After a couple of days in Scotland, I was back on the bus, making my way back to Southend-on-Sea. I couldn’t shake a short dream I had the previous night from my mind. The more I thought about it, the sadder I became. In the dream, I was at a place with my church friends, having fun. But, I found myself walking away from them, up a hill, in silence. All I could hear were my footsteps on the sand. I had never felt more lonely. I was crying out to God for help with my loneliness. Was this a warning from the Lord about what was waiting for me? Or was there something more?

 

The next day turned out to be very significant spiritually. Jean asked me whether I'd care to join her and her daughter at their home group. “What? At that little village church?” I asked.

“No,” she replied. “I go to the Vineyard here in Southend.”

“What? I didn’t know there was a Vineyard here!”

I was surprised, but she said she would talk to me again later as she had to leave for an appointment. I had some calls to make and needed to arrange with a lady in Oxford to deliver a parcel to her from Kris and David in Anaheim. Jean left me with her phone. I finished my travel arrangements just as Jean returned.

Then Jean said to me,

“The church office is looking for you. Give them a call.”

For a moment, I stared at her. What did she mean? How can the church office be looking for me when they don’t even know me? When I asked Jean, she shrugged, gave me the number and said, “I don’t know.”

 

I called them, and Steve Barber answered the phone. I didn’t know it then, but he was the Senior Pastor. I told him my name and mentioned that Jean had asked me to call him.

“Oh, yes,” he said. “Do you have some chocolate chip cookies?”

Silence. Who is this guy? What does he mean?

“No,” I replied. “Oh, okay. That’s all I wanted to know,” he said and then ended the conversation.

I remembered the stash of chocolate chip cookies in my suitcase that I had brought over from America. I felt guilty for lying to the pastor, but things were getting too weird for me in Southend-on-Sea. Why did he want to know about the cookies? Was I supposed to share them with him? Who was he? I had little time to ponder the cookie story. We were on our way to the home group meeting. The leaders were Jim and Amanda, and I immediately felt at home.

 

It isn't every day you walk into a home group and wish all your future ones to look like this one. They were such an interesting group of people. A bit later in the meeting, Jim approached me and said he had a word for me. He told me he went to the pastor, Steve Barber, about a week ago. He asked if he knew about a foreigner coming to Southend. Steve said no, he did not. Then he said to me, “When you walked in here tonight, I knew you were that foreigner. You think it’s just a coincidence you’re here tonight, but it’s not. This is all part of God’s plan for you, and God wants you to know that THIS IS YOUR HOME.”

 

It felt like something heavy hit my heart. It was the most unbelievable thing that had just happened to me. Jim continued to tell me about a dream he had involving Abraham and falling rain. I cannot remember exactly what he said, but as I listened, I had the strangest feeling. It felt as if I had heard this before. Maybe it was in a dream, and it felt almost like that dream was being fulfilled. It all felt so weird and supernatural.

 

Months earlier, in South Africa, we had written letters to a couple of Vineyard Churches. We were trying to find a Vineyard in England that I could call 'HOME', but we had no reply. Here I heard this stranger from Southend-on-Sea, saying, ‘THIS IS YOUR HOME’. I had so much to digest from what happened that day, but it was overwhelming. Somehow, I knew there was so much more to come—more revelation.