Holley Update

Well, it's General Conference time! Gene and I will be heading out EARLY Tuesday morning. Our plane leaves at 7:00, so we will have to leave the house about 5:00. I'm looking forward to conference. I'm sure it will be a good one.

We were in Quitman Friday night and Saturday for the Kid's Day. It turned out very good. Keith and Carla really have it together! Their church was wonderful in doing the things that needed to be done to make this a successful endeavor. Our hat is off to them and the work they are doing there.

We got to see and visit with the Prince's while we were there. That was great! On our way home we stopped by to see their home - it is beautiful!! We are very happy for them and excited to see what God is going to do in Bullard.

Mom and Dad came in Friday before we left for Quitman. They will be here through General Conference to take care of the boys and Cookie. It's always good to see them and have them here with us.

We had a really good service this morning. Just a great presence of God in the place. Tonight we were at Bro. Bernard's for service. All of our people except one were there with us tonight. It was a communion service and we wanted our church to take part in that. This was a very special and sweet time together. God is moving and we know we will see new one's born into the Kingdom in the near future.

Cameron and Chad are doing great. They are a huge asset to our church. Cameron helps me tremendously by playing the bass, and Chad is helping in many areas (and will be helping before too much longer on drums). We are very proud of them and the way they have adjusted to a new way of life.

Just wanted to send out an update of things that are happening around here. We will be having our second outreach day on October 7. Pray that God will send us to homes where people are hungry for more of God!!

I know there are several of our "home folks" that our keeping up with us here - feel free to say hello and make a comment back to us. We love you all and miss you! Come see us sometime!!

Outreach, Holy Ghost, Singing, Kid's Day & more!

Our first outreach in Pflugerville was a success! Did we have anyone in service from it this morning? No. But, we planted seed. We had 10 people come at 10am on Saturday and we spent two hours going door to door. Just over 140 homes were contacted with information about our church! It was a success because we are doing what God commanded us to do - spread the good news.

Saturday afternoon, our family attended a live music event at Formosa Art Tea House (a Chinese Tea Room which is next to our church) at the invitation of the owner, Riva Yeh. This is the lady I have blogged about in the past. She has received the Holy Ghost and been baptized in Jesus' Name. I have been by her place at least twice a week since we have been here -trying to get her come be with us in service again! It was a neat little time. A girl, Amy Star, who is attending a worship leader college here in Austin played her guitar and sang worship choruses. Some she had written and some that were common. Her boyfriend was with her. So after it was over, we got to talking to them and found out that he is an Archer. His dad was a member of the Christian group, The Archer's, that was quite popular in the 80's! Karla used to go to their concerts in Dallas and was blown away to meet the son of Steve Archer! We are just trying to get around and meet people, spend time with them and build relationships. Now, Riva owes me one! I'll tell her this week......

This week has been Revival Services at New Life UPC, Austin and we attended on Thursday, Friday and Sunday nights! I blogged about Bro. Easter last week. We have had, as of this morning, 14 filled with Holy Ghost here in this one week! Tonight, I would guess, there were over 5. I am not sure of the exact amount. It has been so refreshing! Friday night we took a van over to the Revival Service with people from our church and had a great time of fellowship after service together. It was another "bonding" time with us and the church people.

We are planning to take them over next Sunday night for communion service. I think it would be good for our new ones to be a part of this special act of consecration.

Our first newspaper advertisement starts this week. We will be in the "Pflugerville Pflag" each Thursday for a while. Thanks to the donor that is paying for this outreach! We appreciate each form of support...Prayer, Finances, Words of Encouragement, etc.

We will be going to Quitman this Friday to bring a Kid's Day to Keith and Carla's church. It is a Texas District Sunday School Project. We are excited to see what God will do and to also see friends and family. Help us pray! Bro. and Sis. Denny Ploch will be the evangelist.

Are you tired yet?

Promised Sign Picture

Here is the picture of our new sign that I promised a long time ago! It should be easy to read and draw some attention to our little corner. I believe we should make His House look its best - it shows how much we think of our God.

Friend Day

We had a successful "Friend Day" today! We ended up having 3 first-time guests with us for service and for our fellowship dinner following service. The service was touched by God and hearts left changed by His presence.

We added three part harmony to our worship service today! It was great! We now have a soprano, Sheree Robertson, and an alto, Kendra Younkin. I sang tenor and Karla sang along for punch! It sounds so much fuller. We borrowed two microphones this weekend, so we will have to get our own to keep the praise group going.

