Coffee at 75 MPH

Hello everyone. We are in the third day of our not so small journey across the US. Late last night we pulled into Oklahoma City- it was late and I felt like I was in one of those Twilight Zone episodes where the further I drove, the further Oklahoma City got and I was stuck for an eternity just driving to Oklahoma City! Ever been there? We stayed at a 70's style HOJO and got up this morning and started what has become a routine for us since day 1. We get up and take Capo for a couple mile run,

have breakfast, and then hit the road listening to the devotionals people had recorded for us. Then we dip into the "cup 'o' memories" that some of our dearest friends made for us- we do 5 memories in the morning and 2 after lunch. They're just little pieces of paper that have a sentence or two about something that we had done with some friends or funny sayings or whatever, but they have brought a welcome smile and some familiarity to a constantly changing landscape. Can I just vent here for a sec- we have passed through i don't know how many states now and you know how many starbucks we have seen? 2!!!! Arkansas and Oklahoma you need to get your junk together!! I got some Mcdonalds coffee and Bekah was driving this morning and just as we were getting on the highway Bekah says "oh look there's a starbucks" drives right by and gets on the ramp. And I was like "what are you doing?!?!" She said "well you just got coffee, I figured you'd want to wait and find another one later." I said " Are you kidding!? You know I would pour this crap out as a drink offering to get some starbucks." The next one was 400 miles away. My computer died today in the car- it just didn't power back on- so I called tech support and they told me it's going to be a mother board a or power cable- lets hope its the power cable!

Today was nice, we spent some time together just talking and just sitting. I think we both really needed this trip. Yes it's a lot of driving but it has been great (except for the trying to get to OK City last night!) I gave Rebekah this necklace that I have been holding on to for about a month. She saw it down at the farmers market downtown Charleston and would never buy it for herself so "I" did. It's from the 30's and she was admiring it for about 2 months. The last time we were down there she went to go look at it again and she thought they had sold but it was just moved and she was really sad. So it was cool to give her one more little piece of Charleston. We stopped at the Famous Cadillac Ranch today and took some pics. It's this ranch where Cadillac's are stuck in the ground and it's dedicated to the fins on the back of a caddy- the first one is real small and then they gradually get bigger. here are a few pics.









Tonight we pulled into Albuqureque and enjoyed a little local place for brick oven pizza. Tomorrow we have to get a tie pixed that we have been nursing for a day or so that keeps losing air and then we will be off to the Grand Canyon. We have changed our plans a little for the end of this trip though- we are going to go through Vegas and catch a show Cirque de Soleil, called "O" it's all done with water- sounds good. We went to a Cirque show on our honeymoon, so it will be a nice revist for that too. We plan to pull into SAn Jose on Sunday.




Here are a few pics from this evening, a weird house that we saw on the way to dinner, a restraunt that both Bekah and I went to as children with our families that we both thought was out of business and an awesome speed limit sign- "that's what I'm talking about!" Tomorrow we should have lots of Grand Canyon shots for you and a story of how I'm getting along with the Civic, I have made no secret of how I feel about it. Until next time- Archie

Blue Suede Shoes

So we're still on the road and probably will be for about another 3 1/2 hours. It's getting late, and we're tired, but have had a great day! It was filled with alot of fun things. We were talking and realized that this is our first real vacation since our honeymoon - pretty sad huh? Here are a few pictures of the day and some fun things we have done.



Had to have barbecue in Memphis! This was the fun pink pig mobile outside Marlowe's barbecue restaurant. Now this is what you call classy! So fun we had to take a picture.




That's a whole lot of b-b-q! :) Notice the sauce on Archie's face... it was lip smacking good!!!



This is for my dad, he always tells me to clean the bones, suck out the marrow, and get messy, and you're not done till you do all three!







Here are some pics from Graceland... First is the big front living room with the infamous 15 ft white couch. Looks the same as the 70's. Next is Elvis and Priscilla's wedding clothes, a few of Elvis' jumpsuits, the monument to Elvis (kind of creepy), and Graceland itself - not quite as impressive from the front as I originally thought. Just so you know, it's kind of expensive to go to Graceland, and when you get there, they don't let you go upstairs.. something about it's Elvis' private quarters and they are going to maintain his privacy - hey he's dead people. Sorry Elvis fans!



Archie even remembered his blue suede sneaks!




We stopped by the Hotel Lorraine, where Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.




Passing into the next state - Arkansas, and the Mississippi river

Just a few fun facts. So far, we have spent 17 hours driving, and have gone about 1,020 miles. We'll rack in more by the end of the night.
Hurricane Gustav has sent us, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Oklahoma PLENTY of rain. It's rained all day.

