{Dream Big}: A Change of Course

Ray and I have loved leading the Empty Chair ministry at Fellowship Community Church.  In the years that we've been leading it -- 3 years to be exact -- we've had approximately 20 families who have begun fostering and adopting.  It's been incredible.  We've been able to have amazing guest speakers such as Stephanie Fast of Destiny Ministries and Robert Gelinas of Project 127 come to the church and share what God how God is using the church to make a difference in the lives of orphans.  We've also been able to do some incredible projects.  We partnered with Children's Hopechest and have sponsored 100% of the children there, sending our first team down this spring.  We were able to provide Christmas for over 100 foster children in over three counties.  And we were also able to establish an adoption fund for those from our church who have a desire to adopt.  What God has done in our little ministry in such a short time has been astounding.

But God has been calling us to more.  We have friends and family in different churches over our valley who do not have orphan care ministries.  The potential lies in wait and is burdening our souls to help incite and inspire these churches to action.  We've had local churches contact us asking for information on how to get started because they just aren't sure what to do first.  And it breaks out heart to see the Orphan Sunday website list only a handful of events happening within our state.

So over our Christmas break, Ray and I talked a lot about where we were feeling lead, and what the prompting looked and felt like.  And our decision is to launch a new ministry called 127 Place with the idea that we could use this additional ministry to empower Christian churches around the valley and the state with materials and resources for developing and partnering in orphan care.

Ray and I decided to really commit.  The plan is for me drop all of my part-time positions to only one, and commit the rest of this year to working on and developing this new ministry.

This is exciting and scary all at the same time.  But the potential for this ministry, and feeling called so strongly, has helped with our insecurities about lowering our salary.  We're still not up and running, but excitement is fueling us to move quickly and intentionally.  As we look to 2013, hopes soar and we dream big.