Hi everyone.
This past June my family and I began a new adventure as my employment as Creative Director unexpectedly ended.
It was my honor to invest my time working with a team to advance the gospel in the lives of children and teens. I have countless memories from the 20 years I was employed and I made several life-long friends for which I'm thankful.
God graciously gifted me with an eye for aesthetics and a gift for graphic design. He also allowed me to use those talents in a ministry context which made my work even more rewarding. I can say that I gave my very best to every project I worked on and am proud of what we accomplished as a team.
I’m grateful for the men and women in the early years at my work who put up with a young man whose hair was on fire. Through their patient example and investment, they taught me that relationships are more important than projects and that all of our efforts are worthless if we don't have love (1 Cor. 13).
I wish I could report that I've responded well to this trial and have had unwavering faith—instead, I’ve doubted God’s goodness, struggled with cynicism, and have occasionally felt abandoned. I suppose that a trial by its very nature must include some degree of pain and I've learned the hard way, to my chagrin, that I have a low pain tolerance.
However, God has sustained my faith (sometimes by a thread) and has reminded me over and over that He cares and is in control. He has used a handful of friends (you know who you are) to encourage me and point me back to Christ when I was struggling the most. These men have become even more precious to me over the last six months.
And through it all my wife and children have loved me.
In July we put our house on the market and began a job search sending out resumes and hunting for a new landing spot. I have also stayed invested in Advance Graphics and continued working with clients on various projects while launching a new business building websites for churches and other ministries (bellosites.com).
Yesterday we signed a contract on our house and if everything goes according to plan, we will be closing on December 30th (because who doesn’t want to pack and move in the middle of the holidays? ; ) We are thankful—although it does come with a rush of sadness and uncertainty knowing we are leaving our home that contains so many memories and leaving our amazing church.
Our current plan is to pack up our house and move to Laramie, Wyoming for the time being while we get our feet under us and wait for the Lord to provide our next place of service.
I have so many things I would love to do (including driving around in a taco truck or starting my own YouTube channel), but my heart is inclined towards serving the next generation in a local church context or jumping back into a creative director/lead designer type role or some variation of the two—kind of a weird combination . . . I know.
For now, we’re pressing forward by God’s grace and look forward to reporting how He has been faithful and good. Please pray that we will trust Him and not be given to uncertainty and fear and that with humility we will walk with Him wherever He leads.