We Are Moving To Kilgore!!!

Finally, we get to move to the same town as the church! We are so excited!

We have looked at 4-5 homes to rent in Kilgore, but nothing was working out. Rent is so EXPENSIVE!! Well, a local real estate agent has been working with us and she said she had a house open. She gave us the info and we went to look at it Friday afternoon and looked in the windows. She was out of town on Saturday, so we set up an appointment to look at the house on Sunday afternoon, which worked out great because we were able to take our deacon and his wife to look with us. We wanted another set of eyes to look at the house with us. We filled out all the paperwork and gave them our deposit on Sunday, because the houses for rent in Kilgore rarely last more than 48 hours. It is a tough market for renters. I told the church on Sunday night to pray for God's will. If this is the house, make it happen.

Well, the real estate agent called on Monday morning to tell me that 3 other people put in for the house on Sunday. Oh NO!....Well, she said, the good news is...They want to rent to you. Really, I said. Yes, she said, I told them you have no kids, no pets and he is a Pastor in town, they are the perfect renters. Well, I don't know if that is true, but they agreed with her. Yeah! And she says they are going to put in a new stove and doing some work in the kitchen. God is so good!

Anyway, we get to start moving in a couple weeks. We have about a two week overlap between the house and the apartment. Which is great because that gives us time to clean up a little and not have to move everything hurriedly. Yeah!

It is a great house. It is an older home, but is larger than most. It is a country setting on the edge of town. It is a 3/2 with a 2 car garage. and it sets on an acre lot. It will be great for the ministry!

Did I say we were EXCITED! God answers prayer!

Also, not to make it of any less importance. We had a great Missions Conference. The Lord really blessed in all the services and we are thrilled at what God is going to do this coming year with our missions program. Bro. Chestnut did a great job and the people just loved him. We were able to take up a special offering for his ministry in Romania. It was a Great Conference.

God Bless

Busy, Busy!!

Boy have we been busy since the last post!!

We have been to Florida, seen many of our wonderful friends there. We also had the opportunity of being in Disney for several days! Believe it or not it was a very relaxing time! I think it was a great decision going there. We already knew what was there, so we didn't run around trying to see everything at once. We spent lots of time relaxing and also enjoying the great food that was provided on the food plan their offering right now. We ate at places, we would have never had the opportunity to eat in otherwise. The Lord truly did bless us on our vacation.

We also were thrown into the ministry while on vacation. We had one women, who had cancer, when we first left they had given her two weeks to live. Well, she just about made it, and we rushed home trying to get the opportunity to see her one last time. Well, we did not make it home, but the Lord knew that before we ever left Texas to start vacation. Scott did have the chance to speak with her about her wishes before we left, just to show once again that the Lord knew!! Our church family did a wonderful job of being there for her husband and her also, while we were gone! I was so proud of them, they truly were a testimony about what a GREAT church family is suppose to do for each other. We also had another women who had to have open heart surgery while we were gone, and the doctors really did not expect her to make it through the surgery, but our God had other things in mind, and He was not done with her yet!! Today she was suppose to be coming home. What a miracle, I thank the Lord that he allowed me to see his mighty work. So our first week home it was spent at the funeral home and also the hospital. Then we took a small week of just catching up in the office, and we just couldn't continue with doing nothing, oh no, we needed more work. So we began really working on the Sunday School hall way and some of the class rooms. Scott is trying really hard to get it all finished before Missions Conference, which by the way a week from tomorrow. Just one more thing to add to our list. Those last minute things to take care of. I sometimes think that those are the hardest ones to take care of.

It may sound like I am complaining, but really I am grateful that the Lord has place me in the position of serving him. I have been given the opportunity to begin a Kings Kids program on Wednesday nights, and I am also teaching a Sunday School Class. It is great to be able to touch kids lives again. I have missed working with the teens, and I may be working with those who are a lot younger, but really I am looking forward to really building relationships with all of these kids. I have already seen two of the kids whom I believe are ready to seek the Lord for His salvation. It's really amazing that you can see the Holy Spirit working in their faces as they think about what your teaching them. What awesome gift God gives us in allowing us to have a part in showing someone the road that leads to HIM! I just pray that I don't fail, and that I don't ever back down from what they are truly needing to hear! Jesus loves them and He died for their small souls just as much as he did for those of us who are adults and we take it for granted! Except we come to him as a little child!

Enough rambling! Scott is taking pictures of the halls and class rooms that are being changed, so sometime in the near future, we will post them, and let y'all see what God has allowed us to do with his church!

