Well, the time has come to update once again!

Big Changes in "The Life of Me"

Well, when you don't post for a while it is hard to know where to start. To forewarn you, this is likely to be a lengthy post as I have a lot to talk about. While I would consider it worth the read, I will try to highlight the important sections for all you skimmers!

Old News:

We have decided to try to sell our house and join the Navy.

About 4 or 5 months ago, Brenda and I had been talking and praying quite a bit about what we should do with our lives. After all the praying, we came to the conclusion that God was leading us to try to sell our house and join the military. Our reasons were many, including: Getting money for college, getting into a larger house eventually to expand our family, having a job that I would enjoy more than Wal-Mart, and eventually getting out of the military, completing my education and getting a computer networking job that I would make my career.

More, Not as Old News

We are leaving Cloverdale Community Church.

Last October, Brenda and I came to the conclusion that it was time for me to resign as a deacon at our church, we felt stressed out and were no longer excited about church. We thought a little bit about leaving the church at that time, but decided that we should stick it out for a while and see if my being off the deacon board would help our attitudes at all. I resigned from the board and things felt a little easier for me, but we still didn't really feel like this was where God wanted us. About mid-May, Brenda told me that she still felt like we should leave Cloverdale, I had been having the same feelings so we prayed about it a lot more and, once again, felt God's leading. We made the decision to leave the church and then, after much prayer, came up with what we felt was the best way to go about doing that. We chose to talk to all the church leaders prior to planning any announcement from the pulpit (The announcement seemed appropriate to us because I had been leading music for about 3 years). After talking to the church leadership, I made my announcement to the congregation in early June and stated that my last Sunday would be July 5th. The announcement was very well received and our pastor, Dave, stood up after my spill and said some very nice things. Throughout the process we felt God's leading and are so grateful that He made it so easy on us.



More Recent Old News

The sale of our house is looking promising

As you are all aware, this is the worst time to sell a house. We were fully aware of that when we made our decision to let God sell it if it was His will, but we did begin to struggle after nearly 4 months with no offers. Then, out of the blue, our realtor called us and told us some interesting news. Our house was purchased with a Downpayment Assistance loan from the city of Redding. When we bought it, they gave us 75,000 that we would pay back with interest only on the profit from our house when we sold. Our realtor had contacted the city and found out that our loan was non-recourse. We learned that this means if the market drops and we decide to sell, the city may forgive us the debt we owe without any negative repercussions on us. While this sounded pretty good, it sounded far too good to be true, to me. We went down and had a meeting with a lady from the city who explained it to us and it was just as we had heard. Pretty excited, we began to tell people about it. When I talked to one of my friends, he pointed out that we were getting away with not paying our loan and hurting the city. I began to feel incredibly guilty and basically decided that we should not go through with it. I talked to some other people about it, including my dad, who told me that they didn't necessarily feel like it was a wrong thing to do, but that bad feeling was sticking with me. I told everyone in the know to please pray for us that we would know what God wanted us to do. Only two days later, with no new information, God had changed my heart and I suddenly felt like we needed to leave the whole process in His hands. If He wants to allow this huge debt to be forgiven and help us out in this way, then I must be humble and willing enough to accept it. Our prayer now is that if this is not God's will, He will close the door on this opportunity and make it clear to us that we should not continue to pursue it.


Fairly New News

I lost my job at Wal-Mart!

On Thursday, July 16th, I was at work and as is common, I was walking under some catwalks. Something hit me in the hand as it fell from above. I turned and saw that it was some shaving cream that had been squirted from the catwalk. I noticed some broken bottles of conditioner lying on the ground next to me, so I picked one up and ran up the stairs to get the guy back for squirting me. When I got up there, I couldn't bring myself to cover him in conditioner, so I let him go back to work. As I was leaving the area, I thought it would be funny to put some of the conditioner on the rails by the stairs so it would get on this guys hands as he went down the stairs later. I oozed some out onto both rails and walked away soon forgetting about it. When I arrived at work the following day, the manager from the other shift asked me if I had heard what had happened. I didn't know what he was talking about. He then explained to me how someone had been coming down the stairs that morning and had supported themselves using the rails and had slipped in some conditioner and nearly fallen. I quickly thought through my options and realized that if I wanted to keep my job I needed to keep this quiet. I told him that was terrible and I was glad no one was actually hurt. I walked away feeling very badly for lying, but thinking it was really the only option.
Later that day, I was questioned by one of my managers as to whether or not I had heard anything about the incident with the conditioner. I told him I had not heard anything. This same manager later sat down with some of the guys in my area to question them. They either didn't know anything, or were helping me out.
When I left work Friday night, I felt terrible, I had lied and the guilt was horrible. On Saturday when I woke up I felt worse instead of better! I kept trying to put it out of my mind, but I just couldn't shake it. As we sat in church Saturday evening, I couldn't sing or do anything but dwell on this guilt. (We now go to church on Saturday nights with Justin, Katie, Neil and Alicia.) I now knew that I had to tell the truth even if it meant losing my job. I made the decision that evening to tell my managers first thing on Tuesday. Immediately the burden lifted, I knew that I had made the right decision.
I went in Tuesday and told my managers what I had done and they thanked me for my honesty. They let me work my regular shift on Tuesday night and then on Wednesday they let me go.



Almost brand new News

I went in to talk to the Navy recruiter on Friday.

Friday morning I rode over to visit with the Navy recruiter and ended up staying for 3.5 hours. I learned a lot of useful information and then came home to talk it all over with Brenda. Our plan all along has been that if I ever lost my job, I would join the Navy so we felt that God was just opening that door even wider. I went back to the recruiter yesterday, Monday the 27th, and signed all the applicable paperwork. Currently my paperwork is being reviewed in Sacramento and if all goes well, I should be going down to Sac to take a physical and the ASVAB sometime this week. I have been told that if that happens and I pass the physical, I will be asked to choose an available Navy job based on the score of my ASVAB. We beg for your prayers over the next few days as once again we feel God working and desperately want His will for our lives!


The Newest of News to date.

We have accepted an offer on our house.

We received a call from our realtor today that an offer had come in on our house. We went down to her office and decided that the offer was fair, based on market value and other things. Now, the city of Redding has to consider the offer and it is in their hands as to whether or not we will sell the house for the offer price. Again, we are praying that God's will be done in all of this, He ultimately decides if this offer is accepted.


That's all the News, now a blurp from me.

God is awesome

Wow, looking back at all God has done in our lives over the last few months is overwhelming. He is teaching us so much! If we are simply willing to give up and let Him lead, He will do amazing things. Brenda and I both know all of this, but it is so easy to grab hold of life and try to do it by yourself. We are so thankful for all He has done for us and can't begin to express our gratitude to Him. We ask for your continued prayers as we continue to move forward to wherever He leads. Thank you all for supporting us in this way. We love you.