Moving In… Moving Forward!

Since I only have about 10 boxes that are still not unpacked, so I think I can safely say we’re moved in.

Our house is cute as a button, but if you don’t believe me, you can watch a video tour Chris made. I really hate cleaning stuff, and a small house means less cleaning, which means a happier me!

Louisville has brought another surprise. I actually LIKE walking the dog. It’s not so much that Chester is great company, but more because our neighborhood is so full of interesting buildings and eclectic people. And it turns out Chester is a great conversation starter!

So I KNOW that you’re sitting there thinking, “It’s so exciting that Chris and Hannah are starting a church in Louisville. I wonder how I can help them with that?” I’m glad you asked! Let me tell you:

The Lord has been faithful (as always) and provided Chris with a job. It is a huge blessing, but definitely doesn’t pay all the bills. So we depend on the financial support that people send our way. We’re trying to avoid Chris having to get a second job, because that will leave no time for us to connect with our community and actually do what we’re here to do.

There’s another area where we really could use some help! We’ve discovered that we’re going to need a second vehicle here. Isaiah’s school is about 15 minutes away, so if he gets hurt or sick, I need to be able to get to him, not to mention running errands, doctors appointments, etc. It’s not like in PA, where Chris could just walk to church when I needed the car.

We’re looking for something pretty cheap, so even small amounts of financial support go a long way towards helping us reach our goal! If you’d live to give towards a Davis-mobile, click here. Best part is, our donations now go through our partner church (CCF) so everything you give is tax-deductible! Yay for that!

I have a third way for you to help us out! I said Chris wasn’t going to get a second job, but that’s not entirely true. He is developing websites for people on the side. So if you need a site (or any other internet help) or if you meet up with someone who does, send that work Chris’ way! A great way to promote this is by recommending people to http://aw8ken.com.

So there you have it folks! Only you can prevent forest fires and help us start Destiny Church!

This could have been tragic…

Conversation with Isaiah…

Isaiah: I dropped my blue marker in the vent!

Me: I don’t know if I can get that vent open.

Isaiah: If you can’t open it, we’re doomed!

(I opened the heat vent. The marker is retrieved. We are all safe and well.)

Louisville, How’d We Get Here?

We’ve moved to Louisville, KY to plant a church. If that’s news to you, it might be a good idea to start with reading a couple of blog entries back.

So why did we decide to start a church in Louisville?

The Lord pretty much threw church planting in our faces until we got what He was trying to tell us. He wasn’t quite as forthright about location, but one thing He did make clear to our hearts was that our next season of ministry needed to be birthed out of relationship.

One relationship specifically seemed to have a lot of grace on it and that was with a church called Covenant Community Fellowship in Indiana, just outside of Louisville. CCF was planted a little over two years ago by a friend of ours from Bible college and they have a vision to assist with planting more churches in their region.

The Lord also spoke to our hearts via another church planting pastor, who told us to plant somewhere we would be culturally comfortable. Chris was raised in Arkansas (about as South as you can get) and I was raised in WI (about as North as you can get), so what was culturally comfortable for us was a little vague. We figured our best bet would be somewhere right between the two.

When we looked Louisville up in Wikipedia, it said this:

Louisville is influenced by both Southern and Midwestern culture. It is sometimes referred to as either the northernmost Southern city or the southernmost Northern city in the United States.

We saw relationship and region coming together and the more we looked into Louisville, the more life we felt on it as the location we were being called to.

As our hearts grew toward Louisville, I researched specific neighborhoods to see if anything jumped out. One in particular caught my eye, called the Highlands. It embodied elements that had always held a lot of attraction for Chris and I and seemed like it had the kind of vibe we were looking for.

First chance we got, we took a trip down to Louisville to see the city for ourselves. When we arrived, we immediately stopped at a coffee shop downtown to take advantage of wi-fi an get our bearings.

When we ordered, the barista asked us what we were doing in Louisville. We replied that we were just checking out the city and he immediately said, “You need to go to the Highlands.” He proceeded to tell us more about the Highlands, but offered no other suggestions for exploring Louisville. Just the Highlands.

