Summer/Fall 2010 Update
Dear Friends,
It’s been over 18 months since our son passed from death into everlasting life, preceded by a nine-month battle to save his life on Earth. Although Beau is alive and WELL and living an unimaginable life in Heaven, still the adjustment of OUR lives on Earth without him, as well as our family and those who loved him, has been life altering.
Once all the dust settled from two memorial services held in St. Louis and Phoenix, we took a couple of months off to try and pull our broken hearts back together. Soon we started leading worship in the chapels again at Andrew Wommack's Charis Bible College (CBC) in Colorado every-other week (which we'd been doing since Sept. '08), along with continuing our monthly AWM conference schedule. In Sept. '09 we began a WEEKLY trek to the school where we pioneered CBC School of Worship and Music Ministry, leading two chapels plus rehearsals AND teaching 3-5 times per week, INCLUDING the conferences!
By the time the Holidays came around, we were beginning to burn out (imagine that!), which continued a slow and steady "smolder" through the Spring to the end of the school year in May '10. By that time, we had hit the wall and found even previously simple tasks almost overwhelming, but by God's grace we made it to the end of the school year! However it was time for some change.
Interestingly enough, we had received a call from a trusted friend who had a dream about us, that we were in a big race with many others and there was an accident on the track. Out came the yellow flags indicating caution & danger ahead. Some only slowed down, but others pulled off and took a pit stop, got their fluids topped up, tires changed and cars refreshed. Not knowing anything about our struggles the previous few months, our friend felt the Lord was saying, "It's time for you guys to take a pit stop."
Here’s a significant statistic:
Days Spent At Our Home
74 in 2008, 136 in 2009, 53 in 2010 (Jan-June)
Rebuilding
Consequently we feel the Lord has called us to a time of restoration and redefining. As our pastor said quoting Jesus urging the disciples to come away to pray, “Come ye apart”, and he added, “before ye come apart.”
We've had to shift our emphasis to regain focus and restore our hearts, rebuild some foundations in our faith and resurrect some areas of our ministry that have laid dormant for too long.
As Proverbs 11:14 says, There is safety in having many advisors, so we began to seek counsel in many trusted friends and minsters. After much prayer, for the sake of our personal health and the future health of our ministry, we have made the following changes:
• As much as we loved directing the School of Worship & Music Ministry in Colorado, pouring into the students (and not to mention, having the consistent income), we must discontinue our weekly involvement. We will instead be available to serve as an occasional guest-minister at the school, yet continue working with Andrew Wommack's monthly conferences.
• We are taking a major step of faith by radically cutting back our travel schedule. Consequently because of the intensity of our journey & traveling the past 2.5 years, our margin for writing and recording new songs had been all but eliminated, and we know this major part of our calling MUST be reignited. SO, we are in the process of "recreating" our ministry, preparing to fulfill the next phase of what God has called us in Bringing the Word of God in Song to the World.
This will involve not only writing, recording & releasing new music, but writing books as well. We are also in process of redesigning our entire website to be a major outreach which we eventually plan to fill with blogs and resources to help a wide spectrum of humanity live strong and fulfill their callings.
Hindsight is 20/20
Not having ever walked this path, our foresight was not keen to what we would encounter as we embarked on this new venture with the college while trudging through the grief and recovery of our son's departure. However in looking back, we totally see this opportunity at the school as God's love & grace extended to us, giving us a platform to continue reaching out in the midst of our pain. We certainly were in no condition to write songs or minister in churches during that season. Had we just stayed home during those raw times the first year, we could've easily become introverted and paralyzed, obsessed with licking our wounds instead of focusing on trying to move forward and help others in our loss.
And had we not hit the wall, we probably never would've stepped down from our commitment at the school to pursue rebuilding our ministry in songwriting and redevelopment of our website. We strongly believe over time the website will be a major catalyst to help us reach multitudes around the world.
All of these pursuits take time off the road to develop. Therefore, WE NEED HELP in order to turn this corner. The next year is a crucial period in the life of our ministry.
Would you consider becoming a part of our family of financial supporters with a monthly donation or giving a special gift during this transition? This will help us attain these new avenues of increased ministry to more people. It's almost like we're beginning all over again and need help with start-up costs to get everything up and running.
30 Years!
This summer marked 30 years of full-time music ministry! We are in awe of God's grace towards us all these years! Through this time we have said "Yes" to almost every ministry opportunity that has come our way, however we feel the Lord is now beckoning us to set ourselves apart in preparation for our future. Ultimately we believe this will cause us to be more fruitful in the Grand Scheme and leave a legacy of music and ministry tools, which will be a blessing for future generations of believers.
We appreciate all the many prayers sent our way over the months. We couldn't have made it through this unthinkable trauma without them. Thank you for considering how you can help us financially through this new season of our ministry, and especially the next several months. We do believe that your prayers and financial help will ultimately bear a tremendous harvest of blessing to countless individuals like yourselves who have been touched by this ministry.
Sincerely,
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