But when Jesus met us, everything shifted.
He broke addictions, fears, and patterns that were part of our daily life. He touched places in our hearts we didn’t even know were wounded. And suddenly we didn’t want the old life anymore. We didn’t want to live for ourselves. We wanted to live for Him, really live for Him.

When God entered our life, conviction came fast and clear.
Nobody told us what to do. Nobody pushed us.
It came directly from Him.

We both felt the same thing in our hearts:
We needed to honor God and make things right.

And this is where the next part of our journey began.

Saying Yes to God’s Way

For years we lived together, but not according to God’s heart.
When Marie encountered Jesus, she was baptized after a specific event that touched her deeply. She came out of the water feeling new, clean, and unwilling to return to the way she used to be. 

Later, she suddenly felt the conviction:
we needed to get married, not later, not “one day,” but now.

Seven days after her encounter, we were standing in the backyard being married by a pastor. At first, we thought it would be just signing papers at the government office, but when they told us we needed someone ordained, we called our friend, a pastor, and explained our conviction. After some hesitation, he agreed.

It wasn’t fancy or planned.
It wasn’t a big celebration.
It was obedience and it marked the beginning of a new life with God at the center.

This was the real beginning of our walk with Him, the moment when our life stopped being about ourselves and began being lived for God.

The Miracle House and the Garden of the Heart

Not long after, God gave us a house we could never have afforded.
At first it was $40–50k above our range, so we didn’t even visit it. But one day the price suddenly dropped by $40,000. We went to see it and immediately felt at home. We negotiated another $10,000 off, and the owner gave us all his furniture: sofa, gym equipment, gardening tools, everything we needed as a young family starting from almost nothing.

It had everything we prayed for:

• apple trees
• a forest
• land
• a double garage
• an ocean view

It felt like a dream.

But that place became more than a blessing, it became a classroom.

We argued a lot at that time.
We had pride, impatience, and reactions we didn’t see in ourselves before.

Then God showed us something that changed everything:

Our hearts are like gardens.
We can see the weeds in someone else’s garden, but we can only pull the weeds in our own.

So instead of accusing each other, we began seeking God separately whenever we were hurt or offended. We asked Him to show our own heart. And each time, He did. Then we would come back together, share what He showed us, and repent to each other.

It slowly transformed our relationship.
We stopped attacking.
We started understanding.
We saw each other differently.
Unity began growing where pride used to be.

A Three-Year Pit

That house was beautiful, but the season was hard.

We were isolated.
We had almost no fellowship, no church, no spiritual community.
It became three years of character training: work, bills, solitude, and God shaping us quietly.

Eventually, we started feeling dry.
Old habits came back: distraction, video games, drifting.
We felt ourselves slowly slipping back into our old ways, losing connection with God and with each other.

I watched a testimony from a man in Europe who quit his job, sold everything, and decided to live by faith with his family. Something in me burned. I wanted a life that depended on God for everything. I showed the video to Marie.

When I came home later that day, she looked at me and said:
“Okay… let’s do this.”

It shook me.
I was excited and terrified at the same time.

Selling Everything... And the Sale That Fell Apart

We found a discipleship school in California of three months. We felt led to go. So we decided to sell our house and use the money to travel.

But when the sale was about to close… it collapsed.
Just like that, gone.

We didn’t have money.
We didn’t have a plan.
But we still felt peace.

We found a couple thousand dollars, barely enough for gas and food and we said:
“If we want to live by faith, it starts today.”

We packed our minivan, put our children in the backseat, and drove across the continent.

From the Atlantic to the Pacific

We didn’t know where we would sleep each night.
We contacted believers only two or three hours before arriving in a city.

God provided every single time.

People opened their homes.
We shared meals.
We prayed together.
We felt covered.

We crossed North America in ten days from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific, with a minivan, three children, and faith.

When we reached California, the school was life-changing.
The sentence that marked me the most was:

“Many people don’t finish the race because they lack character.”

It went straight into my heart.
I knew that if I wanted to finish the race, I needed to let God shape my character deeply.

We went twice to Mexico for evangelism, and God moved in powerful ways.

“It’s Not Finished.”

When the school ended, I felt sad.
Was our journey over?
Was that it?

On the way back, while visiting believers, God spoke:
“It’s not finished.”

That one sentence gave us the strength to keep going.

We joined another brother in Canada for the summer, and it became one of the most active seasons of our lives: baptizing people, evangelizing, praying for the sick, walking with new believers. We baptized an entire family, the daughter, then the mother, then the son-in-law. That day stayed with us.

Another Pit and a Personal Revelation

After summer, God sent us back east again.
Another quiet place.
Another character season.

But this time, God was speaking.

I asked Him:
“What is my purpose in the Body?”

Little by little, He began showing me things about the fivefold ministry and my function. Not fully, just enough to give me hope, a sense of direction, and a foundation.

I spent a lot of time with God.
Marie did too.
We also had a lot of time as a family, learning our roles, building habits, growing closer. It was a season of hidden growth.

The Vision and Another Step of Faith

As winter was ending, we had to leave the place we were staying, but I had no idea where to go next. Every day I drove thirty minutes to a café because the internet was too weak where we lived. That drive became my prayer time. I would cry out to God, asking Him what to do, where to go, and how to lead my family.

Then one day, it happened.

A vivid image appeared in my mind and then it came again, and then a third time.
I knew it wasn’t my imagination.
I knew God was speaking.

The vision had two parts:

1. The Food Bank

I saw myself volunteering in a food bank simply placing cans on shelves.
Nothing dramatic, nothing special, just serving quietly.

2. Knocking on Doors

Then I saw myself in a street lined with identical row houses.
I was going door to door, knocking, praying, reaching out.
Across the street, there was a brother I knew , the same brother doing the exact same thing.
Only a street separated us, but we were doing the same work.