When we drove into the neighborhood we instantly fell in love. There was a kind of chaotic excitement in the air. Not completely a good excitement, but it was compelling and gripped our hearts more than any other area of the city.

And now we’re here, right in the heart of the Highlands. We are discovering that the way we felt when we first visited the neighborhood was more accurate than we realized. There is an excitement in the air that isn’t necessarily all good. And we can’t help but love it here.

Louisville, We Are Here!

This is a quick and crazy, thrown together blog to update everyone on our arrival in Louisville, with special thanks to Starbucks and their internet. And if you are wondering what we’re even doing in Louisville, check out launchdestiny.com.

The drive from Pittsburgh to Louisville was uneventful, which is a good thing, because the moving in part wasn’t exactly easy-peasy.

I was all excited to see my new house for the first time! Only problem was our keys wouldn’t open the lock… something to do with new keys and an old lock. To save the day, Chris and Phillip (Chris’ brother) climbed on top of the fence, Chris climbed on top of Phillip and then he climbed onto our neighbor’s porch roof and into our apartment window. So that problem was solved with no loss of life (although I am going to have to mend Chris’ shorts).

Then the movers we’d hired through U-Haul showed up 2 hours late. Which wasn’t really helpful of them, but we were glad they came at all, since Chris and Phillip were not enjoying unpacking the whole truck by themselves.

Now, here’s where the loss of (furniture) life comes in… Our apartment is on the second floor, in an old, old house. Think twisty stairs and narrow doors. And then think big, fat couches. Yeah.

The movers BARELY succeeded in getting our love seat up and refused to even try the couch (whimps). I was tired, and in full-fledged post-moving blues, so I was not a happy camper. Not to mention that our apartment was kind of on the filthy side. So being told I was not going to have a couch did not fill me with joy and joyness.

My husband likes to have me happy, so he agreed to try again today. Phillip, Chris and I used our best maneuvering skills. But standing at the top of the stairs, holding the full weight of a large couch that refused to turn a corner, even I was willing to admit that it MIGHT not fit. I was pretty disgruntled, but then I had the idea that a couple of overstuffed type chairs might look pretty cool in my new living room. And suddenly I felt better. Chris assured me that he would procure whatever I needed and that we would not be forced to sit on the floor for our entire stay in our new place.

So if you live in Louisville, keep your eye on Craigslist for the add for an amazing dark sage couch. Because you know you want to buy it!

Setting aside all the above mentioned trauma, I am pretty sure I love it here! I love how the neighborhood feels. I will love my apartment when it is clean. I love the things the Lord is speaking to my heart. This is going to be so good!

And the highlight of my day? Unpacking a box of dishes and finding a love note from Pittsburgh friends, written on a paper plate. And as I type that, my eyes are not tearing up in Starbucks. Not too much anyway.

Why Church Planting?

I few days ago, I blogged about how our family is moving to Louisville, KY to start a church. (Read about that here) So I wanted to share how the Lord brought us to the decision to become church planters.

Probably a year before “everything began,” Chris commented that he thought starting a church from scratch was cool, because you were able to establish the vision that God was giving you from the very foundation. My retort was that it wasn’t that cool because church planters don’t get paid. There’s some faith for you!

You know that feeling when you go downstairs to do something, but when you get there you can’t remember what you were going to do? Or when you’re taking a test and you KNOW you know the answer, but it’s just at the tip of your brain and you can’t quite grab it? A little over a year ago, Chris and I started to get that kind of feeling. An “I know something is up, but I don’t know what it is,” kind of feeling.

Pretty much the only way to get to the bottom of a feeling like that is to seek the Lord. So that’s what we did. We prayed a lot, talked with mentors, fasted and all that good stuff. We came to a couple conclusions. The Lord was preparing us to move and it needed to come through relationship.

And we talked about starting a church. A lot.