Sis. Jennifer Crawford's sister, Carolyn, joined us for today along with Darin Cash and his fiancé, Carla Davis. We enjoyed visiting with all of them.

Darin and Carla were my guests! I was so glad to see Darin and meet Carla (he was a member of our youth group who moved from Wichita Falls about 10 years ago!). They are both graduating with a doctorate in Music from the University of Texas this coming Spring. She is a concert pianist and he is a professional trombonist. They are getting married in December.

We had three other commitments to be in service that backed out at the last minute, but we were so happy to have the three that were there! Karla sang "The Alabaster Box" and I preached about "The Friend" - the one that can reach to the soul, where no one else can. A definition I read explained what a friend is: "One who comes in when the whole world has gone out." When the whole world forgets about you - a friend will be there. This Friend, Jesus, will only come in when the whole world has gone out! We had a good prayer time at the end.

We left about 2:00pm, after a great time of fellowship, laughing and EATING! That is Pentecost, right? Breaking bread from house to house!

We are taking a church van over to the Austin Church with our people on Friday night for REVIVAL with Evangelist Mike Easter. We enjoyed his ministry tonight and will probably go to service (just our family) this Thursday, also. He and his family are pictured here.

Our first outreach day is this Saturday at 10am. We plan to start subdivision by subdivision getting the word out about our church. We also have had a donation given to put an advertisement on the church page for several months in the weekly newspaper just for Pflugerville - "The Pflugerville Pflag"!

Cameron and Chad went on a youth trip Friday night to a Youth Rally in the section. They had a great time getting to know the youth from Austin. Their youth leader, Seth Simmons, is the sectional youth leader also and was in charge of the service. I think Cameron actually enjoyed having Chad on the trip since he didn't really know anyone very well. That would have been a different story in Wichita Falls!

Off to another week....

Texas vs. Ohio

I read on a friend's blog (fellow Sunday School Director), Don Ryan from Ohio, that Ohio State will payback the University of Texas in tomorrow's game for last year's defeat. So, I felt I had to respond. Living in Austin now, you cannot go anywhere, listen to any radio station or read any news, without it all being about the Texas Longhorns. I have included a quote below from our paper stating that there will be a Saturday night victory.....

"A Saturday night victory by The University of Texas Longhorns football team is expected to trigger a massive celebration around campus.

The No. 1-ranked Ohio State University Buckeyes will play the defending National Champion Longhorns, now ranked No. 2, at 7 p.m. at Darrell K Royal-Memorial Stadium on Saturday. This is the first time in 10 years a No. 1 vs. No. 2 matchup has come during the regular season."

There you have it: It is in print—it must be so. There is quite a stir around town about this game, although my life will not be affected! We are planning for our Friend Day this Sunday. We know that one family has four guest commitments and I have at least one guest coming. Pray that nothing stands in their way on Sunday morning! Whether the Longhorns win or not - we are on THE winning side.

Chad is 12!!!

Last Wednesday was Chad's 12th birthday, and I should have done this then but didn't think of it. He is still receiving messages from friends, so if you would like to leave him a birthday message here, that would be great!!

We didn't "celebrate" his birthday until Friday. We went to one of those fun places that has video games, mini-golf, lazer tag, boats, cars, pizza, etc. They had a special going that was a surprise to us - then a lady turned around and gave us a coupon for "buy one get one free". The special included everything at the park - nothing was extra! We ended up eating dinner and having fun (4 hrs. worth) for less than it would cost us to go to a decent restaurant. Afterward, we ran by Wal-Mart and bought his present - Madden '07 for XBox - then came home and I made chocolate chip cookies (Pillsbury!) and coffee. He was happy with his celebration that night. We stayed up until 4:00! They thought it was great - and it was. Just getting to be together as a family and have fun is wonderful.

Chad is going on is first official youth outing this Friday to a sectional youth rally. This promises to be a fun and exciting time for us all - we no longer have a "little boy" in the house but a fine young man.

Another great Sunday...

Just wanted to write a note to let you know that we had such a great service today in Pflugerville. We added an overhead projector to project the words onto a screen and it was a great asset! The people were so loud in their singing! The Spirit was so strong and we broke through in worship. We had a time of praying for the sick and testimonies. You would have to be in a small congregation to understand the excitement of a break-through! We had two healings in this past week! Everyone was shedding tears of joy and worshipping. They left encouraged to "never give up!" We had 12 on this Labor Day weekend - pretty good, I'd say!

