Servant Knights

It's that time again

2010-10-05T12:08:00.005-04:00

We just wrapped up the design phase of the next issue of Revive magazine. The files were handed off to the printer yesterday and we approved the initial proofs this morning. If all goes well, the magazines will go in the mail on October 13th and begin arriving in homes on October 15th. We are printing 32,600 copies of this issue and mailing 28,337 copies to families, pastors, and churches across the US.

As a little treat for our friends and family, here is a preview of the cover of this issue.

Please be praying for this issue; that it will speak into the lives of those that receive it in a timely manner. Pray that God will use it to bring renewal to individuals, small groups, and churches throughout the nation.

Revival Week

2009-08-11T09:18:00.005-04:00

Life Action wrapped up our annual Revival Week on Friday. Every year we set aside an entire week where the whole ministry, including all of the outreaches, gathers together to seek the Lord as a community for revival; in our nations, in our ministry, and in our personal lives.

We had a good week of meetings with two great speakers, Tom Elliff and Randy Rebold. At the opening service, Tom played a video clip for us that has been making ripples throughout our staff ever since. I thought I'd post it here to share with all of you.

Insights from Sled Dogs

2009-02-23T10:25:00.006-05:00

Our small group is currently working through the Galatians Small Group Curriculum put out by Tim Keller's church, Redeemer Presbyterian. We've been talking about the Gospel and how Believers can add requirements beyond relying on Christ as conditions for salvation both for unbelievers to receive salvation and for believers to retain salvation and how this deforms the Gospel and causes it to not be the Gospel at all.

This week, we were looking at the parable most commonly known as "The Prodigal Son" and our leader, Jeff, was noting that the story isn't really about the son at all, Jesus actually tells us "There was a man who had two sons." The story is about the Father, not the son. In fact the two sons actually represent two ways that people run from God. The first is the obvious younger son who doesn't want the Father but rather the Father's money and so demands his inheritance and then squanders it in sinful decadent living. The second isn't so obvious but still leads to seperation from the Father. The second is the older son who, even though he stays at home and obeys the Father, it isn't out of love for the Father or wanting a relationship with the Father, it is also out of a desire for the Father's possessions i.e a young goat to share with his friends.

This represents how we desire God's blessings; be they temporal (possessions, health, financial security) or eternal (entrance to heaven, eternal life, avoiding hell) and completely shun God himself. We try to earn those blessings through religious obedience and moral living. Both believers and unbelievers fall prey to this deception but we fail to realize that our "righteousness" has been completely tainted by our sinfulness even to the point that our motives for obeying are distorted causing even our "goodness" to be sinful.

This was fresh on my mind this weekend as I took Yuki out for a run. We'd just had ten inches fall overnight so we had a nice blanket of pristine snow. Even though Yuki is one the the whitest dogs I've ever seen and I had just given her a bath the night before, compared to the purity of the fresh snow she looked rather dingy. We may be "pretty good" people and compared to the behaviour of others we may even look like saints but, in light of God's Holiness, our righteousness is as filthy rags. Only by relying on Jesus and His righteousness can we have any confidence to stand before God and expect acceptance.

Construction Continues

2009-01-15T22:40:00.005-05:00

I know not much has changed over on the new blog but I wanted to reassure y'all that work continues and progress is being made. I'm just about finished with the wire frame of the home page, meaning I've blocked it out in boxes of different shades of grey.

I need to go back through all my reference sites to make sure I haven't forgotten anything that I wanted to include and then I'll start building the skin in CSS.

First Friday

2009-01-12T09:00:00.001-05:00

This morning I am working from home. I am observing the first First Friday (after a sort).

Aaron and I have been thinking through how we can enable the staff of the iMedia Group to maintain their Ministry Partner teams. One idea we came up with was First Fridays. Many cities, on the first Friday of the month, have an arts event of some sort to promote the arts in their city. This may be an artwalk or free admission to galleries and museums or something like that.

We decided to set aside the first friday of each month as a day for our staff to work on Ministry Partner Development. They can work from the office or work from home; they can work on writing newsletters, visit supporters, contact potential supporters . . . whatever. We hoped this would both enable them to do some of these activities and encourage them to do so.

I wasn't able to take last Friday off because we were wrapping up the next issue of the Heartcry Journal and we needed to get the files to the printer before the end of the day. So I'm working from home this morning writing this post, working on our next email update, and starting to lay the groundwork for the wireframe of our new blog design.

We're BAAaack!

2009-01-07T10:00:00.007-05:00

Well, we're back from the Holidays. Getting into the swing of things and enjoying being home.

We drove out to Maryland the day before Christmas Eve and spent six days bouncing around Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania visiting Amanda's Dad and Step-Mom, Amanda's Mom, and even got together with all of Amanda's extended family on her Dad's side that Saturday. Nathan really enjoyed the Holiday season this year (who wouldn't with FIVE present opening gatherings).

Soon after we got back, Amanda got bitten hard by the nesting bug so we've begun picking colors and brainstorming ideas for Nathan's new room, redoing the nursery for Haleigh and finishing the bathroom. Over the weekend we moved took the tree down and moved all of Nathan's toys into his new room. We also went and picked out some bedding for his "Big Boy Bed" and Monday night I laid some boards across the frame so that the mattress would be low enough for him to climb into bed on his own.

That night he slept in his new room, in his new bed for the first time. Boy was he excited. Since then he's spent every night and every nap-time in that bed and he's been doing very well. All in all, even though we had a good trip and really enjoyed the holidays, we're glad to be home.

Evil Plan To Take Over the World (Phase 1)

2008-11-18T08:00:00.003-05:00

The first step in implementing my grand scheme to become filthy rich and retire before I'm forty (also known as earning a little extra income to pay for unexpected medical bills) is to completely overhaul this blog.