We tried to look at options other than church planting, but when we did it felt like walking through Jello. It felt like death. But when Chris and I dreamed together about starting a church, it felt like our hearts came alive. Suddenly I didn’t care about getting paid (who really needs to eat, anyway?). All I wanted to do was church plant. I wanted it so bad it surprised even me!

Even though we really WANTED to be church planters, we didn’t just go on that. We kept praying, kept trying other options, kept asking the Lord for clear direction. The Lord spoke to us through a lot of different means: in our hearts, through the Word, through other people. But church planting is big step, so we kept weighing things and seeking clearer direction.

One day Chris just laid it out before the Lord and said, “Jesus, I need to know TODAY if you’re wanting us to plant a church or do something else.” That day he got a text before breakfast, had a conversation over lunch, and got an email after dinner: 3 different people, who had no idea what we were weighing, suggested that we plant a church.

You’d think that would have been enough evidence, but a few weeks went by and it didn’t seem like any details were coming together, so we kind of laid the church planting idea aside. One night Chris was gone and I was really discouraged, wanting an answer from the Lord. I basically spent the whole evening saying, “Holy Spirit, please show us what you want us to do.” That same night, one of our teachers from Bible School messaged Chris, saying, “If I were you, I’d plant a church.”

When we read that message, all our hopes and dream for church planting flooded back into our hearts! For us, that was the clincher, where we could say, “OK, Jesus. You don’t need to tell us again. We’ve got it and we’re going for it!”

Once we were set on starting a church, we needed to discover where and how. And that’s another blog for another day.

In the mean time, check out our site about our church planting plans: http://launchdestiny.com

This is an official announcement…

So we’re moving to Louisville, Kentucky. To plant a church.

OH MY GOODNESS!

In a couple of weeks all the stuff belonging to the Davis family will be on a U-Haul headed to Louisville. This is something the Lord has been filling our hearts with for over a year, and suddenly it’s actually happening! And we couldn’t be more excited.

There is a neighborhood in Louisville that we’ve absolutely fallen in love with. It’s called the Highlands and we like it so much, we’re moving right into the heart of it. It’s full of ethnic restaurants, skate shops, boutiques, coffee shops, tattoo parlors, old homes, and lots of arty goodness.

And eventually the Highlands will be full of Destiny Church!

While we’re living in the Highlands, building relationships and growing our core group, we’ll also be hanging out at a great church just outside the city, Covenant Community Fellowship. They’re a two-year-old church plant, so we’re super blessed to have them showing us the ropes.

Chris and I are so thrilled that Jesus has let us be a part of this amazing adventure!  He’s been guiding our steps every inch of this journey so far and we can’t wait to see what the future holds.

Want to find out more about what we’re doing and how you can help? Check out http://launchdestiny.com.

You Forgot Something

I know they say women are good multi-taskers, but I’m not so sure that includes “while talking.”

I was on the phone today when it came time to walk to my son’s bus stop. I called Leah to come put her shoes on and continued my conversation.

I talked as we went out the door. I talked as we walked down the street… about a city block’s worth of street. I talked as my daughter danced on the grassy knoll by the bus stop.

In the midst of all the talking, I looked at Leah. She was wearing a t-shirt, underpants and flip-flops. That’s it.

Now, I know she had pants on at some point in the day. But I never checked to make sure they were actually still on as we walked out the door (they weren’t). So this leads me to conclude that I cannot be trusted while talking on the phone.

The good news, is that Leah didn’t mind being pants-less one bit.

Snow Makes You Crazy!

We have icicles hanging off our eaves over our front walk. But these aren’t just icicles. They are killer-death icicles. You only have to look at them to know any moment one of those babies is going to let loose and come plunging down with skull-fracturing force. And did I mention it’s melting out? Because it is.

When I first realized the peril just outside our front door, I started plotting solutions to keep the residents of the Davis-Mossburg house safe. It turned out we were fresh out of hardhats, so that wasn’t an option. I tried to convince my husband to shovel a path across the lawn to bypass the icicle-killer-death path… but that wasn’t an option either.

And this is when things got crazy.