We got word that Filipe and Mandy Santos, part of our South Bay team, arrived safely to San Jose airport today!! They are home. They flew from Charleston today and got to California in the same day. whew, how nice! :) just joking, we are having a GREAT time and soaking up all the relaxation.

Tonight we'll land in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and try to get a good night's rest. Tomorrow will probably be a boring day of mostly driving, so we'll try to tap into our creative side to keep you entertained! We're praying for all of you that you will be blessed.

Rain Rain Go Away

So it's the beginning of day 2. We are on the road as I type. Gotta love the mobile broadband stuff. We are doing good, encouraged, and feeling God's peace as we travel. Archie surprised me by recording a Bible study and having several people read some scriptures for us. This was over the top! It was nice to have some familiar voices hundreds of miles away. My dad did the first one with a great verse for us to cling to, and my mom wrote her part (she "doesn't do microphones ;) ). This morning our good friend Staci Mclain started off our day in the right direction. So encouraging. We really enjoyed staying with Scott and Rachel last night in Nashville. I put a few more pictures of our stay last night and a few other good ones from yesterday, as well as the Nashville sky line. We had breakfast with them this morning before hitting the road again.

It's funny how things like car trips make you spend much needed and desired time with the one you love! :) Doesn't mean that every single second in the car has to be filled with conversation, but sitting next to each other, reflecting on God's grace and provision, enjoying the beautiful landscape and holding hands makes you feel closer to each other. So far we really haven't done anything but sit. Yesterday we even kind of enjoyed the silence. We drove most of the day without music or anything. (Save for the new coldplay and john mayer albums we've been holding out to listen to for the trip). It's been a good trip. I think the time is good for our souls! Pray for us today if you think about it, we will be hitting the remnants of hurricane Gustav, and we've tried to find another route around it, but the thing is huge! so I think we will end up driving through alot of it. Pray against our little engine that could from flooding too! Okay, here are the pictures, we'll update later.




More of dopey Capo








Courtney, Hailey, and Scott and Rachel Parker, and the Nashville skyline

Road Trip Day 1

Well we are at the end of the first day of traveling to California and we are a mix of so many things: excited, tired, sad to leave friends and family, and optimistic about what our new future holds for us. We left this morning at around 10:30 after having breakfast with our families, and hit the road to Nashville. We passed through South Carolina (obviously), North Carolina, and Tennessee. Capo did a pretty good job sitting in the car for the trip, after getting some meds from the vet, he was a little dopey! :) We were thinking, that this was the first time that Capo had left South Carolina. Since we were going to have so much time on our hands, we decided to have a little fun. So we played the license plate game to see how many states we could find, and we already have 22, hopefully we'll find all of them before we get there. Then we decided to see if we could single-handedly take the political survey of the country (you know how they do the polls and you say, they never asked me what I was thinking), to see how many bumper stickers we could find for each political candidate - we found two stickers for each! :) so far the country is even. Archie decided he needed to have a last fix of Krystal. So, let's just say that the GPS is good, but not great - it found several krystal's that were closed, and then took us to some girl named Krystal's house (ha), it was really a high school. so we wasted a good 45 minutes or so looking for a Krystal, but alas - we did succeed (that's for you Rick). We finally arrived in Nashville and are staying with our good friends Scott and Rachel. Can't believe how big the girls are! It makes you forget how fast time goes by. We have spent the evening having some good conversation and trying a new game for the Wii called Wii fit. It has been fun to watch each other make idiots of ourselves playing these games! (Notice in all the pictures Capo is like Capo-the-drug-dog, except he's the kind that takes them, not finds them) But it has been fun. We made good time, passed through 2 states and amazingly enough got 37 Miles to the gallon today! Tomorrow we head out for Memphis in the morning and Oklahoma City tomorrow night. For your enjoyment, here are some pictures of the day - the states we passed, Capo the drug dog, Archie's krysal obsession, and some Wii fit action.

