Holidays!!!

It's been a long time I know!! With school started along with everything else, we are even busier!
Thanksgiving has passed and Christmas is fast approaching.I'm still trying to figure out where the first part of 2010 went. Time is sure flying.We celebrate not only Christmas in the coming month, but also our second year with LBC! These two years have been great! We've seen spiritual and physical growth and it has blessed our hearts tremendously! We love our church! During the month of October, we had meals brought to us every Monday and Tuesday night of the month in honor of Pastor appreciation month. We were feeling (and still feel) very overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and respect shown to us during that time. We definitely feel loved and appreciated ALL the time! We have people that are so good to us, and we feel so undeserving. We feel so priviledged to be part of such a wonderful group of people! Thanks to all of you who have been part of making our first 2 years in the ministry so wonderful! We look forward to another beautiful Christmas season with our folks at Liberty! Love you all! Please be sure to join us for our Christmas Banquet @ Bethelwoods on Dec. 11. The signup sheet is on the bulletin board in the sanctuary ;)

Blessed Hope Youth Conference in Arkansas

What an awesome time at this youth conference!! We were able to see old friends, meet new friends, and most importantly, hear some fabulous preaching from great men of God. They challenged us to be totally committed to serving Christ. One of our very own said he knew that the Lord wanted him to do something, he just didn't know what, and asked for prayers as he tried to figure out what Gods will was for his life.
Our teens participated in an ensemble and quartet competition, both of which they placed 3rd in ( not bad seeing this was our first year competing! ) and by the second day, they were already talking about how they couldnt wait to go back next year! Blessed Hopes (SC) teens also participated in quartets, where they placed 2nd, as well as Zach Brackett in the instrumental, placing 2nd!! and Brad Hanke, and Zach Brackett in the preacher boy contest, placing 1st and 2nd!! I was so proud of our teens for their efforts. I hope to see some of LBC's boys in that preacher boy contest next year!!
Our goal for taking them was this: Our life is about more than what we may consider comfort. It's about more than what we view as a difference of opinion, etc. It's about what we can do to give back to our Lord, who by the way, gave up all comfort to come to this world to die for us. Think about what He went through...do you for one moment think He cared that He had to walk in the dust, sleep on the ground, (with NO air condition might I add)or depend on the kindness of strangers for food? He had a goal. To seek and to save that which was lost. And He was totally committed. We may not be the Billy Grahams of our day, or the CH Spurgeons of our day, but can't we at least be committed to living for God? That's the LEAST I can do. We let our everyday comforts spoil us and get in the way of our spiritual goal. How will we act when some of our comforts are taken away for the cause of Christ? Will we spend more time complaining and pouting? Or will we focus on the commitment at hand?

Here we go!

Well, we are officially fulltime in the ministry! Exciting AND scary! I am so proud of Matthew and the job that he has done as pastor of LBC. He has shown strength, commitment, endurance, compassion, need I go on? All of which I knew he was capable of, but to what extent caught me by surprise. He is truly one of a kind and I am honored that I get to walk by his side through this ministry. We as a family have been shown overwhelming support, for which we are grateful. We truly are blessed with a remarkable church family. I pray that the Lord gives us a long and fruitful ministry, and that we always keep our eyes on Him. Please pray for us, that we will both be what the Lord would have us to be. And also continue to pray for LBC, that God would continue to bless, and that our people would keep their eyes on Jesus as well. With our eyes on Him, we cannot go astray!

SummerTime and Changes

Wow! Summer is officially HERE! We have already been busy with cookouts, mini-vacation, and getting ready to gear up for a busy busy time at church!!
June starts our youth month, which is kicked off by Graduation/Promotion Sunday. Always a fun day! The Pastor has a special theme each Sunday this month pertaining to the youth of our church, with the last Sunday of the month being the finale,and extremely awesome might I add! We will also introduce some changes this month along with promotions...new sunday school classes, new teachers, new wednesday night programs....(Patch the Pirate, YAY!!)Oh..and the preacher starts his first day as a FULLTIME pastor on June 11!!!!!!!! The Lord has allowed us to enter into the fulltime ministry, for which we are excited,yet nervous, and grateful, yet humbled! Our church family has rallied behind us and supported us 110% in this endeavor, and with their help and of course with God leading the way, we are going to make LBC the best church we possibly can!( I personally think it's already the best church around ;) I'm so excited about how it's growing, and how people are on fire for the Lord. We have people wanting to do things, wanting to work, and stay busy for the Lord. We have ministries popping up all over the place!! We have recently put into place a care team,which has been constantly in motion since the start about a month ago...we have a maintenance team that will hopefully be in motion SOON because the good Lord knows it's needed!!!!!!! We have folks interested in starting a senior ministry, we have people working with our youth, our kids, young adults, you name it and it seems we have people wanting to do, or are already doing it! It's amazing, and I just hope that the Lord allows it to continue.
July is also a very busy month...the busiest for us by far. We have VBS seeing June out and welcoming in July, our big 4th of July Bang on the Sunday evening of the 4th, kids camp in Cameron SC, teen camp in Arkansas, AND LBC's Second Annual Camp Meeting. We have some neat things lined up for the camp meeting this year and the Pastor and I look forward to being able to devote more time to it this year, making it even better than last year, which was a huge success.
August our people (anyone interested) gear up for Summerfest. Last year was our "Prayerfest at Summerfest". We had a tent and passed out tracts and invited people who didnt already have a church home to church, and we gave away 2 bikes. This was the first time that a few of our kids had ever actually put a tract in someones hand. This took courage for them, because if we are honest, it's not easy when you witness to someone for the first time! We were so proud of our kids. We will need volunteers for this again this year, so if you are interested, or if you filled out a commitment card to help with this, get ready!!
September 19th is our Homecoming....and we are thrilled to be here to be a part of it!! This will be a very special day for LBC.

