Final blog post for Uprooted to Paradise.

This is my last blog for Uprooted to Paradise. Read on for an explanation.

Exactly one year ago, the MacPhails landed in the Bahamas as residents. Still exhausted from saying goodbye to so many people, we put our hearts and mind to setting down roots here in Nassau. When contemplating the big transition to Nassau, Bryn and I knew in order for ministry to be effective and for our family to thrive, we would need to establish roots in Nassau and be able to consider this place home. God has been so good to us, we indeed feel settled, we feel more than settled we feel rooted.

My roots did not arrive with my belongings on a cargo ship, nor did they happen when the school routine began with our daughter. Not even when I started my work here as a therapist did my roots show up. No, I am firm believer that on June 3rd 2010, when I landed here in Nassau as a resident that unbeknown to me, I had roots. I brought them with me.

This transition, this move, this big huge enormous change in my life called Nassau, has taught me something. Roots are not where you live, roots are not where you are from. Roots are those things that grow from within caused only by knowing to whom you belong. My roots are strong and firm, my roots nourish and support me during this crazy thing called life. God is the One to whom I belong, the One to whom I gain my strength, and He is the One who really really knows me. He shapes my roots, through the knowledge that more than anything in this world I belong to a God who adores me for who I am. So whether I be in Timbuktu, Zimbabwe, or Toronto I can claim my roots, this transition to Nassau is what taught me this truth.

Along this journey I have seen and felt God's grace and mercy in my life in ways I could never had predicted. Through this part of my life I have felt God's unrelenting hand of love, showing me over and over that I belong. Perhaps a better way to say this is that God himself, has taken root in my heart, I am rooted from within. Sometimes I try to tether myself to things, people or ideas but being rooted from within is a no fail solution to this uneasy world. A tether is a temporary solution that lasts as long as you can hold on and is dependent upon the strength of your rope. Finally, I get it, I am rooted,I always as have been, as long as I have known Christ I have been rooted from within.

So why is this the last blog? This blog has been so helpful in my understanding of this truth, and the processing of my thoughts and feelings throughout this transition. I might be letting go of Uprooted to Paradise but I will be beginning a new blog shortly. Stay tuned, I promise to let you all know of where my next blog appears and what it will be all about and thank you for all your kind words, thoughtful comments and prayers as I realized I am rooted in Paradise.

Shine on my friends and thank you for supporting myself through this blog.

Allie "firmly rooted wherever she goes" MacPhail