I initially wanted to set this site up in Wordpress (another blogging platform) but Wordpress requires a working knowledge of CSS and XHTML, programming languages that didn't even exist when I went to college and got my very rudimentary website development education. Gaining a good understanding of these languages will be essential to executing what I have in mind so I will be using this transition (migration is web-speak) to polish my <div>, <span>, and <class> skills.

If you want to see how it's coming along, the new site is live at www.servantknights.com/blog. I will also be building out the site with more of the functionality that I originally envisioned for the core of our Ministry Partner communications. Beyond the basic blog area, I want to create an "About Us" area, a "Contact Us" page, Photo Albums, a place to download PDF files of our printed newsletters (with possible expanded content, including video?), and places to subscribe to our e-mail updates and our printed newsletter.

Are there any features you guys would like to see in a site geared towards communicating news about our family and our ministry? Leave a comment and I'll be sure to see if I can't work it in to the new site.

Alternative Revenue Streams (Part 2)

2008-11-10T21:42:00.013-05:00

I really appreciate the thoughtful comments from my last post. As there are so many things to consider on this topic, I think I'll be publishing most of my thoughts as posts rather then creating long comment strings
.
As I mentioned in my last post, one of the major drawbacks of side projects is that the extra time commitment and work load drain a person of their energy reserves; hindering the work that the Lord has called them to in the ministry in which they serve. I was discussing this with my close friend/supervisor/fellow-music-team-member Aaron and he was saying what would be ideal would be an arrangement where, as it grew, it would still require the same amount of effort as it did when you started.

Another drawback is that side work of an odd-job nature is typically outside of the profession that a person is practicing within the ministry and to increase your expertise and enable yourself to charge professional level fees for your services diverts you again from the work within the ministry.

So, after considerable time mulling all of this over, this is the plan I've developed.

Within the field of Graphic Design there are many disciplines. I currently find myself fairly knowledgeable in the area of print design with a working knowledge of internet graphics. Outside of those areas there are still the disciplines of photography, web programming or development, motion graphics, animation, typography and font design, and others. There is so much that I have left to learn before I have mastered my profession.

Most of you who know me know that my slightly obsessive tendencies will require that I won't be entirely content until I have learned everything there is to know about as many areas of my profession as possible. Since I am going to be working through these various disciplines anyway, I thought it might be a good idea to see if I couldn't make a little money along the way. There are stock photography sites that you can submit your photos to and receive a commission for their sale. The same is true for custom font families. And again for website and blog themes.

So as I begin to produce work in these areas, I plan on submitting it to the various outlets for redistribution. As I produce more work, my porfolio expands and the potential for more earning expands but the amount of time require to maintain it remains the same.

I'm also going to continue to take on freelance work in the areas of print and web design. These projects not only provide me with the opportunity to work on different types of projects then would come my way at Life Action but also give me a chance to continue to develop my abilities in these areas. And they pay well.

I'm planning on gathering all these pursuits under one umbrella website and calling it Servant Knights Studios.com. (Sound familiar?) This would be centered around a blog the content of which would cover my progress as I pursue mastering the graphic design profession. There are many design blogs out there but I haven't come across one with this approach yet. This would give me yet another alternative income as there are quite a few ways to make money off of a blog. By linking that site in a subdued way with this site (probably through the "About Me" secondary page), there's even the faint possibility that it might generate a few Ministry Partners for us as well.

I figure it will take probably at least six months to get this all up and running. Eventually, I'd hope to put in about four to six hours a week on evenings and weekends. Nathan goes to bed around 9:00 and if I get to sleep by 11:00, I'm usually pretty good. Wednesdays and Thursdays are taken up with Music Team practice and Small Group but if you figure one or two of the other nights I can get two hours in and then three hours or so Saturday or Sunday. If I could post one or two good posts a week, I think that would sustain a blog fairly well.

So, I'd love some feedback on what y'all think. Does this sound feasible or like a major distraction and drain on my time?

Alternative Revenue Streams (Part 1)

2008-10-28T06:53:00.001-04:00

Also known as "Side Work" . . . or "Tent-making"

There's this interesting dynamic that I'm noticing among those of us that work in ministry and live on support. It seems as though many of us have only been able to develop partial support teams and so are living on restricted incomes. What I'm seeing is that this leaves someone in this position searching for ways to supplement their income. Quite a few end up taking side work in their fields or even do odd jobs in order to make a little extra money. This seems to be pervasive throughout the field and not just limited to Life Action.

Having only been able to complete about 50% of our team, I've been engaging in a little bit of this myself. But what I'm noticing is that the extra time commitment and work load is draining me of any energy and focus that I have left after working a full day at Headquarters. Consequently, this actually leaves me with less reserve for fulfilling my role at Life Action and takes up time that could be used in working on raising support.

Not only that, but it raises questions about motive and faith. Is it failing to trust in the Lord to persue other sources of income when living on support? Are you valuing financial security more than a relationship with the Lord and thus making it into an idol? Is living on support even a correct model of ministry, given that so many people struggle to complete their support teams? Some of these questions I'm even hesitant to ponder because they may have drastic consequences to my life decisions, depending on the conclusions they eventually lead to.

Anyway, as I've been spending multiple hours at the top of on extension ladder, doing some painting work for our church for some side money, I've had time to contemplate some of these things. I think I've come to some conclusions but need to "put them down on paper" to see if I actually agree with what I'm thinking.

A Good-looking Bunch

2008-10-25T21:48:00.004-04:00

I thought y'all might like to "meet" the folks that serve with me in the iMedia Group at Life Action.

The gentleman on the left is Wayne Lake who serves as our administrator. He works very hard to help Aaron and me make sure all the Purchase Orders get filled out and all the Invoices get paid on time.

Behind him are the two gentlemen who make up our Audio/Video team: Kirk Jensen and John Wreford. The two of them have worked very closely with Aaron and Nathan Roth (who was recruited around the same time I was) to develop and produce our new weekly podcast: Infuse. Nathan is the smiley young man on the far right.

