Week 2 at FamilyLife

We finished up our second week which proved to be much more productive with the completion of editing 8 FamilyLife Today programs. A 3 minute clip of each day will be posted on the web site 2 weeks before the program so people will get a flavor of what the program is about. The next 2 weeks will be a little slow because of Christmas and New Years. We are building edit suites next to our studio so we can be in the same general area all the time.

The girls continued in home school and reached their Christmas break on Friday. Charlotte continues to settle in meeting many people at FamilyLife. She was able to participate in a Ornament exchange at FamilyLife, the Christmas Party and received a home visit from 4 women at the ministry. We are seeing God orchestrate all the events to help us continue to fit in to this new phase of life God has called us to.

Hal

We began our ministry at FamilyLife

I guess it is about time for an update, much has taken place about a month early. I started work at FamilyLife on Monday and I was able to use those God given talents immediately. The first day I was able to help a co-worker with a Photoshop question, and today I will be helping another with Photoshop.

As for the video department (which is why we are at FamilyLife) I do my first shoot today and the projection is, we will save about 8 hours of editing time a week because I can use my directing skills immediately. God has put us in the right place at the right time.

Now, why am I at FamilyLife a month early? God blessed us with the completion of our support (2% from finishing) in the past few weeks. We did adjust some things, which made it possible to be this close and to minister now and our FamilyLife coaches gave us the 'go ahead' to begin work over the weekend. Thanks Tom! The first day was a little overwhelming looking at all the projects that need completion, but we will be able to knock a few out pretty quick.

Charlotte is still trying to get the house in order and do Christmas all at the same time. We still can't find a few of our Christmas lights, so another trip to the store. Many trips to Home Depot and Lowes to change a few things to our house to make it a home. I put mini binds up on the kitchen window last night, it really helped dress up the kitchen a little.

Charlotte and the girls went to Tulsa last week to see the dentist and connect the girls with some of their friends. That was good for everyone, but Amy is seeing Tulsa drift into her past.

The girls are doing great at home school, and Kristi's basketball team is really good. Their average point spread is over 50 points per game. This gives Kristi plenty of playing time, she scored 10 last night. Amy is busy cooking desserts and would do 2 or 3 a day if we let her, she did a pumpkin pie on Monday.

God has been gracious to us this past month with all the changes and getting settled in, we are in awe.

Hal

November News

The November newsletter is available on the left panel. It has been such an exciting month to see how God is confirming over and over our call to minister at FamilyLife.

Thankful

Hal is back in Tulsa to finish the last 8% of our monthly support. We have so much to be thankful for this month, from the 7% new monthly support, to our move to Little Rock, that Charlotte and the girls could remain in Little Rock to get settled in, and for all the prayer behind our transition into full time ministry.

Made it to Little Rock

We had a quick closing in Tulsa, finished loading the trucks and hit the road at 12:15p. We arrived in Little Rock about 4:45p and met two of our neighbors. Kristi checked in at DSW shoes, which is where she worked in Tulsa and she was able to transfer to the Little Rock store. After that we picked up the washer and dryer and met a potential ministry partner. Had dinner with the Murray's and made it to bed by 10. Now the big part comes today, empty the truck.

Our Tulsa friends, Forrest & Nina Cowan, that came with us were such a help leaving and getting to Little Rock. Poor Forrest, he drove the truck and was beat by the time we arrived. He said he has never used side mirrors so much and been so tense when driving. I can understand that since this was a 24' truck with a 13' 1" clearance. Thanks Forrest.

We have some friends coming from FamilyLife to help unload, and my new coworker came down with the flu and can't help. (just trying to get out of unloading :-) ) More tomorrow . . .

Hal

Leaving for Little Rock

We close on our Broken Arrow home this morning and drive to Little Rock (4 hrs.) to move into our new (to us, 1971) home tomorrow. The Lord provided the needed percentage of support from a dear friend from our California days so Charlotte and the girls can officially remain in Little Rock while Hal finishes connecting with the remaining 8% of needed partners in Tulsa over the next month.
If you have a second, check out Ex 15:11, our God is GREAT!

Hal

Little Rock, Here we come!

Much has happened since our last entry. We have reached 87% of our financial support with only 13% left. The moving truck and all of the preparation that led up to it was completed yesterday with the help of many friends and some of 20+ age group men to move the piano.