For he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings and they that are with him are called, and chosen and faithful. Revelation 17:14b

Senior's Lunch

We had our first Seniors Lunch today. Whew! What a wild time we had. There is certainly still a lot of life left in this bunch. We enjoyed a delicious meal, some good singing, and some fun fellowship. We talked briefly about a name for the group. We haven't decided on one yet but the name "Fruit Loops" did come up!? Also, we discussed some activities and ministry projects we would like to accomplish together. Overall, it was a grand time. I can't wait till next month! Here are a few shots of the day.

Don't ask about the last one---Miss Charlene was in a zone.

God Bless and have a great day.

Let me leave you with a verse I shared with our Seniors today:
Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being ensamples to the flock. 1 Pet 5:3 (KJV)

Our Travels

Here are a couple shots from the Brookshires' Wildlife Museum

we went to see with Mom and Dad

Here are a couple shots from the Rose Garden in Tyler

This week we are in the middle of our Vision Building School. It is going great. I will report back later and put in a couple photos of the fun and development.

Here are a few verses I want to share with our folks tonight:

1 Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! 2 It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard: that went down to the skirts of his garments; 3 As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there the LORD commanded the blessing, even life for evermore.

-Psalm 133:1-3 (KJV)

We're doing Fine!

We are doing fine! We have been visiting with Scott's parents. We did some site seeing while they were here. We went to the Brookshire Museum, the Rose Garden in Tyler, and also the Board Walk in Sherveport, LA. I think that we all enjoyed our time together! We also got in a couple of card games, which we won't mention who won. It was an ugly time when it came to that!!! We have some photo's I will have Scott post those soon! We still didn't get around to seeing the Oil Museum, maybe sometime in the future!

We went last weekend to check on a camp, that has been given to the Temple Baptist Church & Clarence Sexton, to run. The camp's name is Independent Baptist Youth Camp. It was a very encouraging time for both of us. Scott was not able to get peace about what camp to send the kids to camp this year, so they didn't get the opportunity to go. We have been praying that the Lord would direct us to the camp He wanted us to attend. After the meeting it truly felt like we had an answer to prayer! The philosophy is what we want our kids to be exposed to, and Pastor Sexton, wants camp to always be an uplifting place for our kids to be at. We sure do miss the camp that we were attending in Georgia! Venture of Faith was our answer to prayer in Florida and we're praying this camp will be the same for us here!! One of the great things is that the camp is only 3 to 4 hours away from us! Less travel time. Also it's close enough that we can take the teens and juniors on seperate weeks. We're already heard from one of our teens that teens going by themselves was going to be fun! Anyway that was truly and encouragement to both of us!

We are having a "VBS" this week, and no it's not Vacation Bible School. We're having Vision Building School. We will all sit down together and share what we want to have the church do to reach our community, but how we can also help each other have a closer walk with the Lord. Where do you want to see your church in 5, 10, 15, 20, 25 years from now. We want the kids to realize that this is their church as well, and their opions really do matter! We're both very excited about what this can do for our church! But more importantly it has potenial of bringing us all closer to the Lord if we will allow that to happen!

Next month we will have one of our teens going off to college, the church will really miss having her, around all the time. We are all excited about her desire to attend Champion, and we're all excited to see how her life will change because of this step away from home, and what she is really comfortable with. She will do wonderfully! So pray for Donna, and also her parents, their nest will be empty, so just keep the whole family in prayer!

Scott and I will be celebrating 21 years of marriage next month also! Boy, it seems like only yesterday, we were those two young kids walking down the isle, our life truly has changed since then! The Lord has truly blessed our lives together! We have done some really fun things together, and the Lord has moved us all over, but we've been together so it couldn't have been any better! I am thankful that God allowed the two of us to be together all these years, I am grateful for the wonderful loving husband, who really loves the Lord, and really wants to please Him! I have the BEST HUSBAND in the whole world!

Enough of the running on! Keep us in your prayers, we're going to start working on the Church some more next month, we need to start on the Sunday School areas and get those cleaned up and up to date! More work, it shouldn't take long, but it will be exciting to get it all finished! So keep checking back, I am sure Scott will post those pics. also!

Well, it has been a while since either one of us have said anything on here! Yes, we are alive and we are doing well. We have been doing the normal things in life, of work and church! Sunday, we had a wonderful day! One of our largest crowds and there wasn't a special occasion, and the kids were not doing anything special, the Lord just blessed us with a full house and it was great! We also had two more families join our church, what a blessing, we are growing! We had a meeting for the whole church last night, the men had a meeting and the women had "Ladies Nite Out" (our monthly ladies meeting) there were 24 people that came out and we had a table of desserts, for everyone to share when the meetings were over!