This is of course not everything that will be going on this summer....we always have special events popping up...but listed these just to give you an idea of some of the highlights of the summer.
We are looking forward to it!! We have great people at Liberty....people that want to serve their church and community and as long as this continues, we are bound to keep seeing souls saved as the Lord blesses our efforts!! That's what it's all about-seeing peoples lives changed for eternity...salvation!

The photo to the above right is us at Coastal Light Ind. Baptist Church in Charleston, SC where Brother Meredith Sears is the pastor. We had the priviledge of joining them on Memorial Day Sunday where they had an awesome service dedicated to the military and public servants. He even recognized my hubby as a police officer and presented him with a new testament that was purchased at Ground Zero in New York. We pray for God's blessings on this church and Bro. Sears' family, as this pastor truly has a servants heart and loves the Lord with all of it. We look forward to visiting with them on our next trip to the beautiful city of Charleston!If you are ever in that area, we highly reccommend that you visit them. Great preaching from the Word sure to bless you ...it would definitely be a blessing to them!! We believe that even on vacation, God should still be top priority, and whats 2 hours of your trip? NOT ENOUGH!!

End of School

The end of school is here....and with that, a new beginning! We get to learn how to live as a fulltime pastors family :) My husband asked me this morning, "Where am I going to study this summer with 4 kids running around this house?" Well, first of all hunny, Shelby doesn't run around the house much anymore. She's mostly laying on her bed listening to her ipod, playing games on her ipod, or not here. She really wants a summer job, so I doubt we will have much rowdiness coming from her. Wes and Andy....yes. I can see them still running around, yelling, laughing verrry loudly, throwing things....that might be a problem when trying to study. Gracie? Well, she's Gracie. And along with her comes many many distractions. She just has soooo much to tell. So much. I'll try to limit the sugar and caffeine intake for her as much as possible :) And me.....well I guess I'll be cleaning, cooking, doing what I normally do. But you know, Carowinds season passes would probably come in verrrry handy when trying to study. I'm thinking that would empty the house, making it nice and quiet, thus becoming a study sanctuary! I'm glad I thought of that! Excellent idea. I can really think of no better way at this time to make our home a good habitat for a studying preacher. If I think of a better way, I'll let you know! (but I'm convinced that there is NO better way! ;)

Mothers Day

What a wonderful Mothers Day weekend! We started it off with our Mother's Day Banquet on Saturday. We enjoyed good food, a tribute to mothers, and topped it off with the Mother/Daughter game (played like the Dating Game). I encouraged our moms to raise our children in the admonition of the Lord, not to give up even though we live in a society that discourages the molding of our children. Our mothers that helped out in the tribute were Carolyn Padgett, Becky Shugart, Michelle Terry, Angie Rash, and Stephanie Lingerfelt. I appreciate each of you ladies taking the time to research your given decade, dressing the part and sharing with the rest of us ladies! We loved seeing the different styles of the day, and got quite a few laughs as ladies shared with us a day in their life in the 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's!! I was told that some brought back a lot of memories by bringing up things they hadn't thought about in many years! Stephany Harrison kindly volunteered to be our photographer, and did a brilliant job!! Thanks Steph! And also, many thanks to the ladies that helped prepare, decorate, etc. Couldnt do it without you!

Then the preacher brought a wonderful message yesterday morning on the home, and the mothers role in the home. It makes me want to be a better mother. But not even a mother centered message limits who gets spoken to.....a young man came forward for salvation during the invitation! AMEN!!! What could make a mothers day better than that? We thank God for working in our church. He sure is blessing!!

Thanks to each of you for your faithfulness. Please keep praying daily that God keeps His hand on our church, and that your pastor and I can be what He needs for us to be!

My Testimony

Some of you have already heard my testimony, but I'm going to share it again.