I am appropriately surrounded by our three print designers. (I'm in the middle in yellow, just in case you weren't sure.) The two ladies in front of me, from left to right, are Lauren Davis and Joy Lehman. Joy has been the lead designer on our quarterly Heartcry Journal, a journal on Revival targeted to pastors and church leaders across America. Lauren has been a valuable asset in developing a number of different promotional and marketing materials as well as recently being the lead design on the complete retool and redesign of our quarterly newsletter.

Standing behind my left shoulder is our Senior Designer, Tom Jones. Tom has been serving with Life Action for over 25 years. During that time, he has faithfully produced the artwork for our semi-annual magazine: Spirit of Revival. He has also been the creative mind behind our award-winning annual calendar. He and I will be working very closely together on a large upcoming project that I'll have to tell you more about in another post.

Rounding out our crew is the young man in the knit cap: Jonathon Toledo. Jonathon is currently off at college but he continues to provide support on the web side of things. He had been working at headquarters assisting Aaron with the maintenance of our website and sending out our various email updates and newsletters.

Last but not least is our intrepid leader, Aaron Paulus. Aaron in the brains behind the whole thing, providing the stategic thinking behind all of our internet communications as well as much of the direction for the Audio/Video and Print Departments. Besides all that, he is in charge of all Marketing efforts for all of our outreaches accept Revive Our Hearts.

We've been blessed that the Lord has gathered such a diverse and talented group of individuals to make up our team as we serve together, using various forms of media to facilitate revival among believers.

Everybody's Going Live

2008-10-22T12:59:00.004-04:00

For those of us who have no idea what a Life Action Revival Summit looks like, the Blue Team is currently conducting a Summit at First Baptist Church in Brandon, Missouri. The church is streaming the services live each night and you can tap into the stream on their website.

The site says "Watch our Sunday Services Live" but the link will take you to the services each night. The schedule for the Summit is posted here, just keep in mind that all times are in Central Time Zone. This would be a good opportunity of you've ever wondered how exactly Life Action ministers to the churches we are in but haven't had a Summit in your area.

True Woman Goes Live!

2008-10-10T10:50:00.007-04:00

Nancy Leigh Demoss in her element

As you may or may not be aware, one of Life Action's outreaches, Revive Our Hearts, is conducting their first ever national conference on biblical womanhood. True Woman 08 kicked off yesterday in Schaumberg, Illinois (a northwest Chicago suburb) with over 6,000 women in attendance.

One of the opening plenary sessions.

As you can imagine, coordinating this event has been quite the undertaking. Our iMedia group has been heavily involved in providing support services for the conferece. Our director, Aaron Paulus, and our newest recruit, James Klein, are on location providing support for the live media (James) and live internet streaming (Aaron).

Aaron doing what he does.

Those of us in the print department were busy in the lead up to the event. Tom was involved in the development of a new resource being released at True Woman (TW08); Holly Olliff's new booklet "Turning the Tide: Raising more children who follow Christ." I worked very closely with Laura Shaffer, Revive Our Hearts' print coordinator, designing all of the directional signage, breakout session signs, and resource room signage. All told I think we had around twenty breakout session signs, half a dozen or so direction signs, and about four dozen resource signs (at least one per table in the "bookstore"/resource room).

Music for the weekend is being led by Keith and Kristyn Getty.

Unrealized Objectives

2008-10-08T18:07:00.004-04:00

So, you may have noticed that there weren't any new posts written here and no emails went out over my week off. The reason being that we jumped head first into Phase I of our bathroom remodel project that first weekend. The work proceeded pretty smoothly, it just took three days longer to finish then I had planned.

That resulted in me wrapping up work on the shower around midnight the night before Scott came to visit. This meant we were able to take showers before he arrived (whoot!) but didn't have time for much else. Many thanks to Dan, Colin, and Aaron whose help on the job was invaluable. If you would like a much more thorough coverage of the shower remodel, there are many pictures over on our Cognitive Meanderings blog.

No worries, the vast majority of Life Action is off to True Woman '08 for Thursday and Friday so, even though I'll be heading in to the office, I'll be taking advantage of the slow work load to catch up on our MPD projects.

Is this thing on?

2008-09-22T22:00:00.001-04:00

This is just a quick note to let y'all know that yes, we're still around. The past two months have been crazy busy; at work, at church, and around the house. We've been good for the most part, mainly just worn out a bit.

Amanda has been battling the alleged "morning" sickness which has left her physically tired as well as feeling ill so we would all appreciate if you could keep her in your prayers.

I am wrapping up the last of our recent major projects before taking a week off from September 29th to October 3rd. We aren't traveling anywhere or making any MPD visits. This will be our first window of family time since I started working for Life Action a year ago.

Oh yeah! I've been at Life Action for a full year! Whoot!

No worries, we are planning on working on some correspondence with our supporters while I'm off so those of you who are on our e-list, you will probably be seeing another e-mail sometime soon and we're hoping to complete the first of our printed newsletters.

After that, our college friend, Scott, will be coming out to visit for the weekend of the 3rd and then Amanda's Dad and Step-Mom will be visiting for a week.

We're so loved. :)

Belated Labor Day Photos

2008-09-04T16:55:00.003-04:00

Tim had fun playing badminton with nieces and nephews.

Nathan and a cousin nosh on some chocolate fudge brownie ice cream cones. What a mess I had to clean up! :)

2008-08-23T19:30:00.000-04:00

EDD: April 23, 2009

Trip to the Zoo!

2008-08-19T19:27:00.006-04:00

With my mom visiting this week, we thought we'd take a trip to our local zoo. We had great weather and it wasn't crowded at all. Nathan had such a great time looking at the animals and riding on the train! And, man, did he take a great nap this afternoon! :)

You can see more pics of the zoo here.