I started thinking about Chester and how good he was at jumping through the snow, making paths to find the perfect pooping spot. And a scheme was born. I decided Chester was just the candidate to blaze a trail through our front lawn so we could reach our cars in safety.

I snapped Chester’s leash on him, armed myself with a box of stale ‘Nilla Wafers as incentive and we set out to save the family.

Chester was pretty excited about those cookies, until I threw the first one into the snow bank. He looked at me like I was crazy. I couldn’t really blame him, since I don’t think I’d get too excited about plunging into 30 plus inches of snow, wearing nothing but a leash. However, to a Beagle, cookies are pretty exciting, so after I tossed in a couple more to sweeten the deal, he decided it was worth it.

I don’t think he ever quite figured out what I wanted of him, but as long as I kept throwing cookies into the snow, Chester kept after them. I tromped behind him, beating the path down even more, until we had a big arc, bypassing certain icicle death.

Clumping through the snow drifts, wearing my husbands big boots (one of which was leaking), holding a box of ‘Nilla Wafers in one hand and a leash in the other, I realized I had completely lost it. Completely. The snow had finally gone to my head, causing me to do the kind of ridiculous things that make the neighbors stare at you. One too many snow days had pushed me over the edge.

On the other hand, I’d rather be crazy than impaled by an icicle. So I guess I’ll embrace a little insanity, although Chester may think twice before he accepts another cookie.

A Shower of Words

My kids love to talk to me while I’m taking a shower. Something about that time of my day brings out massive amounts of conversation in them… probably the fact that it annoys me greatly.

They love to talk to me during my shower, but they do it with great trepidation, because it’s gotten them in trouble so many times. I precede each shower with strict instructions to stay out of my room and leave me alone, with a small contingency for emergency situations.

Today, I heard Leah calling to me from my bedroom doorway. I shouted back that I couldn’t hear her. Next I heard her talking from inside my bedroom, so again I called out, explaining that I couldn’t hear her and told her to come into my bathroom. (Remember, this whole conversation was being held while shower water was drumming in my ears, so I wasn’t exactly at the top of my game)

Now that the inner sanctum had been reached, she was ready to deliver her great communication:

Leah: Mommy, I’ve got to talk you about so’thing.

Me: What is it?

Leah: ‘Saiah’s butt stinks.

That was it. That was the amazing revelation that caused her to breach all the rules and enter my august, showering presence. We need to work on what actually constitutes an emergency at our house.

Watch Out Bullies, He’s 6 Now!

I think one of the hardest parts of sending my son off to Kindergarten, was the fear that some other kid would malign his self-worth. You know… a bully. But we’re over halfway through the school year and it’s been smooth sailing.

Until yesterday. Isaiah got off the school bus, his little 5-year-old shoulders slumped. I asked him what was wrong and he said that some kids had been picking on him. I was getting ready to pull out my phone and speed-dial the school, but I dug a little deeper.

“What did they do to you?” I queried. Isaiah replied with great indignation, “They… they… they called us The Three Musk’teers!”

I wasn’t super successful at not laughing, but I did try to pry more of the story out of him. Turns out, when he’d gotten on the bus with his two other Kindergarten buddies, the bus driver had said they were like The Three Musketeers. Some of the older kids had latched onto this nickname and began saying it repeatedly to them.

Isaiah went on to tell me, “They weren’t being good friends. An’ I yelled at them! One girl kept looking at us and saying it, so I told her, ‘I’ve got my eye on you!’ and I told her, ‘You better watch out, because I’m almost 6!’”

I tried to convince him “The Three Musketeers” wasn’t really a derogatory nickname. We went home and looked up The Three Musketeers in Google Images to see that, not only were they some guys with cool swords, but also a yummy candy bar. He still wasn’t too impressed, although he liked the looks of the candy bar.

The thing that concerns me is, today is his 6th birthday! What is going to happen to those bullies now? They’d better not mess with him, or he’ll unleash all of his newly acquired big-kid fury. I hope I’m not the one getting a call from the school…