We head for Little Rock in the morning to begin a new chapter in our lives. We are so thankful for everyone who was praying for us this past week as we had some challenges to overcome, which the Lord provided in His timing. We learned once again to patiently wait on the Lord.

Please pray with us for 2 good home closings and a safe trip.

God's Hand at Work

I have decided to try to document as many of "God's Orchestrations" on this post for the next six weeks so we have a record of what God is doing in the final stages of our move to FamilyLife. When we accepted the contract on the house we agreed that the next six weeks would have to be directed 100% by God.

• Sept. 18 - Offer accepted on the sale of Tulsa house on Hal's dad's 80th birthday
• Sept. 21 - FamilyLife receives news
• Sept. 22 - FamilyLife presents the idea of house hunting even though we were not at 90% support. Since we are so close to Little Rock physically, they felt it would be a good time to find a home, and close on both homes at the same time and make one move to Little Rock instead of multiple moves or storage.
  The inspection on our Tulsa home happened today with no problems.
• Sept. 23 - God chose our realtor in Little Rock! One of our FamilyLife friends recommended the realtor they just used two weeks ago and were thrilled with. Before contacting him, Charlotte wanted to get the name of a realtor Dave Ramsey recommends. You guessed it, it was same name. God is so good to us; we are in awe.
  
• Sept. 24 - FamilyLife gives us Oct 1 to be in the office for meetings with HR and other interviews. Because of this date not being earlier or later than Oct 1, two other events fell into place. Hal's parents left for Chicago on Sept. 30, which Hal had forgotten (bad son) and return the day after we returned to Tulsa on Oct 5. Therefore, if we had gone earlier in the week, Hal's parents would have had to find another ride to the airport from our house. Then, since we will be in Little Rock on Oct. 2, Kristi was able to attend a retreat with the HomeEd Seniors in Little Rock, their first event of the year. Hopefully, she will feel more a part of the group in Little Rock after meeting some new friends. If we went to Little Rock later or earlier than Oct. 1, this would never have happened.
  
• Sept 25 - Updating the blog while being totally blown away at what God is doing already and beginning to see why God's plan was to keep us in Tulsa past September.
• Sept 28 - Received the inspection report back on the house, only four minor things to address. The builder of our home of 16 years, Jim Kelley, recommended an electrician to use, and he was available first thing Tuesday morning. We, also, confirmed staying with our friends the Murrays, in Little Rock instead of a hotel. Late tonight we receive an email from the home school basketball coach inviting Kristi to be on the team in Little Rock. This is huge for Kristi, since this is what she loves to do, and it will be an opportunity to connect with other girls her age and make new friends. Pray that Kristi and Alison (from another new FamilyLife family whose daughter is also a senior) will hit it off. Alison is struggling with the move to Little Rock.
• Sept 29 - The tears of joy are flowing today and I struggle writing this update, as I am totally overwhelmed with God's goodness. This morning the four items on the inspectors punch list to fix on our house were done in 30 minutes, and one item didn't even need attention after all. About 11:15 am, Kristi returns a call from the home school basketball coach in Little Rock and this is her Facebook post: "Ahhhhh! I'm officially on a bball team in little rock!!!!" God is taking care of our children in making this adjustment to a new life away from Tulsa.An hour later I'm sitting at lunch with our new pastor from Tulsa Bible Church sharing all these exciting things God is doing in our lives, and the Lord touches the heart of one of our friends to partner with us monthly, which I received in an email after I returned from lunch. See why it's a good 'cry' day?!
  My coach at FamilyLife sent this to me today, which is so appropriate right now - "Who among the gods is like you, O LORD ? Who is like you— majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?" Ex 15:11 I think this will be our verse for this phase of watching God put our partner team together.
• Sept. 30 - Traveled to Little Rock to meet with FamilyLife and look for our new home. We had about 12 homes we had found on the internet to give to our realtor. We left Tulsa a little behind schedule, stopped in Fort Smith to see some former TBC friends, the Gustafsons, for dinner and arrived in Little Rock about 9:45p.
• Oct. 1 - We headed to FamilyLife about 8:45 to hand off the girls to Trish Tully who has a daughter Amy's age. Met with the VP of HR, my boss, the department I was to be working in and my boss's boss. We both came away from the day with way too many emotions for a blog, but were happy since they started seeing Hal as someone who could fill more than just a video role (graphic design and internet design, also) and a little sad since we had never considered the question, "So what if you don't find a home this weekend?". In our wildest dreams, we had never considered the fact we may not find a home, we just knew God would find us the house He wanted us to have.
  That evening, we had a great dinner and fellowship with one of my new co-workers, the Timmers, and they showed us around Maumelle, only to find another home to add to our list. After leaving the Timmers, we headed out into the 'sticks' to pick Kristi up from her first B-ball practice. Now for all the Tulsa people, let me put this into perspective on distance and time: TBC to Claremore, but half of this was a dark, tree lined, country road. We were able to watch Kristi practice for about a half hour, met her coaches, some dads and found out that two of them attend The Bible Church of Little Rock. Kristi practiced for 4 hours and was exhausted by 9:30, but happy that she not only could practice, but met a new group of great girls.
  