We're really learning to enjoy East Texas, and we are so excited about the time when we can move over to Kilgore!! No Longview, is not that far away, but we want to be closer to the church, and the community. We're learning Kilgore pretty well, we know Longview very well, just ask, we can tell you where just about any store or restaurant are, Not that we should, but we can find the food!! But, we still have 6 months on our lease, we're hoping that we will be able to find something here in town when the time arises!

We will begin working some more on the church again soon!! We want to get the halls and classrooms painted and new carpet put down. We would also like to put a kitchen in the other building, and continue using the large room for the fellowship hall. It won't be a complete kitchen at first, but as time goes on we will do all the necessary work and get it finished. We are so excited about what the Lord is doing here, and the renewing spirit that is taking place. In the buildings, but most especially in our hearts!

We serve a Mighty God and He is worthy of our praise!!!

Whew!

It has been busy. I'm sorry I don't have any photos to post, but there has been a lot going on. (I will hopefully, Lord willingly, get some new pics soon.) Anyway, since we moved into the new Auditorium for Easter Sunday we have been a little busy. On Saturday, April 25th we had a open house for the church. We wanted to "open" the church to the public. Come see what was done and meet the new pastor. This has been something I have been planning since day one. We put a big ad in the newspaper, we advertised all over town, we rented a sno-cone machine, popcorn machine and had helium balloons. We put together packets to hand out about the church, upcoming events and even some candy inside. Well the day was great! I can't say we had a huge number of visitors, but folks were aware that something new was happening. We waved at every car that came by for about 3 hours solid. We held up signs inviting them to come. Like I said a few stopped by. It was a big boost for our people. They really enjoyed the idea of making us so "Public". We have met some folks on visitation since then that have said, "Yes, you are the church that had the open house and has a new pastor. We want to get by and visit." Who knows what will become of all of it. Also, we must have let 100 balloons go that day with tracts inside. Good day. I believe the Lord did bless and will continue to bless.

Also, we were able to have a week long revival with Daniel Hawtree, May 3-8. What a great meeting we had. The Lord was so good. Sunday started with a big day in attendance and I was so excited to see one of our teenage van riders get saved. He had no doubt Jesus had come into his heart. I ask him if died right now where would he go, he said "I know I am going to heaven when I die because I just got saved Pastor Scott." Amen. The rest of the week was just as great. I have been preaching on being prepared for revival for several weeks and I believe our folks were truly ready for and expecting revival. The messages all week were very effective. Several of the members have told me that have moved closer to God because of the revival. Praise The Lord.

On the personal side, Becky and I are doing great. We are longing more and more to get moved into Kilgore. It is very difficult trying to minister from out of town. We just want to be closer to the church and the people. God is good. He will provide for us. We are just anxious I guess. Otherwise, we are fine. Like I said we have been busy. I am excited about the warmer weather and longer days. I can get in some evening visits. Becky is enjoying the warm weather and the beautiful colors of spring and early summer.

I will go. Lord willingly, some pics to come soon. God bless and I will leave you with a thought from Bro. Daniel's message on prayer:

Ask--Seek--Knock.

7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:8 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. Matthew 7:7-8 (KJV)

We Made It!!

We made it!! We got back into the new remodeled auditorium for Easter Sunday. We worked hard and long for several days, but we made it. It was so exciting to be finished (Well, with this project anyway). What a great day we had! We had another record day--84 and we got to use the new van to pick up kids. Amen!

Anyway, I have some photos of the final product, but I must say the pictures don't do it justice. You need to come see it for yourself (Hint-Hint). It looks great! Thanks for all the prayers and support from all. We couldn't have made it with out you.

Hope everyone had a great Easter.

We love and miss you all! God Bless.

And as they were afraid, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, Saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.

Luke 24:5-7 (KJV)

Praise The Lord!!

We have much to Praise The Lord about.

The Lord has done so much for us in the last couple of weeks:

1

We are almost finished (I use that term loosely, this is only phase 1 of at least 4) with the remodel of the auditorium. After many, many hours of work, (including about 12 hours on Saturday for most of the men) we are almost there and holding while they install the carpet. We will make a mad dash this weekend to finish all the details before Sunday. We are all looking forward to having Easter in the new sanctuary. Praise The Lord!