Matthew and I married in May of '93. Both of us were saved at early ages.He had grown up in a preachers home, I grew up in a broken home before moving in with my grandparents who then became my parents. I lived an unfruitfully saved life. (yes, I think I just made that word up!!) Our lives were very very different. I knew that he had been called to be a preacher, and he knew that I didn't want to be a preachers wife. So for many years, I stubbornly refused, using the old "microscope life" as an excuse. The fact is, I was just too selfish to completely turn my life over to God. I was busy doing what I wanted to do. I know that this hurt God and my husband. I just didn't care enough to surrender. I did this for about 12 or 13 years of our marriage, which didn't exactly make our marriage a happy one all the time! This was probably the number one source of arguments between us. I had witnessed what other preachers wives went through and I kept thinking "No way would I willingly do this to myself!" It's funny how the Lord works. I hadn't come to a point where I was thinking, "Ok...maybe"... as a matter of fact, I had pretty much stopped thinking about it. Matthew had grown tired of talking to me about it I suppose, because we didn't really even discuss it anymore. But, one day when I was driving home from work, I was listening to the radio, and a caller had called in and was saying something about her husband, who was a preacher, and that's really all I can remember. The next thing I know, I'm riding down the road crying because I had suddenly realized that my husband should be a preacher. I was so disgusted with myself at that moment, knowing that the only reason he wasn't doing what God had called him to do was because I was standing in his way. I never said anything to him that day... but my heart was so burdened over the next couple of weeks. I knew that the Lord was dealing with me and I felt absolutely horrible. Like the worst wife in the world. I had done absolutely everything possible to keep from becoming a preachers wife, and I now realized that despite all of it, that's what the Lord wanted me to be. I'm not sure how long I went on like this before I finally went to Matthew and told him. I think my words went something like, "Ok....if you still want to be a preacher,I'm ready...." Not exactly convincing, huh? However, those were the hardest words I have ever said. It's funny, because he didn't waste a lot of time before springing on me the fact that not only was he called to be a preacher, but that the Lord had been dealing with him about pastoring. Talk about SCARED! But the Lord had already prepared me. I knew it was coming eventually. It happened so fast. He had been preaching meetings in different churches regularly for a little over a year when he got a call from one of the churches to candidate as pastor. Through this time, and even now, I had so much guilt and heartache over the fact that I had kept Matt from this ministry for so long. The Lord has used him so much already in just over a year that I can't help but wonder how much more could have been accomplished had I not fought for so long. I have often said that I don't know why God was so patient with me. But I know He has a plan that we are a part of. He has blessed us with a church that loves and supports us, and He has blessed me with some godly friends that encourage and help me. It's hard, like I knew it would be sometimes. But there's a peace I now have....and that's knowing that I'm in the center of God's will...and that I'm part of a ministry that is making an eternal difference in lives. What could be greater than that? I am so thankful for my husband. He loves the Lord with his whole heart and is the most compassionate person I have EVER met. I truly do not deserve such a wonderful man, but God put us together, and for that I will be forever grateful! My desire now is that I can be the best preachers wife that I can be. That one day, people will be able to look back and say, "She was a godly, caring woman, and such a help to her husband." I want my life to be a legacy of hope. If the Lord can use me with tainted testimony and all, (what a picture of mercy and grace, by the way)then He can use anyone who is willing to say "Lord, here am I. Use me." He will!!!

A hard week

This morning, as I get ready to head out to sub for our local Christian school, I am thinking about the last few days that have been quite a blur for me. I have had sickness and death in my family within the same week. While I sat with my grandfather in the ER on Wednesday night, my grandmother was at the funeral home, visiting with her only remaining sister, while viewing the body of their baby sister that past away last Sunday. I couldn't help but think at that moment how fragile life is. I was overwhelmingly thankful for not just my grandparents that night, but for my own family. My husband and my children. Life is so short. My grand daddy was able to go home that night, but still feeble and weak. As we went to the funeral yesterday for my great aunt, I listened to my 75 year old grandmother and two of her lifelong friends relive times from their childhood. I wish you could have heard them, talking about things that happened 65-70 years ago like it was just yesterday. My grandmother was so weary from the heartache of losing a sister, and from the worry of her husbands health, yet when she remembered the old days, she smiled despite the tear in her eye. I sat there thinking of my own childhood, and of my children. One day, if the Lord allows me to live that long, I too will think of days long past with a joyful ache.
With the busyness of the last few days, I have missed a lot of time with my own family as I helped with the things going on in my life around me outside of my home. I have also missed my church family and haven't been there for them this past week,(even having cellphone issues has added to the lack of communication!) and for that I feel badly. Even so I have not neglected to lift them all up in daily prayer. It is very fresh and clear on my mind that time is fleeting. I have so many duties and obligations, but aside from God, my dear family is my first and top priority. I love them so much and want to be the best mother, and the best wife that I can be. God has been so good to me. I am blessed beyond measure and my cup is running over at this point. I just want to thank Him today for my precious home and all that dwell in it!


I want to leave you today with a poem that is not my own, but sounds as if it was written from my own heart. I guess this must be how every preachers wife feels!


"I Am the Preacher's Wife
by Diane Pellin

I am the woman who proudly sits in the shadows as her husband stands in the light. I am the one who knows her husband is a gift from God, and so I give him back to my Lord through his full-time service. Often times, I am so lonely for him because I share him with others.
But I am also pleased that he gives of himself so unselfishly. I am the one who encourages the preacher when others sometimes fail to. I am the one who listens to his dreams for the church and helps him look into the future and see his dreams become a reality.
And when others wonder if he really cares, I am the one who sees him on his knees, shedding tears for the future of the Lord's church."