• Oct. 2 - We have finally reached the day we have been waiting months for and a long two weeks from the initial day our Tulsa house sold. We dropped Kristi off to spend the day with the home school seniors, some who she played B-ball with the night before, and then headed off to meet the realtor. Upon our initial meeting, 2 or 3 of the homes we had picked had been sold or had a contract in the past few days, including one we have had our eye on since April. Obviously, it was not the one God had picked for us. Also, the realtor had found a couple of homes we had either not seen or did not meet our parameters. Some of our parameters included making sure my dad could have access to the house without stairs (a little difficult in an area of mostly hills). We headed out about 10:30 on a trek we thought would last most of the day. Home after home, Charlotte and I either saw extremely bad conditions or knew it would be too much work to fix up. One home didn't even have a workable eating area. Pictures on the internet are so deceiving. The last home we came to was the last one in the area that would put us within that 15 min. commute to work we desired, We have a new home! God showed us, over the next 24-48 hours, so clearly that this was the home for us, just as we asked God to do. After spending close to 3 hours looking, analyzing, etc., we decided we needed to at least feed Amy, who had been along with us and see the house out of commute range. It was a lovely home from an interior designer's point of view, but not really workable for my dad and too far to the office. We then decided to go back and take a second look at the only home which met most of our parameters and was the nicest one we had seen all day. We spent the next hour going over everything we could think of to make sure this was God's house for us. We put an offer on the house within our parameters, offering them $9K less than their original listing. If they were not interested with that price, they would have two options: kill the offer or counter. They were interested! We now had to wait until noon on Saturday to get the answer.
  We then headed out to have dinner with the Tully family (our coaches throughout this whole process of moving into ministry, and had a great meal and fellowship.
• Oct. 3 - Before noon our realtor called with the news. The seller countered with a reasonable offer, but we felt it should be better (let God prove to us a little more that this is the right house knowing all the time, the offer could fall through). A little side note, we have such a little amount of faith it scares me sometimes. We countered back with an offer that took more off the price and other minor changes. They countered back later in the afternoon with a deal we could not have negotiated ourselves. They backed off the initial asking price over $5K, picked up some of the closing costs we asked for and didn't even blink on the closing date we had given them with the stipulation they would have to vacate on the day of closing also, which our realtor said "it's not done that way in Arkansas".
  Lining up the inspection was the last part of this weekend we had asked God to put into place so we would know beyond a shadow of a doubt this was the one He had picked. We called the first 2 inspectors the realtor recommended and they were not available. The last name we had was one that a few of our FamilyLife friends had just used to inspect their homes, and you guessed it, he could meet us Monday morning at 8:30 so we could walk the house with him. Is God good? He is awesome!
• Oct 4 - The inspection happened as planned and a list of about 20 items was assembled. It was recommended that we have a structural engineer look at some settling on the west side of the house which meant we had to wait another day. (God felt we needed more patience.) We headed back to Tulsa to wait.
  
• Oct 5 - We contacted a structural engineer and he verified what the inspector had assumed, the movement was over 15 years ago and had not moved since and it probably won't move any more. So, on Nov. 3 we close on the house in Little Rock and move our stuff. The plan is to return to Tulsa to finish the remaining percentage of our support. We will find a place in Tulsa to call a temporary home, so where or how this will happen is only God.
  