What's In A Name?

2008-07-21T21:45:00.001-04:00

So you may have noticed that the "Name Our Newsletter" poll has been closed for a while and you may have assumed that since "The Knightly News" won by one vote that that will be the name we landed with. However, it has come to our attention that certain individuals engaged in voter fraud, skewing the results (Amanda's sister voted twice).

That left us with three titles in a dead tie. "The Knightly News", "The Servant's Dispatch", and "The Steward's Stylus". While we were intrigued by the humorous component of "The Knightly News," my aversion to using puns and word-play in marketing and communication pieces won out and we decided to go with "The Servant's Dispatch". This idea of a dispatch, a communication from a soldier on the front lines back to his commanding officer, coupled with the servant imagery, to us invoked the parable of the servants and the talents. The image of someone being entrusted with resources and having the responsibility to be faithful with those resources is exactly how we feel about those of you who are our Ministry Partners.

So we now have a title for our newsletter, the template has been designed and we're just left with the hard part; actually writing the content. :) As you might guess, creating visuals comes much more naturally to me then writing does. However, we feel very strongly that those of you who support us deserve very much to hear from us regularly on how we are doing personally and how people are being reached through the your support of our service and ministry with Life Action.

Don't worry, if you aren't a Ministry Partner and would still like to read "The Servant's Dispatch", we'll be generating a PDF version and making it available for download in the sidebar area.

Weekend Round-Up

2008-07-20T21:30:00.004-04:00

Here are some pics from the weekend.

A boy and his dog. A dog and her bone.

Hey, this could work!

"Nathan, where's your belly?"

2008-06-19T07:22:00.001-04:00

Received from our dear Sister-In-Law.

BTW, I've never worked so hard in my life. :)

Encouragement - Part 2

2008-06-02T21:05:00.000-04:00

I am continually amazed at how encouraged Tim and I feel during and after our support trips. Some of our friends and family members are praying for or have experienced revival personally or in their churches. I love hearing their stories and am grateful that they would share them with us. The fellowship that believers have with one another is so unique and special. These trips have the potential to be quite stressful, but the fellowship with other Christians is just incredible.

One thing I am realizing about myself is how much I need the fellowship, how much I need to be in communion with other people. My tendency is to try to go it alone, to be self-sufficient. But you know what? That doesn't work for me, at least not in comparison to the relationships I have forged and am forging through this process. I never knew that relationships could be this fulfilling.

Praise the Lord.

For The Record

2008-06-01T12:12:00.002-04:00

In case ya'll were wondering, you ARE ALLOWED TO (AND PLEASE DO!) leave comments to this blog even if you do not support us financially. :D A friend was wondering about this, which is why I bring it up. So, you are more than welcome to respond to any of these posts, ok?

:)

Lincoln Park Zoo

2008-06-01T11:55:00.005-04:00

We made it to Chicago in one piece, just in time for Tim's younger brother, Noel, to have lunch ready for us (White Chicken Chili - YUM!). Later that afternoon, Noel and Ashley took us to Lincoln Park Zoo. Nathan (and his parents) had a great time looking at the animals and "hoo-hoo-hoo-ing" like monkeys and roaring like lions. What a blessing it was to us to see our little guy delighting in some of God's creation.

BTW, yes, Nathan's face is all banged up. The morning we left for Chicago, Nathan fell out the back door and face planted on the cement stoop. :( He is fine and healing well.

And We're Off!

2008-05-27T21:06:00.003-04:00

Our quick and busy trip to Minnesota starts tomorrow. We're swinging through Chicago to see Tim's younger brother and his wife and then heading to (near) Minneapolis on Thursday where we'll spend a couple of days meeting with three families. We'll be home on Saturday or Sunday depending on how far we want to drive.

This is a whirlwind trip compared to our others and we'll be quite busy, but I'm very much looking forward to it.

Please pray for safe travels for us, good fellowship with friends and family, and that the Lord would be preparing the hearts and minds of those with whom we will be sharing our ministry.

Thanks so much!

Best E-mail Ever

2008-05-22T09:21:00.003-04:00

On Wednesday, we sent out the very first of our e-mail updates. We've been working on developing this communication vehicle for about two months and are really excited to have it completed.

This will allow us to stay in regular communication while reducing the expense of printing & postage that comes from a more frequent newsletter. Also, this will allow our Ministry Partners to receive information about us in the manner that they prefer. I'm working on a form for the sidebar of this blog that will let you subscribe to the e-mail (if you aren't already receiving it) and I will be building an unsubscribe page that will be linked to from the e-mail itself. After we've created the printed newsletter, I'll also provide the opportunity to receive that newsletter digitally (in case you don't like real mail) as well as a second unsubscribe page where you can opt out of receiving it altogether (although I can't possibly think why you would want to) *grin*

A side benefit is that I'm getting lots of experience with these types of pieces which are exactly the kinds of things that our department develops and executes for Life Action. Please let us know what you think about any of these pieces, good, bad, or ugly so I can improve them as well as factor that into our thinking about Life Action's pieces.

Politics & Pundits & Polls, Oh My!

2008-05-20T22:31:00.002-04:00

We are beginning to develop the third and final piece of our communications family for keeping in touch with our Ministry Partners, friends, and family. This blog was the first piece and we recently finished developing an html email template to match. What we'd like to do next is create a printed newsletter with the idea in mind to post semi-regularly to the blog (weekly if possible), send an email update once a month and a print newsletter through the mail every quarter.

However, we can't settle on a name for our newsletter. This is where you come in.

We've posted a poll to the sidebar with some of the concepts we had for a name. We would love to have you pitch in and let us know which one you prefer. If you think they all stink and have a better one, leave it in the comments. Everyone is free to vote, regardless of whether they are official supporters or not (comment too!).

The poll will be up for a week, after which we will tally the results. We reserve the right to completely disregard anything you have to say and name the newsletter whatever we want.

