Fall Fun - Catching Up

Calvin having fun with the Princess Leia wig!

Ellerie's turn...

The Crew on Fall Festival - Candy night!

Yoda carrying his Lightning McQueen car.

Annakin

Princess Leia - with her gun in her holster and baby on her hip!

Sweet friends!

More friends...

Coleman and Ellerie in the leaves (if you can see her)...

Emmie

Dad and Calvin

A New Home

The last couple of weeks have been hard for my our family. (Well, the kids have been spared most of the heartache so far). The story began three years ago when God clearly called us to help plant a reformed Bible-teaching, expository-preaching church in this area. During these past three years, the biggest blessing has been to see how God has grown my husband and refined his gifts in the area of leadership, particularly in the service of teaching and preaching.

One of the greatest joys has been the strengthening and deepening of Christian friendships. True friends have been the ones who have pointed us toward Christ, encouraged us in the hard times, and stood by us when no one else did. I am thankful for these type of relationships which speak Truth to us (not just what we want to hear) and challenge us to be more like Christ.

During the last year there has been some tension among the leadership of our church about the job responsibilities of church planting leadership. Through a long series of unfortunate circumstances, we saw that in order to protect the body from division, it would be best for us to step down and find another place of worship. (If anyone has questions for us, we are more than willing to talk with you in private).

This decision has been hard and is grieving our hearts but at the same time we feel a peace about this new direction for our family. All along, our desire has been to bring glory to God with our lives. Is there regret? Not at all! We have seen God working in many ways the last three years. Our comfort has been that our service is not for any man, not even for the church, but for Him!

So now we begin the journey of looking for a new church home. Read here to find out how our first day went…

The Church

Today, while reading "Women's Ministry in the Local Church", I read this quote by Ligon Duncan:

"The Bible is to have a controlling influence in our lives and in our ministry in the local church ... The people and the house we serve are not ours; they are His. It is vital that we live and minister in accordance with His Book. This is completely counterintuitive in our pragmatic culture. We want to minister our way. We want to set up our own rules and define the game plan. But Paul emphasizes that if we are to grow in grace as a congregation, if we are to be what He has called us to be, we have to live and minister according to the Book."

Pumpkin Patch Pictures

Back in October we went to the local pumpkin patch for a hayride, a straw maze and pumpkin picking! Here are some pics...Ellerie - "I can get it ..."

Calvin - 'this will work but...'

'I'd rather have this one!'

Coleman on the hayride...

Emmie in the straw maze

Let's try for a group shot...

Ok - let's try again...

Alright - one more time.

Work with me people!

All the VA cousins...