  Hal
  
  
  

Our Home Sold

We don't know where to begin with this post, so much has happened in the last week, so how about the beginning. Two weeks ago we had a 'looker' at an open house on Sunday. Monday they want a second look and utility bills. Wednesday is the third look and a contract. The offer was very bad, so we countered back with the original amount of sale and a couple other tweaks. The buyers counter came back this time with only a $1000 reduction in price. So on Friday, (my Dad's 80th birthday the Lord sold our house. Wow!

The buyer set a closing date of Nov. 2 which gives us 6 weeks to wrap everything up. Knowing that God will orchestrate everything, Hal called FamilyLife with the good news. Since then we have received the approval to come look at homes in Little Rock and try to move right after closing on Nov. 2. We will go to Little Rock on Oct 1 to look for a new home. God already has the right house for us, hopefully within 10-15 minutes of FamilyLife.

Pray that we find our home quick, the seller will accept our offer, and we can close the beginning of November. Pray also that the remaining 19% of our support comes in quickly because Hal will have to come back to Tulsa to finish if we do not have 100%. That means that even though we are in Little Rock, Hal cannot start serving until that goal is met. We need about 20 to 'partner with us in the gospel' at $100 or 40 at $50 or any other combination. We are also looking for more prayer warriors.

Exciting days are ahead as we see God's hand at work every day.

Hal

New Family Picture

It was really funny on Tuesday, we needed to take a new picture for our church's mission conference of just the part of our family going to Little Rock. Our son Jon just started taking pictures without poses, positioning, etc. and we just had a great time laughing at some of the shots. This picture ended up being the best one of 120 pictures. Did Jon go crazy? Yes! This was also probably one of the least stressful times we have ever had taking pictures except for the mosquitoes. It was fun!

Hal

September Begins

We started the month of September with a bang. Seven appointments in the first week, but week two has zero so far. We are starting to reach outside of Tulsa Bible Church for the remaining support. Pray with us that we will be able to reach the 5% needed this month.

Hal

Great News!

The end August has arrived. We have been blessed beyond measure throughout this month; we celebrated 34 years of marriage, mom celebrated her 80th, a new church is supporting us as missionaries, and what many of you have prayed for, a 5% increase in support came in at 4.75%. Please continue to pray that the momentum that has started will continue throughout the fall. We officially end the month with 77.5% of our financial support reached. We are anticipating the day we report to FamilyLife and begin the work God has called us to.

Hal

Church Support

A small church had decided to support us monthly, this is so cool since this is only the second church along with TBC. God has been so faithful in providing 72% of our support from individuals like you. We are forever thankful. "God is good all... the time, all the time God is good". (noted quote from Marshall Gordon)

Hal

God will bless us if we let Him

God has a sense of humor! When we finally get off ourselves and our abilities, He surprises us with something wonderful.

I am on a youth retreat with TBC at a camp called New Life Ranch. God's creation is everywhere and it is impossible to say 'there is no god', He is everywhere. After opening games and orientation for the kids, they had free time to get snacks from the store. As I picked up a candy bar for myself and Amy, I sat down with some adult friends to catch up. As we are sitting there the wife pops up with "we sent our first support check before we left". That may not sound all that special, but we met with them over a year ago to share the ministry and at that time they were gracious to share a one time gift with us, but were unable to help monthly. Now a year later, during a really low week connecting with people, hitting an all time high amount of folks saying 'no', calling on the Lord for His help, and He brings a monthly supporter out of the blue. God loves to bless us when we get off ourselves.

I was reading through "Leadership as an Identity" by Crawford Loritts this week. Throughout this book he keeps going over the fact that God can only use leaders who let God lead and stop using their own abilities to lead. That has really played out this weekend after a week of trying to do ministry myself.

Hal

Eureka Springs

It's that time of the year Charlotte & I get away to be alone to celebrate our wedding day 34 years ago. Time has flown so fast, but it doesn't feel like yesterday every time I look at our kids and how old they have a way of reminding us that it has been a few years. What a blessing to be married to the same woman and have all six children together. This again is another reminder why God has called us to FamilyLife.

Charlotte saw in the Tulsa World Tuesday the list of marriages and divorces. The list went something like this:
9 marriages, 9 divorces requested, and 8 divorces granted. No longer are 50% ending in divorce based on this list, twice as many are getting divorced than getting married. Where is the family going and where is God going along with it? All the more reason for Christians to help those who have struggling marriages by inviting them to a Weekend to Remember.

Hal