My name is Timothy Joel Ritter, and I'm running for President.

God Bless America.

Head 'Em Up, Move 'Em Out

2008-05-13T09:23:00.002-04:00

Well, it's that time again. We are in the initial stages of organizing another MPD (Ministry Partner Development) trip. This time we're heading up the the Upper Midwest and will be doing a tour through Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota.

We've left this trip until now in order to avoid the dicey-ness of trying to travel with a toddler through the ice and snow that typically plagues that region through March and into April. We have a few old friends, relatives and former supporters that we will be visiting with and that it will be really good to see again.

Please be praying that the Lord will go before us and will be preparing the hearts of those that we will be seeing; that they will be interesting in the message of revival and willing the join with us in promoting and facilitating revival in the lives and churches of believers in America.

Also be praying for us as we continue to see slow progress in our support level. We need extra measures of grace and faith to trust that the Lord will continue to be faithful as he has been in the past and continues to be every day. Pray that we will rest in His promises and the knowledge that His is the earth and everything in it.

Heavy Stuff

2008-05-06T09:52:00.005-04:00

I've posted before about how being in the place where the Lord has brought me, where I sit under rich, substantive teaching every week at Fulkerson, where I have chapel twice a week at Headquarters, where Amanda and I attend small group once a week, and where the community and family we are a part of wrestle with serious, substantive concepts through their blogs and through regular fellowship; how all of this is like drinking from a fire hose.

This morning was no exception. We are going to be watching the videos of some of the sessions from the recent Heart-Cry Conference during our chapels for the next few weeks. This morning, we watched a session by Richard Owen Roberts. Man, was that intense. Ever come out of a message feeling like you've been beat up one side and down the other?

There was so much substance in his message, it would (and may) take multiple viewings and multiple posts to even just scratch the surface of it all. One thing that particularly hit home was that God gives water to those that are thirsty and sends floods to dry ground. How can God give us water if we are not thirsty? Are we not filling ourselves with other things? Has the business and busyness of life robbed us of our desire for Christ? Have we so gorged ourselves on television, movies, news, politics, entertainment . . . relationships . . . theology books . . . worship music . . socializing disguised as "fellowship" . . . training puppies . . . . . . . . blogs
that we have no space left for even a drop of Christ?

How can God fill us with the fullness of Christ when we are full of ourselves?

Like I said . . . heavy stuff.

I came away from chapel this morning feeling like what we ought to do is put aside all of our programs and activities; cancel worship practice, suspend sermon preparation, let go of the book study for small group, and spend a whole lot of time, individually and corporately, in the times we normally "do stuff", to seek the face of Christ and empty ourselves of ourselves.

I'm going to try to track down a source for the video so that I can watch it again and if possible, make it available to you as well. If I find it, I will probably be doing a series of posts processing the subject matter for my own benefit. If the Lord uses it to benefit some of you in the process, all the better.

Other Business

2008-04-28T06:52:00.013-04:00

So besides going through a busy season at Headquarters and filling in leading music for a bit, I thought it would be fun to do a little side work at the same time. What's life without a little challenge every now and then, right?

Actually, I very much enjoyed working on these projects and was glad to be able to serve both the local church body that we are a part of as well as my brother and his wife.

Having drafted and ratified a new constitution and made the transition to an Elder-based governing model, the leadership of Fulkerson felt that it was time to begin to intentionally work on becoming a more outreach and missional oriented body. As a part of that focus, it was decided that we needed to develop and improve some of our promotional pieces for the church so Brian drafted some copy for a new brochure which I then worked closely with him and the other elders to polish, design, and print. This was our first project together and I think it went very well and we ended up with a nice little piece.

I had actually done a little bit of work on some graphics for a new phone directory (community guide? . . . body directory? . . . we haven't landed on what to call it yet) that is being put together and with the development of the brochure design, we were able to create an attractive little cover for the directory as well.

A few weeks later, we began work on a new, custom bulletin "shell" on which our secretary could imprint the different weekly information. Having a fairly established design style by now, this piece came together fairly easily with doing some research into which printing technique would provide us the lowest price and still function with the way we wanted to use it being the most difficult part of the process.

I was also able to wrap up and have printed a brochure that I have been working on for my brother, Noel, and his wife, Ashley. Noel is transitioning from his current position with Breakthrough Urban Ministries to work with the International Teams Urban and Ethnic Division. He will be working as part of the North Lawndale Team on staff with West Lawn Gospel Chapel. Noel and Ashley are needing to gather their own Ministry Partner Team for this position and we've been working together to develop an informational brochure that will be part of their ministry partner development strategy.

It's been very enjoyable working with them and processing this thing called "Support Raising" together. We've been able to dialogue about different approaches and strategies as well as just lend moral support to each other as we go through the process at the same time.

Musical Interlude

2008-04-26T21:41:00.002-04:00

I realized today that y'all might want to know how things went when I was leading music a while back. I know most of you that read this blog go to church with us and therefore know exactly how we did, but for the faithful few who live in other realms, here's an update.

The first week's service went very well. The team played well together and, in my opinion, the congregation responded well. The second week wasn't as smooth from the music team's point of view. There were a number of glitches and bumps that required active thinking to adjust for but I think we all reacted well and for the most part, from feedback I've gotten from friends, the congregation wasn't distracted and for the most part, didn't even notice.

Those two weeks were a stark reminder, though, of how much work leading music is and after that second service, I was pretty well spent. However, I did enjoy it quite a bit and while I haven't heard anything concrete, I'd be more than willing to fill in again in the future.

Coming Up For Air

2008-04-23T16:52:00.000-04:00

So I've had intentions of posting for a while now and then I realized that it's been almost a month since we've last posted. Y'all have probably been wondering what's happened to us it's been so long.