Our new sign is up and we now have a offering "bag" like the big churches! Thanks to Keith and Carla Clark for donating the money for the offering bag - our church was so grateful. In fact, some that have not given recently, gave in the offering today! I will post pictures of the new sign and more comments soon.

Beautiful Wedding/Beautiful California

As I'm sure most of you can imagine - the wedding was beautiful. Danelle was radiant and Matt was beaming! They make a very handsome couple. Danelle really let her personality shine through during the wedding - it was really cute.

When we flew in last Wednesday night, we had a convertible rented. The guy at the rental place pulled it up for us and already had the top down, so we left it. We nearly froze.

Thursday and Friday were both busy with the wedding and rehearsal and all.

Then Saturday we were able to spend some time with our close friends, Jimmy and Bobbie Shoemake. They are just finishing up on a new building in San Jose, so we all went over to see it - it is very nice.

Saturday night we made our way to the infamous In-n-Out Burger. Mmmm good!

Sunday we went to church in Hollister - with the Hurst family. They have a great church, and they are also in a new facility. This was only their second Sunday to be there. It was great! They have alot of new converts, so it is always exciting around there - we love it!

Today, we went to Monterrey and Carmel. It was gorgeous!! The weather out here has been awesome - especially since it's been so hot at home. We have really had a good time. It was great to get together with family and old friends.

Tomorrow it's back to Texas!! Even though it's hot - it's still home!!

California, Here We Come

We are headed out today to California. I am definitely looking forward to the cooler weather. The highs are only in the low 80's and at night in the 50's!! Danelle (my niece) is getting married Friday, so that is why we are going. Gene and I are singing, and Cameron and Chad are both in the wedding. We have a convertible rented for the time we are there and plan to take a daytrip over to Carmel and Monterrey. This is our vacation this year since we didn't take one during the summer with the move and all.

We'll try to post some pictures later for those of you that would be interested. I'm sure Danelle is going to make a BEAUTIFUL bride.

Church Remodeling and such

Well, we grew our auditorium by 15 seats! Yesterday, my Dad and I spent the day cutting down the two unequal pews we had, to be equal in length and short enough to fit from side to side of our auditorium. Before, they were turned lengthwise and when you walked in the front door, everyone was basically looking at you! We wanted to make it more visitor friendly and this also allowed us to set-up two complete rows of chairs. It really looks more like a church now. It felt good, too!

We had 18 in service this morning. I also had Bro. Younkin help lead the service. That was wonderful! I actually got to sit in my chair on the platform! He took the prayer requests (we are still calling them out personally right now) and handled the offering. By the way, we are taking the offering in a black box with a hole in the top that someone had rigged up before we got here! The first week, I thought I would go get us an "up-town" offering bag, but lo-and-behold, the price tag was $46!!!! We are still using the box. We will upgrade someday! (If the Lord lays it on your heart.....!?!)

You should have seen the look of shock on people's faces as they came in today to the new auditorium. It was so neat! My Dad still had some orange modular office walls and they match our orange pews. (We finally got rid of those orange pews in Wichita Falls in the last remodeling project and now we have orange again!)

Our next project is to put the new sign up. The banner came in on Friday and looks really good. I can't wait to see what it will look like! Hopefully we can get it put up on Tuesday. I am borrowing a ladder from the people next door to the church - Jef and Riva Yeh.

Jarrid and Kendra Younkin's little girl, Eliana, is such a cute little baby and is so good in church! That is quite a blessing in a church where there is no nursery and no where to take them except outside if they get loud. This young couple will be taking care of services this Wednesday and Sunday, since we will be heading to Hollister, CA for our niece's (Danelle Hurst) wedding. They are excited to be able to help out and get experience also. We will be flying out on Wednesday after school and coming home Tuesday afternoon. We are looking forward to some cooler weather and some time away, since we didn't get a vacation this year. Camps, then the tryout and taking over process here, took all summer.

This whole remodeling thing started because we wanted to have a Friend Day, but we were afraid we wouldn't have enough seating for everyone! So, now we are ready for our upcoming Friend Day on September 10th. This is the flyer that they are using to invite friends and neighbors to come. Sis. Rhonda and Sis. Crawford were a little unsure about their glowing faces being used on this flyer. I think they look great, but you know how we all are about our pictures!

We enjoyed a wonderful service and an exciting message from Bro. Wayne Francis (the UPCI Youth Department Promotions guy) at the Bernard's church tonight. He was in town speaking at their Youth Retreat. Cameron did not get to go because we did not get moved here in time to get him signed up. Sounds like they had a great time!

Well, that is all I can say... We are a little tired.