Today it begins!

Ok this is last years picture, but today I am leaving for Oregon. This time I will be flying into Seattle to visit family for a couple of days and pick up a vehicle that my uncle has graciously allowed us to borrow. (Thanks Uncle Scott!)

I will be ministering to thousands of Boy Scouts at a Camp just 10 mile east of Mt. Hood. We will enjoy an awesome staff of teenagers and scouts age 12-18. This is an equestrian facility, so horse back riding and gun shooting will be a normal part of our schedule. Oh yeah, and a huge lake is on the property with 60 degree water. Brrrrr!

Getting here was amazing, as usual. 4 weeks ago we bought our plane tickets on faith, without knowing where the money was coming from. Well through 6 or 7 crazy circumstances, (not one circumstance was linked with another) sums of money began to arrive from various places. Someone sold some furniture, people sent checks from out of state, even some classmates from my High School reunion gave an awesome gift. All in all the tickets are covered. Thanks everyone!

Oh, by the way, our house got rented for the next 2 years also. 10 months into this process, God brought the perfect family to use our house. What a relief!

Can you feel the momentum picking up? I certainly can. Some big things are on the horizon.

KingMaker Update

Oregon Trip

God gave me the opportunity to go back to Oregon this summer. If you are not sure what I am talking about, I will be a Chaplain for the Boy Scouts of America again this summer. I will be ministering to about 3000 scouts and scoutmasters at a Camp at the base of Mount Hood, Oregon. The Pacific Northwest is in desperate need for Godly leadership, so much so that they are flying me in from Florida. It was an awesome Adventure last year, so when they called this year I had to say yes.

I don't know what I was thinking, but I actually began planning like I was going by myself for the 7 weeks. Yeah, thinking about being away from the family for that long was a little nerve wracking but because of Cessie's school test in July and the cost of tickets, it just didn't look possible for us to go together. Well...

Cessie was able to take her Elementary Education test early (and passed, yeah!) and some very unexpected money has come our way to buy one of the 3 plane tickets we need to get the rest of the family to Oregon. We are only 2 tickets short, about $1000 for both. Someone has graciously let us borrow their truck while we are there, so everything is coming together.

We are asking for some huge prayer support while we're gone. and if God moves in your heart to give to offset the cost of these tickets, please obey him. We are going in faith, and i have been working some side jobs to help us get through the summer.

Send tax free gifts to our Address: 716 Caliente Dr. Brandon, FL 33511

Make checks payable to: Global Reach Foundation

Keep praying:
For our house to sell or get rented...had some great contacts lately
Travel safety, We leave June 26th and return early August.
2Tickets and travel expenses totalling $1500.

Computer Geek

Yeah it has been a little while...It is all because of Claude Cannon and his Assembly business. I worked with him while in college, 8 years ago. I put gas grills and wheelbarrows together, it is something that makes some money but I hate it. I am not cut-out for that kind of work. Needless to say it has kept me off-line for awhile. But this is my last week...yeah!

OK now that that its off my chest the real blog follows:
I really gotta pat myself on the back for my internet page editing prowess. I am not as computer savy as Jason or Claude, but I just successfully linked my (this) blog to my Kingmaker website.

I used Iframe, which I had no idea existed until about an hour ago. It essenitally opens a window on my website to peer through and control the blog site. A pretty nifty thing if I say so myself.

Check it out (here).

My next project is to learn how to copy and post a screenshot onto my blog. Any hints?

View from St Louis

Great stuff!

Telling Lewis of 'Lewis and Clark' not to mess around and get scalped.

Wow look at that!

View from the Arch. Our hotel was the cylindrical tower in front of Busch Stadium.

630 feet! We took a tiny cable car constructed inside the Arch in the 1960s

The View Straight Down!

The View from our Hotel Room downtown.

I will be your tootsie wootsie

We are in St Louis, MO. this weekend for a wedding. We took the opportunity to make it a weekend getaway for just Cessie and I. This is just in time for our 7 year anniversary, which is this week...yeah 7 years married!

St Louis is a very large and old city with mostly brick buildings and an industrial flair downtown, but the community parks and the country side are beautiful, lush and green. Lots of runners and bikers to dodge. With cool mornings and mild afternoons it has been a great escape from Florida's humidity.