Things have been hoppin' in the iMedia Group lately. Within the past month, we've developed the promotional materials for Life Action Camp's Father/Daughter Banquet, Fall Family Camps and Father/Son Retreats. We've also developed a new email template for their email communications and began working on updating the home page of their website.

Joy and I were busy creating all of the materials for the Heart-Cry Conference, an event that we co-host with Canadian Revival Ministries and is sponsored by quite a few others. This year we designed the conference notebook, a cd package slipsheet, CD faces, Media Order claim tickets and support graphics for the video materials.

In order to get the Heart-Cry Conference materials completed in time for the event, Joy had to take a break from working on the upcoming issue of Heartcry Journal but she has since been able to get back on that project and we are wrapping up the final loose ends. This issue should be ready to go to the printer by early next week.

While all of that was going on, I was wrapping up the design of a new promotional brochure for our Summit ministry, geared towards the Senior Pastors of churches that are considering having a Summit in their church. Lauren provided some additional muscle on that project and we were able to get it completed in time to have 500 pieces printed and delivered for use at our booth at Heart-Cry. Seeing as we've been working on the particular project since shortly after I came on board here, it feels really good to have it wrapped up.

Meanwhile, Tom Jones, our Senior Designer, had begun work on this year's Mid-year Financial Campaign which is being called "Vision Infusion." We were under a rather tight time frame for this project but by working closely with Aaron and the project sponsor, we were able to keep it moving. We wrapped up work on the print material about a week ago and Aaron and I are putting the final touches on the email and web pieces that will support the campaign. The mailing will be arriving in homes as early as Saturday with the last pieces arriving no later than Tuesday. An email will go out on Friday with the website going live within the same window. Please be praying for the Lord to bless this campaign and that people will be moved to infuse their prayers and finances into seeing the Lord revive His church in America.

As if having all this going on wasn't enough, last week the designers had to take Thursday and Friday off while their workstations were being torn down, rearranged and expanded to make room for the internet department of the iMedia Group to move into the same physical space as the print deparment. They didn't complain as the new arrangement allows them a more collaborative environment as well as the best view in the entire ministry. Aaron and I attempted to be productive in spite of the construction but honestly, we didn't get all that much done. I was able to pull together a last-minute ad for Collegiate Impact but that was about all that got done during those two days.

We're all enjoying the new setup and are looking forward to working more closely together.

Leading Music In Service

2008-03-22T10:00:00.006-04:00

Amanda and I have been serving as part of the music team at our church, Fulkerson Park Baptist, for over four years now. In that time, I've played many roles on the team, including rhythm guitarist, bass guitarist, tenor vocalist and percussionist (if you can call faking it at the djembe being a percussionist). Sunday, March 30th, for the first time ever, I will be serving as music leader during a service at Fulkerson.

It has been almost five years since I have led music in a service, going all the way back to when we lived in Lemoyne, Pennsylvania and we led the music team at Shepherdstown United Methodist Church's contemporary service. I would sincerely appreciate your prayers for me as I am making decisions about song arrangements, providing direction for the instrumentalists and preparing to help the members of our congregation engage their hearts and minds in worship of our God. I will need wisdom, insight, patience, and humility throughout the whole week.

Also, please be praying for Amanda and Nathan as this will mean quite a bit of my time in the upcoming week will be spent preparing for Wednesday night practice, conducting practice and practicing myself on Saturday [practice, practice, practice :)].

Another Support Update

2008-03-21T15:43:00.002-04:00

Praise the Lord! Our support has continued to steadily climb and in ways that demonstrate unmistakably that it is the Lord that is gathering our support team for us.

This week, a family friend stopped by headquarters and stuck his head into my "cube" to say "Hi" and to let me know that he and his wife had been praying about supporting us an that we could count on them as part of our monthly financial team. We had not yet approached these friends about partnering with us, the Lord had just laid it on their hearts.

This brings us up to 46%!

Mission Accomplished

2008-03-16T22:02:00.002-04:00

So I don't know if you can tell or not, but we've made a few changes around here. I mentioned a while ago that we would be customizing the look of this blog. Well, here it is.

Whaddaya think?

We're planning on taking this look and developing an e-mail newsletter and a print newsletter based off of it. There may be a detail or two that I missed in changing over the template so if you stumble on something that doesn't quite fit, please be sure to let us know about it.

In other news, this coming Friday is Amanda's twenty-eighth birthday! Don't tell her but I'm cooking up a little something special. ;) If we have anything interesting happen while we're celebrating, I'll be sure to let you know about it.

Support Update!

2008-03-12T22:10:00.004-04:00

We just wanted to let ya'll know that we have seen fruit from our support trip and other meetings and our monthly level is now at 44%!! Praise the Lord!

Also, we have added new pictures of Nathan to the Photo Stacker located in the right hand column of our blog, so you'll have to check that out. You click on the top photo to see the photo beneath it. Enjoy!

State of the Department

2008-02-28T10:28:00.011-05:00

Well, I thought that since I've been back for a few days, I'd let y'all know how we're doing back here at Headquarters.

Our third designer, Lauren Davis, is back with us after being out for a few months for surgery and post-op recovery. Even though she's been able to do some work while she was out, we're very glad to have her back here in Michiana with us.

The new issue of Heartcry Journal was on my desk when I got back and looks really nice. This is the first issue that we've gone with full color throughout and it has added a lot (without actually adding much price). The new issue of Spirit of Revival (SOR) is at the printers and should be finished soon.

We've also wrapped up design of the materials for this year's Vision Gathering, a conference for many of Life Action's major donors and ministry partners. We approved press proofs of those pieces yesterday and they are going to press today.

The Action Partner brochure that many of you have seen the file of is in production at the printer and we are expecting to have a handful to review with the Road Team Leadership when they are all together for Vision Gathering in early March. It's also looking like it may be possible to get some copies of SOR for Vision Gathering, which was a desire of our senior leadership.

