A guest blogger shares how God counseled him and his family from the couch of a pastor’s office to the mission field.

In Neil’s final post, he shares the path that God has invited his family to take: a return to a much-loved desert land in the Middle East.

As our family is transitioning to the Middle East, we are in awe at how God has so intimately and precisely led us. He truly has counseled us with His loving eye upon us (Psalm 32:8).

We stepped onto this particular path four years ago when the Lord spoke about going to Bible school. We were obedient, even though at the time this seemed like a foolish decision bordering on the impossible. But as it turned out, it was during Bible school that the Lord began to turn our hearts toward the Muslim people.

I was worshiping one morning in a chapel service and the Lord showed me a picture of a desert valley. There were millions of people standing in this valley, staring at me. The Lord said, “I have little ones here who do not know Me, but I know them, and I need you to tell them about Me. I will take you.”

After this vision, the Lord began to give both my wife and I His heart for the “people of the desert.”

In 2013, we spent three months in Northern Iraq serving with a team that had graduated from our Bible school years earlier. During this time the Lord continued to fine-tune the vision for our family. We still didn’t know the details, but we did know that our lives were to be devoted to bringing the Kingdom of God to the Middle East.

We returned to the States at the end of 2013 and I finished Bible school the following Spring. By the end of 2014 we had begun raising support to move to the desert, although we still did not know the specific nation God was calling us to serve. We were simply moving forward in faith, knowing that God would speak and lead us in due time—like He had so many times before.

Then one October morning last fall, the Lord began to speak to me in prayer about my role in the Middle East and who it was that He was calling me to be. The leading He gave me that morning shed just enough light to see the steps on the path before us, and it led toward a specific—albeit still unknown—nation. But the final illumination wouldn’t come for another four months.

In February 2015 I had a dream. In the dream the Lord showed me a team member from our time in Iraq. The way in which God highlighted this brother told me that Iraq was to be our home.

My family and I are joyfully embracing this assignment that God is leading us into. We are so excited for the work that He has prepared for us and are eager to return to the desert once again.

Now we are in the final stages of our support raising, and we are praying about the specific timing of when we will land in Iraq.

God has been so good to us and so faithful every step of the way. We covet your prayers as we ask, once again, that the Lord lead us and counsel us with His loving eye upon us.

And we pray that, as you wait on the Shepherd’s leading and counsel, you would know that He will faithfully counsel you, and that His loving eye is upon you.

Neil Broere

While living in Iraq in 2013, Neil and his wife Lindsey (and their 4 children) saw firsthand the wide open door for the Gospel in the Middle East. They are preparing to move back to Iraq to minister to Syrian refugees. Neil and his family are passionate to see the church in the Middle East restored, rebuilt, and replanted (Ezekiel 36). www.ironkiteinternational.com