That detail, the same brother, the same row houses, is what convinced me the vision was truly from God.

I instantly knew which city it was.
But I didn’t know how anything could work:

• Where would we stay?
• How would we afford it?
• How do you move a family and a trailer without a plan?
• How do you settle in a city where you know almost no one?

The vision was clear, but nothing else made sense.

So I called the brother I saw in the vision.
He listened and simply said:
“You need to take a leap of faith.”

That sentence grounded me.
It calmed the panic and allowed me to breathe again.

I remembered another brother who had invited us to visit him a year earlier.
I called him and asked if the invitation still stood.
He said yes and opened his home to us.

At the same time, I shared the food bank vision with another believer.
He told me he worked at a food bank and they were exactly looking for someone to fill a vacant volunteer spot.

Everything began falling into place.

So once again, we packed everything, put the kids in the minivan, hooked up the trailer, and drove twelve hours into the unknown.

And just like the vision showed, it all happened.

I began volunteering at the food bank.
It was simple work, but it shaped my character, humbled me, and helped me connect with people I would never have met otherwise.

We eventually moved from our trailer into a small apartment. We had nothing.
Not even beds.
No kitchen table.
No sofa.
No furniture at all.

And God provided everything.

One thing after another came: beds, mattresses, a table, chairs, a sofa until the entire place was furnished. It felt like God was saying:
“I see you. I care about you. I will take care of you.”

This touched Marie deeply. It became a reminder for her that God sees the small things as much as the big ones.

A year later, God told me to spend time with a specific brother.
Together, we went to the streets, praying for people, evangelizing, and building relationships.

Then the local church opened its doors to us.
They wanted to learn how to reach people the way we did, so we started training them, equipping them, and leading them in the streets. It was beautiful, but also a season of learning for me and of making mistakes.

Until then, I had always done things alone, taking the lead, doing what I thought was best.
But in this season, God taught me:

• how to submit
• how to wait
• how to recognize when my part was done and to step back
• how to let Him lead instead of running ahead

It was humbling, but it was necessary.

And it was in this same region, in this season of correction, character, and quiet obedience that God began revealing the first pieces of the Cambodia calling.

The Birth of the Cambodia Calling

Two years earlier, I had two dreams that I knew were from God, but I didn’t understand them. So I wrote them down and kept them.

A year later, God began revealing their meaning.

We met someone who lived in Cambodia.
I showed Marie the images of the region and I froze.
It was exactly what I had seen in my dream.

Marie’s heart changed instantly.
A few years before, she never wanted to go to Cambodia. She had no desire, no interest. Nothing.
But now, she had peace.
She had enthusiasm.
She had conviction.

It was as if God flipped a switch in her heart.

We began preparing in faith:

• working on the website, maybe as a way to help fund ourselves
• connecting with Cambodian believers
• attending a Khmer church in Ontario
• praying for direction
• seeking confirmation
• learning the language little by little
• preparing our family for the cultural differences

When we looked back, we realized something powerful:
God had been planting this seed for years, long before we realized it. He showed me events and moments from the past that proved a seed had been planted.

Like a tiny desire buried deep inside, growing slowly through every season.

We have a heart for families.
We have a desire to build strong foundations, restore what is broken, and walk with people long-term.

Cambodia has many broken families and we believe this is where God wants to send us.

Everything we’ve gone through, every season, every pit, every move, every lesson has shaped us for this.

How God Worked in Marie’s Heart

Before knowing God, Marie was not the same person at home and at work. She looked down on others and lived from a place of pride without realizing it.

Her turning point came through the Holy Spirit one day as I spoke to her.
It wasn’t emotional or dramatic, but something shifted inside her.

She didn’t want the old life anymore.
She wanted to live as a daughter of God.

God worked on her character, teaching her patience, humility, gentleness, and love.

As a mother, He taught her how to love our children and pour into them.
As a wife, He transformed her entirely.

We stopped being two individuals and became one, walking in unity, seeing each other differently, supporting each other as partners and parents.

Marie says that what she values most today is raising our children with God.
Without Him, our story would look very different.
She prefers the life we have with Him.

How God Shaped Our Children

There isn’t one dramatic moment, but many small ones.

Through all the moves, the changes, the traveling, the ministry, the unknowns, God shaped their hearts.

Sometimes they miss houses we lived in.
Sometimes the changes are hard.
But they’ve learned to adapt, to trust, to obey, and to care for each other.

Their interactions, their reflections, even their arguments show growth.
They are learning how to love, how to forgive, how to walk together.

And God always brought us to places where there were other children.
God has been shaping them quietly through every season.

Where We Are Now and What God Is Teaching Us

Today, God is teaching me obedience, even when I don’t understand, even when the process is slow, even when I don’t see the full picture.

Joseph had dreams, but he went through pits, prisons, injustice, and misunderstanding before those dreams came to pass.
His story encourages me to embrace the process, to trust God in the hidden seasons.

As a father, God is teaching me to spend time with my children, to pour into them, to lead them by example, and to trust Him with their hearts.
I want to say what Jesus said:
“I have not lost one of those You gave me.”

Marie and I still seek God separately in our own personal ways by reading, praying, listening, and then we talk about what He’s showing us.

Every so often, after the kids are asleep, we have a “family direction talk,” sharing what we feel God is doing and where He is leading us.

It isn’t complicated.
It’s simple and it works for us.

Our story isn’t finished.
We’re still learning, still growing, still trusting God step by step.

But one thing is sure:

God still leads families.
He still speaks.
And if we say yes, He is faithful to lead the way.

Thank you for reading our journey,
and for walking with us as the story continues.