As I was typing this post, Aaron stopped by to show me the Home Life Cafe banner that I was working on during our trip. The vendor has printed and produced it already and it came in this morning. Looks great, doesn't it?

All in all, things are going well. All of our major projects are wrapping up and are looking to be produced on time. We're working on putting together some final pieces for Vision Gathering (presentation materials and graphics and such) and are knocking off some of our smaller, run-of-the-mill projects. (That's right, those donor receipts you get every month? Those come through us. Those prayer calendars? Yep, those too.) We'll also be working on some of our work flow and practical things and looking forward to the next Heartcry Journal issue and the Heart-Cry Conference materials.

It's good to be back.

Home Again, Home Again . . .

2008-02-24T12:58:00.003-05:00

Jiggity-jig.

We got in last night around 8:00 p.m. We had been planning on visiting with friends in Ohio but since they had a family function that took them out of town, we decided just to press on through on drive straight home.

The trip took a total of 14 hours and, needless to say, we were all pretty exhausted by the time we rolled into South Bend. We stopped by to surprise Sarah at work which was quite fun and then headed home to our comfortable, familiar, and most welcome beds.

We are spending today recouping and settling in (unpacking after a two week trip is always . . . interesting) and then we will begin writing thank you cards and developing our other MPD communication devices in earnest.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers for us while we traveled. More updates and stories will follow soon.

Encouragement

2008-02-12T09:29:00.001-05:00

I just wanted to say "Thank you" to a couple of people that we've met with thus far in our support raising journey. I won't mention their names; it'll suffice to say they are the parents of both of my freshman year college roommates (I also went to high school with both of them.).

They have been unbelievable encouraging to us and excited about what Life Action does in our country. Tim and I soak up their kind words like dry sponges and it is really really appreciated!

Thank you, dear friends!

On the Road Again...

2008-02-07T22:51:00.001-05:00

"Just can't wait to get back on the road again!"

Seriously, though, I am excited about our upcoming trip, if not a little daunted by all the packing I still have left to do.

We will be leaving Saturday after lunch and staying with friends of Tim's in Ohio. I'm so thankful to not have to make the whole 12 hour trip (and that is the figure pre-baby) in one day.

All of the meetings planned so far are with people we know, although some of which we have not seen in years. This is what I'm looking forward to, the catching up with old friends.

Please be praying for us: safe journeys, the Lord will be preparing the hearts of those we will be meeting with, that our financial levels would increase, and that we'd have a renewing time of fellowship with friends.

Thanks so much!

See you in a couple of weeks!

And now I'm going to bed! :)

Request For Prayer

2008-02-05T22:17:00.001-05:00

We received an email today from one of our administrative staff regarding the Summit that one of the teams is currently conducting in El Dorado, Arkansas.

There is a man in the church that they have been specifically praying for who is being very responsive during the Summit. He has asked forgiveness from the pastor and others and it seems like God is really at work in his life. The Pastor does not seem be responsive to this man. Please pray for the Pastor to be broken and humble in the midst of this Summit. It is possible that he is the key to this Summit breaking wide open!

Also, there is a man who has attended each service who divorced his wife 17 years ago. Neither have remarried. He is believing that he and his wife need to get back together. Please pray for this couple that God would do a work of reconciliation in their relationship.

Thank you for praying. This is a very critical time in the midst of this Summit!!

Home Life Cafe

2008-02-02T23:30:00.000-05:00

This project was a redesign of the workbook materials for a special seminar that takes place on the second Saturday of a Summit. The Road Team Leadership Team was wanting to take what was called the Family Revival Seminar, rename it Home Life Cafe, and theme the seminar around a coffee shop setting.

The cover is a custom illustration that was created by a classmate of mine from college, Jen Scheckels, and the layout was designed by Lauren Davis, one of our in-house designers. I was heavily involved, coordinating with Jen and providing creative direction and input to both Jen and Lauren.

So far, the piece has met with very positive reactions, both from within the ministry and from those who have attending a Home Life Cafe seminar since the Blue Team has started using it.

To flip through the workbook, either click on a corner of a page and it will auto-flip itself, or you can click, hold and drag a page. This format (the animated page flip) is something that we are considering for digitally publishing "Spirit of Revival". Life Action did something very similar for the previous issue of SOR but they had to contract it out to a third party provider. In anticipation if the upcoming issue of SOR, I did a little research into the effect and how it is created. I soon discovered that it is created in Flash and after digging a little further, found an open source copy of the native Flash files, enabling someone who has a working knowledge of Flash to create their own custom page flip files on their own.

What do you think? Would this be a good format for publishing "Spirit of Revival" online? Keep in mind that the size and resolution can be adjusted and that this is a very basic application of the format. More advanced uses would include active hyperlinks embedded withing the articles, linking to additional resources; embedded video content; and just about any other website based interactive content. Another idea I'm mulling over is proposing to convert the extensive archive of SOR issues to this format for those who may not have received earlier issues or may of lost the copy they want to reference.

Having A Little Work Done

2008-01-27T20:30:00.000-05:00

So the time has come, I think, to begin to make this blog a little more unique. I've been poking around and figuring out how blogs are constructed and I think I have a good enough handle on it to be able to add some extra spice to this one.

To begin with, you may have noticed that in the sidebar, we have included a Photo Stack. This is a widget that I came across in my meanderings of the world wide web. Provided by the good people over at GoodWidgets.com (they're not bad), we thought it would be a really snazzy way to share random pictures of our family with you.

In the days and weeks to come, we'll probably be adding a new header and tweaking the color palette as well as possibly trying out some other bells and whistles. Be sure to let us know what you think of the new stuff and if you have any suggestions as to what you'd like to see, we'd love to hear about it.

Year One

2008-01-11T19:37:00.000-05:00

Well, it's the start of another year and here in the iMedia Group, that means taking stock of where we are, figuring out where we want to go in the next year, and developing a strategic plan for getting there. My boss, Aaron, and I have been spending a lot of time doing some critical thinking and trying to pull together a comprehensive, coherent roadmap for the Print Department.