By Memory

For a long time now I have been wanting to do our music on Sunday mornings from memory- which means no music stand. I made this decision a year or so ago after visiting a large church in Atlanta. Having no music stands on stage just makes it look cleaner, there is nothing blocking the worship leader from the congregation, and it's a little more professional. This has always been something I've wanted to do but never made the time to do. Well this weekend I will be at my father-in-law's church, Pointe North in Moncks Corner and I will playing with their worship team on backup guitar and then I will be leading on electric guitar and singing on two songs in the morning and leading the whole evening 5:30 service worship. We also will be sharing our vision for the new church. Their church has a rule of no music stands! At first this was kind of a "aw crap" moment but it has provided the challenge that I've needed to make the jump to no music stand. I spent about 2 hours today trying to memorize all the chords and words to about 8 songs. What's funny is that for 4 of these songs, I've been singing them for 5 or 6 years! It just goes to show you if aren't intentional about things you'll never really learn. On the few that I'm playing with the pointe north band, I am just now learning. They have a rule on their stage that you can have one sheet of paper as a reminder. Well my sheet of paper for the songs I'm doing with their band is completely covered in notes one sided. It's kind of like cheating in french class, you write as much information in the smallest area possible (not that "I" would ever do anything like cheating in French class in High school uh-hmm) But for the songs I'm doing by myself- I will have no cheat sheet Yowzers! Anyway, just a thought about the processes that I'm going through.
Archie

Catching Up

Well we have been pretty slack on the blogging here- But we have a lot to catch you up on. Here are the top 11 highlights (in no particular order:)
1) We got a full price offer on our house, and we close on AUG 29!
2) Our last day at Crosstowne Church was AUG 10
3) Rebekah and I are pregnant due in april, just in time add to the attendance in the new nursery!
4) We have offically moved out of our house and are living with Rebekah's parents in Pinopolis, SC until we pack the moving truck AUG 27-28th.
5) Rebekah's car broke down and cost us $800 (that we didn't have) and by the end of the day God provided a check for $800 out of the blue from a good friend.
6) I am designing South Bay Church's website http:/www.southbaychurch.org (not up yet but look for it soon.
7) Our Faith has been tested in every way possible during this process, we are still trying very hard to raise our own support to do this
8) We have sold most of what we have and are still trying to sell our couch, dining room table, and 98 Chevy Malibu any takers- let me know 224-8114
9) Just kidding about being pregnant- I was trying to make this list exciting
10) Rebekah is scheduled to take the National Board Exam for Occupational Therapy next week on thursday! Please pray for her!
11) We are pulling out of town on Sept 2! We will pass through 9 states to get there, and drive over 2800 miles with our dog in the civic that just cost us $800 and the check engine light just came on again today (did I mention our faith and patience was being tested?) and we will hit touristy spots like Graceland in Memphis (Elvis's home) and the grand canyon along with seeing some good friends on the way out there.

Thanks for keeping up with us. AS we travel out to CA we plan on updating this daily with pics and hopefully video so can know how to pray for and with us. Thank you to everyone who has been so encouraging to us during this, it has been a challenge but one of the best experiences of our lives- I just can't wait to see what God will do with all of this.
Archie

Bill Hybels

This week I had a once in a lifetime opportunity with our South Bay Church staff to fly to Michigan and meet with Bill Hybels, the pastor of Willow Creek Church in Chicago. It was a great honor to meet with a guy who has served Christ for over 30 years and grown a church from 8 people to over 20k!! And here I was sitting across the table from him asking questions. He was kind enough to meet to with us while he was on his vacation. It was strange to meet someone in person whom you've only seen on tv or heard on a teaching CD. But there he was bare-footed in shorts and a polo shirt- a normal guy. He had a lot to share with us as we are starting this dream together. If I could give our time together a couple themes it would be: 1) That this whole thing is about relationships, 2) Family is hugely important, 3) and Stay fluid. I'd like to share just a bit of our meeting with you:
1) relationships- He just reminded us, as I think that we all in ministry need to be reminded every once in a while, that all of this (starting a church) is about bringing people to Christ (which goes without saying) but past that, as our minds are racing about the logistics of moving out there and finding a place to worship, and raising money to remember that loving on people is what matters and will ultimately grow our church- not strategy.
2) Family- As we were talking to Bill his wife, Lynne came in and talked to us a bit about family. And she summed it up best when she said that "We decided a long time ago that if had to choose to disappoint either our family or the church, then the church would lose every time. Because the bottom line is, if someone gets so mad at us that they leave the church, there's always another church they can go to; But our Kids? We're the only parents they have and when we get to heaven we're not going to be judged on if we made our church 'Happy' but how we raised our kids."
3) Stay Fluid- Lastly he just reminded us to let God do our planning. We have a plan and that is a good thing but he encouraged us not to look too far down the road but look at each step as it came and to enjoy each step. He said not to be in a hurry to have a huge church but enjoy the people God sends us and then grow with them.
It was a time I will never forget, and a time that I look back on and gain from his wisdom.
Archie