When the Dominoes Don’t Fall the Way You Planned
If you’ve ever spent hours setting up dominoes—carefully lining them up, imagining the beautiful chain reaction they’ll create—only to tap the first one and watch the whole thing collapse halfway through, you already understand the story I’m about to tell.
Because that’s what the last 25 years have felt like for us. We planned. We prepared. We prayed. We pushed the first domino. And then… nothing. Or at least, nothing that looked like what we expected.
But this is a story about what happens when you keep offering what you have—even when it feels small, even when the timing feels off, even when the dominoes keep falling in the wrong direction. It’s a story about how God quietly weaves together the lives of people who don’t know each other, in countries none of us planned to be in, through circumstances none of us would have chosen.
It’s a story about the fullness of time—that mysterious moment when God brings together threads He’s been weaving for years, sometimes decades, into something none of us could have orchestrated. And it all began with a lunch, a fishing net, and a promise.
The Long Journey of “Not Yet”: The Dream That Took 25 Years to Ripen
When Bob and I were dating—long before we had degrees, careers, or any idea what our lives would look like—we sensed God whispering something that felt both thrilling and impossible: Take what I’ve put in your hands—your love for healing, your passion for the poor—and carry it into the hardest places in the world.
We didn’t know how. We didn’t know when. We didn’t know where. But we knew the dream was real.
And then… nothing happened. For 25 years. We tried. We prepared. We studied. We worked. We pushed domino after domino. And every time, the chain reaction stopped short.
People asked us, “Are you sure God said this?” And honestly, sometimes we wondered too. But the dream never left. It just waited—quietly—like a seed buried deep in the ground.
In the Fullness of Time
There’s a phrase in Scripture that appears from Genesis to Revelation: “In the fullness of time.”
It’s the Greek word kairos—the moment when everything finally comes together. Not early. Not late. But right on time.
Most of the journey is the waiting. Most of the journey is the frustration. Most of the journey is setting up dominoes that don’t fall the way you hoped.
But when the fullness of time comes, it’s unmistakable.
And for us, that moment began with a simple question God whispered earlier this year: “Ask, and I will give you the nations.” It sounded beautiful. It sounded impossible. It sounded like a promise too big for the little lunch we felt we had to offer.
Thread 1: The Lunch
“Lord… all I have is this.”
When God whispered that promise, my first reaction wasn’t bold faith. It was embarrassment.
“Lord, all I have is this little lunch. A few loaves. A couple of fish. It’s enough to feed me… maybe a few people around me. But the nations? Really?”
And then God brought to mind the boy in John 6. A boy who didn’t have much. A boy who wasn’t a leader, a scholar, or a miracle worker. A boy who simply said: “Here’s what I have. You can use it.”
And Jesus took that tiny offering and fed 15,000 people.
Not because the lunch was big. But because the boy was willing. That was the moment I said, “Okay, Lord. Here’s my lunch. Do whatever You want with it.”
I had no idea what that yes would set in motion.
Thread 2: The Fishing Net
Throwing the Net on the Other Side
For years, we worked in Latin America. It made sense. We spoke the language. We understood the culture. It felt like the “right side of the boat.”
But the dominoes never fell the way we expected.
Then, unexpectedly, God nudged us toward Spain—a country we never planned to work in, with people we didn’t know, in a context that didn’t match our vision for the urban poor. It felt like Jesus saying, “Throw your net on the other side.”
It didn’t make sense. It didn’t fit our plan. It didn’t match our training.
But we threw the net anyway.
And that’s where the first thread of the fullness of time began to appear.
Thread 3: The People God Was Already Preparing
Gerardo and Arlet — 25 Years of Waiting
In Spain, we met Gerardo and Arlet—Mexican missionaries who had spent 25 years laboring in a spiritually dry place with almost nothing to show for it. They told us, “We know God called us here. But after 25 years, we have little fruit.”
They were tired. Discouraged. Still faithful, but weary.
And then they encountered the emotional healing tools we brought. They began using them with youth. The youth told their pastors. The pastors told their national leaders. And suddenly, after 25 years of little, doors began to open.
Gerardo said, “This is what we’ve been waiting for. This is what God brought us here to do.” Their son told us, “I’ve never seen my parents so alive.”
Our little lunch had collided with their long obedience.
Rick and Luz — A Thread From South Africa to Spain
Through Gerardo and Arlet, we met Rick and Luz—missionaries who had just moved from South Africa to Spain.
While we were teaching in Spain, a pastor from South Africa called them in desperation: “Trauma is destroying our community. Do you know anyone who can help?”
And Rick said, “Actually… yes. They’re here right now.” That phone call became the doorway into South Africa.
Another domino we didn’t set up. Another thread God had been weaving for years.
Pastor Vuyo — A Cry for Healing
When we finally met Pastor Vuyo in South Africa, we realized God had been preparing him for decades.
A boy who grew up in a township. A teenager who gambled to feed his siblings. A young man who gave up his only income because he wanted to follow Jesus. A pastor who watched trauma tear apart his community. A leader who prayed, “Lord, show me how to heal my people.”
And God answered that prayer through a chain of events that began with a boy’s lunch in John 6, a whisper from God, and a trip to Spain we didn’t want to take.
Pastor Phil — A Prayer Waiting for an Answer
Then came Pastor Phil—a leader of a network of pastors across southern Africa.
Months before we arrived, he had prayed, “Lord, send someone to help us respond to the trauma our pastors face every day.”
He didn’t know our names. We didn’t know his. But God knew both. And when we met, he said, “You are the answer to the prayer I prayed in November.”
Another thread. Another domino. Another fullness-of-time moment.
Thread 4: The Vision God Confirmed
The Song, the Anthem, and the Vision
Before we left for South Africa, God gave me (Carmen) a vision while I was listening to a South African choir sing the Lord’s Prayer in Swahili. I saw South Africa like a spark—sending out bursts of light that leapt from nation to nation.
I didn’t tell anyone. I wasn’t sure it meant anything.
But when we arrived, Vuyo pulled me aside and said, “Carmen, God showed me the exact same picture last week.”
Then two women in the program said, “We believe God wants to bring healing to the nations through South Africa.”
Then a pastor we barely knew stood up, pointed at me, and said, “You are here because God sent you.”
By then, I wasn’t skeptical anymore. God was weaving something far bigger than our plans.
The Fullness of Time: When All the Threads Come Together
When we stood in that small church in the township of Cambridge—surrounded by people whose stories, struggles, and prayers had been unfolding long before we arrived—we realized: We were not the beginning of anything. We were stepping into something God had been preparing for decades.
Our lunch. Their prayers. Our waiting. Their longing. Our frustration. Their faithfulness. All of it converged in one moment. The fullness of time.
What This Means for You
This isn’t just our story. It’s yours too.
Because every one of us has a lunch—something small, ordinary, unimpressive—that God is asking us to offer. Every one of us has a net—something we’ve thrown on one side of the boat for years with little to show for it. Every one of us has threads—relationships, experiences, disappointments, delays—that don’t make sense yet. And every one of us is part of a story God is weaving together with others in ways we cannot see.
Your offering matters. Your waiting matters. Your story matters. And in the fullness of time, God will bring the threads together.
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