Creative Scribble

I didn’t really want to talk about the economy on this blog because it’s become that topic that everyone expects you to discuss. You know, like the week after Christmas everyone asks “How was your Christmas?” Or the question Harrison and I get asked at least 27 times a day “How’s married life!?” Like we’re going to say “Just awful, can I talk to you about our problems?” (which, by the way, it is GREAT! Love you baby…)

But the economy is drastically affecting new churches and we are experiencing that in a big way. Already one church that had committed funds isn’t sure how much they will be able to give and others that I thought would be sure bets have given us the “wish we could help” line. It’s been discouraging, but I know it will all pan out.

So we’re getting resourceful. Already we’ve been able to secure some sound equipment for extremely cheap or loaned to us long term for free. All told that has amounted to a savings of about $12,000 that we would have spent. But it still takes a lot of money to start this thing up. We still need about $70,000!

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To start chipping away, here’s our plan. We’ve sent full-length proposals to about 25 churches asking for support. Starting today we’re sending support letters to friends and family. These letters include a stamped, addressed envelope to encourage their return. No amount is too small and we want to make it easy to get it sent back. All told about 200 letters will be sent. Finally, two big funding proposals will be considered over the next few weeks. One is tomorrow and one is April 6. Depending on how these go, about half of our outstanding needs could be covered. That would be huge.

The other thing that has come from this has been an increase in faith. I have a strange peace that there is nothing to worry about. We will be fine. Additionally, we are finding ways to cut costs and God is sending us many fish with gold coins inside when we least expect it. As I read on a friend’s blog, I believe we will look back on this one day and be amazed at how God provided for us in the midst of the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression. Once again we will be reminded that it is His church, not ours.