Praise the Lord!

After 6 months of processing (which was supposed to take 6 weeks!) and various unforeseen hoops that needed jumping through, I was contacted today to let me know that my visa application has been APPROVED!!!!!!

Starting in September, I have a year-long residency permit for Sweden!

PRAISE THE LORD!

I can't fight the feeling that this only went through because of His hand of favour on the forms. The system had nowhere to put me, and Mike and I could only HALF fill out the forms since they wouldn't really fit what I was attempting to come here for... I just prayed and prayed for His favour and for my caseworkers to have sympathetic hearts :)

Also, by a sheer move of God, I have a flat for September! I think I'll be rooming with a lovely Ugandan student from my church, Peninah. Flats are NOT easy to get here. My friend Sorinella has been on a list to be interviews for one for YEARS and only JUST got invited to interview this April... after she'd lost her job and so wouldn't be an attractive applicant anyway. Yet somehow, they passed her through and out of 40 people applying for this flat, she got it!!! Then, God gave her a new job in Ireland! So, she was given this flat she didn't know how she'd pay for and then leaving the country! But it just so happens, Penny needs a place starting in July, and I need a place starting in Sept... So, we'll see how this works. But it looks like a move of God to me!

Peninah (future roommate?) and me and Teri-Anne (current landlady :))

Now, we only must pray that when I get back to the states on July 21st for the weddings, my passport gets to the Swedish consulate and back again smoothly, with the visa stamped in, so I can be back to Rescue Mission Ministries and all that He's doing here by September 1st! And, of course, that He continues to provide the finance for all this...

Thank you, Jesus!!

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EDIT!

So, as it turns out, God has other plans for my living arrangements.
Plans with Peninah fell through so they had to sublet the flat to someone else for the year starting in July...
I can rent a room here where I have been for as long as I need, and I will plan to come back here, then, in September, but for ministry reasons, I would so so love to have my own flat (with a roommate for financial reasons). Who knows what He has in store, but do pray with me for leading to all the right roads to just the kind of place He would see fit!