2
We were able to buy a "new" van for the Church. It is a 2002 Chevy Express. It is in great condition. We are thrilled to be able to get it. The old van is....well,...old and wore out. We can still use it around town, but not for any trip. This is such a blessing. We have been praying about a van since we arrived. However, with all the remodel that was needed, the funds just weren't going to be there for awhile. Anyway, a foundation in town distributes grants to local non-profit organizations. To make a long story short, we petitioned for a grant and after much prayer and "worry" we received a check in the mail for $5,000.00! Praise The Lord!! The funny part of the story is that after about 10 days from presenting our need and proposal to the board. I told Becky while driving to church one day, "I sure would like to get a response from the foundation." It wasn't an hour later when I was in the Church discussing the remodel with my deacon when Becky tapped me on the shoulder and handed me an envelope. When I saw who it was from I was scared to open it. Needless to say I was thrilled when I opened it and saw the check. God Is Good. He uses many things to supply our needs. Well, from the grant and some other money that was given we were able to pick up the van at a good price.

3

Becky and I and our other nature lovers Paul & Betsy were able to steal away last Friday for a couple hours to see the beautiful azaelas. Tyler, a town near by, has an "Azaela Trail" that you can follow in your car and also walk through some beautiful gardens. We were a tad late in the season, due to our busy schedules, but they were still just as beautiful. Praise The Lord for His Beauty and good friends to share it with!

God has been so good. May I close with these good verses:

Praise ye the LORD. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise him in the firmament of his power. Praise him for his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent greatness.

Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and harp.

Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and organs.

Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.

Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD. Praise ye the LORD.

Psalm 150:1-6 (KJV)

Hangin Rock

We got started on hanging drywall this past week. It is going well. We should have it all up by the end of the week. The men are working so hard. We are having another work day this Saturday. We still have lots to do. The time of fellowship while working has been so sweet. The folks are all thrilled about getting it all "New" again. Becky & I are thrilled too. It is fun to serve the Lord.

Anyway, here are a few new shots to show the progress:

This past Sunday was a exciting day also. We had our highest attendance since I have been pastor. We had 76 in attendance and on Sunday Night we had 58. The Spirit was good and folks have been seeing some prayers answered. This coming Sunday we will have to put out a few more chairs in our temporary auditorium and move the wall back a little. Amen!

Lead me, O LORD, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies;

make thy way straight before my face.

Psalm 5:8 (KJV)

Construction Begins

Construction or should I say "Destruction" begins. We started this past week on the remodel project. Saturday we had a big work day. Most of the guys started working in the auditorium and the ladies got our "new" temporary auditorium ready. We have worked a few nights also this week on demolition. There is no turning back now!!

How Fun!

Before

During

The Temporary Auditorium (In the School Building)

We had our first service in the school on Sunday 3/8. It was really exciting. I have been preaching on our themes of Building Faith, Family and Future. I finished up last week talking about the family and was able to begin this week with Building our Future. I preached a sermon from Joshua 3:5. It was called The Future Is Bright. We had a great day. The service went great, the spirit was good and we had a family visit. God Is Good!

And Joshua said unto the people, Sanctify yourselves:

for to morrow the LORD will do wonders among you.

Joshua 3:5 (KJV)

Our Chairs Are Here!!

Yesterday our chairs arrived!

We ordered 150 new sanctuary chairs. They are a beautiful burgundy color. We will have our last service in the "old" auditorium this Sunday-3/1. While we are remodeling the auditorium we will be meeting in the school building. There is lots to be done. There will be many more pictures to follow to show all the work being done. But this is phase one--comfortable chairs to use while in the temporary auditorium and then transfered into the new beautiful auditorium for lots of versatile comfortable seating. Praise the Lord!

Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.

Proverbs 29:1818 (KJV)

Flags, Friends & Flowers

The city puts flags up on certain propertys for a few selected holidays. So, in honor of Presidents' Day, they put up a couple on the church property. Very nice.

We got a few flowers planted in the planter box.

We had a great time at our Sweetheart Banquet on Valentine's Day.

Here are a couple shots of a few of the games.

Not too bad looking of a couple. (She's cute anyway!)

On Monday, Paul and Betsy Robertson (a sweet couple from our church) took Becky and I to the most incredible place. It is called Ms. Lea's Garden. It is gorgeous!!! The family owns about 1000 acres and several years ago they planted a train box car load of daffodils on the property. They are everywhere. I must have taken 75 photos or so. Like I said it is beautiful, but these pictures don't do it justice.

May I leave you with these words:

O LORD, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches.--Psalm 104:24 (KJV)