A New Huster

We are proud to introduce you to Katie Huster. She was born July 12 and is now twelve weeks old. For a few weeks now, the kids and I have been visiting different litters of Golden Retrievers around the San Diego area. We found a beautiful little puppy who is so smart.

In just one day she is walking in correct position with a leash and is well on her way to being potty trained. Faith and Isaac are on cloud nine and wonderful care takers.

Not So Fast

Well... I wish I could bring better news, but things blew up on the floor of Presbytery. There is great animosity with a few toward Harbor and what we are doing in San Diego. It is a minority but very virulent few. My sermon and exam on the floor went well, it was other issues concerning exceptions to the confession that caused a blow up for me and two other candidates. The other two candidates caught it big time.What ended up happening over a two hour period is that the examination for all purposes ceased and people began fighting for their doctrinal positions. The forum just happen to be our examination? This had been brewing for quiet some time and it finally blew up.

In the end, the Candidates Committee and process will be over-hauled and I will be able to go through examination again in January.The official response to me was they wanted me to become sharper? I met with the moderator yesterday and he apologized to me. He told me that I just walked into a loaded time bomb. My written exam, sermon, and all other paper work, were officially approved. All I will need to do is go through the floor of Presbytery again. Glory!

It was a tough experience. On a funny note: the sermon I preached at Presbytery was "Grace In Unexpected Places", with two main points 1) Grace in Pain 2) Grace in Rejection. It was approved and warmly received, I did not realize at the time it was written for my benefit.

Michelle's health has not changed much in the past month or so. Still having lots of digestive issues leading her to be extremely weak. Monday, we went to her internist and were encouraged. He is going in a different direction now that everything in her digestive track seems to be normal. We should have results in a day or so from their latest labs. His logic seems to make sense, pray that they find something.

Thanks for your prayers!

HE PASSED!!

We are giving thanks and praise tonight because Jim passed his oral ordination test! After almost 3 hours of questions he is so close to being ordained. On Saturday he will go before Presbytery to preach a sermon and then the floor will be opened for 10 minutes of questions. Thank you for your prayers!!! Please continue to lift him up.

Tough Day For Michelle

Michelle had her colonoscopy and endoscopy today. Add this day to the list of medical procedures gone bad. We infadicaly told her doctor that Michelle has a high tolerance to pain meds and sedation and that she needed extra. Well, to get to the point, Michelle was completely awake during both procedures. They had to restrain her during the endoscopy so she would not pull out the hose. It was horribly traumatic. To make thing worse, they did not find anything abnormal that is causing the chronic diarrhea. Thank you for your many prayers.

Mile One

We have made it to mile marker one. I must confess, I should be enjoying this first mile more, but my impending ordination exam has cast some scattered clouds over this season. I go before the committee next Wednesday (24th) in the afternoon. I am actually on a study break from the "Doctrine of the Church" to type this blog.

Well, how was the second service? Church planting math says you should divide the first week attendance by two, then you will have your starting congregation. Week one you get lots of well wishers who are already committed to other local churches but wanted to encourage us. We had around 85 week one, so with the above formula, we should be in the mid- 40's? Well, we had around 65! It must be the dynamic preaching, right!?

Funny Story: After the service, one of my good friends Mikey, came up to me to ask a question, "what is repentance?" Fare question right? Well, my sermon Sunday was on the Parable of the fig tree, on repentance from Luke 13. My three points of the sermon were 1) The Need for Repentance 2) What is Repentance and 3) What does Repentance Look Like Lived out? I just spent thirty minutes breaking down repentance with analogies, illustrations, and scriptural support and then he asks "what is repentance?" All this to say it must be something else than my preaching bringing people to Harbor Church. Actually, I know what that something else is. God's sweet Spirit has defiantly been visiting with us.

Michelle is still in the middle of the storm. I would not say she is any worse, but not much better either. She will have a colonoscopy on Wednesday morning. The preparation regiment for it is not going to be pretty. Please pray for her as she has to take the prep milk shake. uggg... My sister Cameron is holding her own and doing much better than she was a month ago. A couple weeks ago she was able to record her senior recital for her Masters in Harp Performance. They reviewed and accepted it and mailed her diploma last week! She is about half way through a 30 week cycle of chemo and radiation.

Well back to the confession... Blessings!!!

We Have Lift Off

What a day! What an adrenalin rush! What a good God! Our grand opening mailer went out on Tuesday to over 20,000 homes in the Ocean Beach community. All week I received calls from folks who received the mailer inquiring more information about our new congregation. Due to the calls I received, I was optimistic that we would have quit a few first time visitors. I was blown away by how many actually came. I would estimate that we had about 50 folks who came just because they received our mailer. All told we had around 85 for our first public worship. Everyone seemed to interact well and enjoy the worship and fellowship. The praise team knocked a home run. Their spirits ushered our new congregation right into a powerful time of worship. I had a strong sense of the Holy Spirit helping while I preached. There is nothing more fun than preaching the Word of God when you have been filled in an unusual way with His spirit. Courtney Hall, our good friend who has been living with us on and off since April, shared her testimony. It was soooo good. You can download my sermon and Courtney’s testimony online at http://www.harborob.org/.

Michelle was not able to make it to our service this morning. She had been up most of the night with multiple trips to the bathroom. By morning she was completely wiped out. She tried to shower and get ready but she was so weak. I am so thankful for Lois Swagerty, another Harbor pastor’s wife, who came and laid in bed with Michelle during our service. They cried and laughed together. Michelle needed some well timed encouragement. The Lord was so gracious to send Lois today.

Tomorrow starts a two week cram season for my ordination exam. Thankful, I was able to put off the exam a few weeks. Looks like I will go before the committee on the 24th or 25th. But for today, I will celebrate and this amazing new chapter of Harbor OB.

It's Coming Together

We are two days away from our fist public worship service! We had a preview service last Sunday morning, to do a test run of setting up and breaking down the OB Elementary auditorium. For the most part it was smooth. Of course there are a few minor things that go wrong like the projector screen not being left down for us or not being able to turn on hall lights. But overall, it was a great service and Lord meet with us all. The worship team has come together and did an excellent job in leading worship. The children’s team was zipping around and the children loved our new children’s church.

This week our “Grand Opening” mailer went out and I have received a dozen or so calls, most of them positive and encouraging. Of course living in a place like OB, you are also going to get some creative and highly descriptive calls to remind you why God has called us to OB. I’ve clapped my hands and rubbed them together numerous times today. I get so exciting thinking about our opportunity. I’ll give a complete run down Sunday evening.

Michelle is doing a little bit better. She is no longer having to go to the bathroom 20 plus times a day, but has slimmed her visits down to 3 or 4 times. This does allow her to retain some fluids and food. Earlier in the week she picked up a UTI infection and started breaking out in boils. I told her that she is starting to look like Job? In the midst of feeling rotten, Michelle’s spirits have been joyful. She has been singing and worshiping more in the past few weeks than I can ever remember. Having her good friend Katrina from back in SC visit this week has been such a blessing for our entire family. It is hard but there is a joy that only comes from being close to God in the midst of suffering. We are actually incredible blessed!

Faith and Isaac are both back in school and loving it. Well, Isaac loves his new class and friends but misses his sister and wants to go to her class. Thanks to grandma Lees, they have been dressed in the best of back to school fashion. I have some good looking kids.