Well we are off to the Art Museum in Forest Park...Check back for pics later

The Chapman Family

MARIA SUE CHAPMAN, DAUGHTER OF STEVEN CURTIS CHAPMAN, DIES IN ACCIDENT AT FAMILY HOME

NASHVILLE, TN...5/21/08... At approximately 5pm on the afternoon of Wednesday May 21st, Maria Sue Chapman, 5 years old and the youngest daughter to Steven and Mary Beth Chapman was struck in the driveway of the Chapman home in Franklin, TN. Maria was rushed to Vanderbilt Childrens Hospital in Nashville, transported by LifeFlight, but died of her injuries there. Maria is one of the close knit family’s six children and one of their three adopted daughters.

More than five years ago, Chapman and his wife MaryBeth founded The Shaohannah’s Hope Ministry after bringing their first adopted daughter, Shaohannah, home from China. The ministry’s goal is to help families reduce the financial barrier of adoption, and has provided grants to over 1700 families wishing to adopt orphans from around the world. Chapman is a five-time GRAMMY ® winner and 54-time Dove Award winning artist who has sold over 10 million albums and garnered 44 No. 1 singles.

We pray for their family and their son in this tragic time. Their concert and testimony sealed the deal for us to begin taking seriously the adoption process. So as soon as we get settled in Greenville we will pursue adoption.

Thank you Chapman family for sharing your love with Maria while she was here; God knew that she would receive the love and care she needed in her short life. You were a blessing to her and her to you.

Zoo

So we played hooky from church this Sunday and went to the Zoo. It was $5 day and we were at my parents housesitting, so church was too far anyway. It was super busy at the zoo, but now that gas is so high and ticket prices are in the $20 range, it was an awesome value.

Damage Control

So we have had a week to stew on the disappointing results of our contract falling through. I wish I had a more victorious story about how God has brought us through unscathed. That is definitely not the case.

We just, as in this morning at church, reconciled our hearts to God about the situation we are in. I began to entertain the thoughts of life without 'Discovery Church', asking myself what I missed, and what was the purpose of this failure? Why does God not want us to go and what else is out there? We were stressed, confused, conflicted, convicted, pouty, angry, (did I say confused...?) and other emotions.

We were exercising our minds, trying to figure out God, and not liking the options we were coming up with. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and early this Sunday morning we, honestly, were unsure what God was doing. We were making contingency plans and searching for other jobs on the internet. Conflicted in our hearts, we were "grasping for straws" for any ray of hope. Anyone ever felt this way about God? Anyone ever given or been given any good advice about how to deal with it?

This morning God whispered to me while in church, "Why are you treating me like an adversary?"...and that was it. I realized that in our search for clarity and direction, we were distancing ourselves from God. Adversary is the literal definition for Satan. So I know that what draws me away from peace with God is the "adversary" working to create disunity. I am not a "devil behind every corner" kind of guy, but like in the garden, with Adam and Eve, I was listening to reasoning that was in direct contrast to what we heard just a few weeks ago.

Just weeks ago we were celebrating with friends that God confirmed His call in us to N.C. and that we just needed to be patient and persevere. We knew then that God was writing an amazing story about us to lead and encourage others. It is not a funny thing to know that the next opportunity to show perseverance, we (I) failed miserably.

Thank You God, that You are patient with me. Help me to be patient with my kids and family. You give me what I don't deserve, and You don't give me what I do deserve...like a lightning bolt up my......;)

Rewind- House NOT under contract

Not sure what is going on but the brakes have been hit on this moving process. The potential buyers are military and have had a change of plans, not their fault but a change all the same. So we are scrambling to get some work lined up for the indefinite future but are confident that we are on our way.

The buyers are still interested and might lease purchase this property but it will take them at least 2 months to figure this all out, we would love to still help them. Until then we will get the house back on the market and use this time to sell the house.

God is still in control and it is just a matter of time before we see this transition completed.

National Day of Prayer

I started the day off right by co-leading a worship and prayer service at Onething Prayer Center from 12 midnight to 2am. It was an amazing time and I really enjoyed worshiping without an agenda or a church program. We just worshiped and prayed what ever God led us to. It was refreshing to just rest and hear from the Father.

So by the time it was finished I didn't get home 'til 4am, so I am a bit off kilter. But it sure was worth it.