One of the things that we are trying to develop is a way to fill a hole that we see in the services that Life Action provides to churches, families, and individuals. As we see it, right now Life Action is a mostly event based ministry. There are some resources that people can take advantage of to follow up to help them integrate the revival principles they have learned (mainly the Seeking Him devotional, Nancy's radio program, and the Life Action Camp) but we would like to develop a strategic publication that more specifically addresses this area. We are currently in the early stages of creating a podcast to be distributed regularly through our website and we would like to add to that a print piece which we think will give us an effective follow up ministry to those whose lives have been changed in a Summit or Thirst Conference.

We are also continuing to consider how we can best integrate the efforts of our three media departments and best utilize the time and talents of the staff that we have. Aside from all of this thinking and planning, we are also continuing to work on our regular publications, including a new issue of Spirit of Revival which, Lord willing, we will have completed by early to mid-March. Please be praying that the Lord guides us and gives us wisdom during this time as we are laying the groundwork for the coming year.

An Exercise In Flexibility

2008-01-07T22:01:00.000-05:00

While all of that with our cars and our dryer was going on, the iMedia Group was in the middle of wrapping up the last of our major year-end projects.

Every year, Life Action sends their major donors a Christmas present as a way of saying "Thank You" for helping us promote revival in churches and homes throughout America. This year our leadership had the idea of rather than giving our ministry's supporters one more thing to put on a shelf or set on a desk, it would be nice to give them a gift that they would be able to give to someone else in turn.

It took a little doing but in the end, what we sent out was a Gift Certificate to a two day, "Romantic Reflections" retreat at The Lodge. This Gift Certificate was placed within a gift certificate envelope which was wrapped with a ribbon belly band and sealed with an embossed foil seal. All of this was placed within a custom gift box that was wrapped with a cord ribbon and a personalized note from our Executive Director was tucked under the cord ribbon. The idea was for the donor to take the gift certificate, fill it out, and give it to a pastor-friend for Christmas.

This was quite the project to oversee as it involved ten internal staff members (not to mention the dozen or so volunteers for the "stuffing party"), four external vendors and the post office. Due to an internal miscommunication at the vendor, the custom gift box order arrived four days late and partially incomplete. Fortunately, we had a contingency plan in place and we were able to substitute the missing gift boxes with a type of envelope wrap and we were still able to get the mailing out in time for them to arrive before Christmas.

We are already beginning to receive replies from pastors that received the gift certificates for Christmas. Please be praying that our donors and their pastors will be blessed by this project and that there will be a good response. We would love to see many pastors come to these retreats this year and return to their ministries rested and refreshed from time spent with the Lord.

Perfection In Timing

2008-01-06T15:26:00.000-05:00

I wanted to post about this a lot sooner but have been prevented, for one reason or another, from doing so until now. Brace yourselves, this is going to be a long post but I think the details are important. :-)

Amanda was getting the house in order in preparation for a visit from her Mom and her Mom's Fiance' on Friday, December 7th, when, on the very last load of laundry, the dryer stopped working. It still spun around but there was no heat whatsoever. We thanked the Lord that she was able to finish all our clothes (the dryer had only blankets in it) and put off worrying about it until after our guests headed back home.

Friday night, Mom and Chuck arrived, bringing along a wonderful Christmas present in the form of a Silver 2002 Honda Civic (Amanda's dream car). Mom had purchased a Kia and instead of trading in the Honda, she and Chuck thought they would like to give it to Amanda. We were very grateful as the two cars we had were getting older and would need to be replaced in the near future.

On Saturday, we were up at my folks house for the big, family-wide, birthday party for Nathan's first birthday (Happy Birthday Nathan!) and after my Dad found out our dryer had died, he said "I've got an old dryer sitting in our garage, you can have that one if you want it." Unfortunately, it was an electric dryer and our basement was not set up for an electric dryer. We determined that it wouldn't be a big deal to make the adjustments needed to accommodate the replacement dryer but I wasn't comfortable tackling the job by myself.

At church the next day, I briefly mentioned the situation to our friend, AJ, and he offered to help me with the electrical work but said that he was booked and wouldn't be able to help me until the next Friday. We figured we could get through five days without having to do laundry and thanked AJ for his willingness to help.

On Monday morning, as I was pulling into my parking space at work, the '91 Camry (affectionately referred to as Bullet since he couldn't drive very fast) had the right-front CV joint fail. Slightly irritated but not overly upset (we had known Bullet was on his proverbial last legs for a little while) I headed in to Headquarters very thankful in the perfection of God's timing in providing us with a new vehicle just days before.

On my way in, I ran into AJ, who told me that he had been able to shuffle some of his week and would be able to help me with the dryer that evening, so long as that wasn't a problem with me. This was perfect as I now needed a ride home and we would use his truck to drive the dryer from my Dad's to our house. We picked up the dryer that afternoon and worked all evening removing the old dryer, capping the gas line, shuffling around circuit breakers, installing a new 220 breaker and running wire to a new 220 outlet. Ready to be finished and let AJ get home to his family, we hooked up the replacement dryer and pressed "Run".

Nothing happened.

It turns out that the replacement dryer was missing machine screws at the contacts between the power cable and the internal mechanics. I picked up replacement screws the next evening and the dryer has been serving us wonderfully ever since.

I switched over to driving the '97 Camry (affectionately referred to as Enya) which worked well for us until a week later when she stalled out on me at a stoplight on my way home from work. I was able to get her restarted but any time the RPMs dropped below 1000, she would stall out again. Fortunately, I was able to nurse her back home and when I called a man in our church, who is a mechanic, the next day, he was able to tell right away what the problem was. After hearing about all that had happened with our cars and that we were planning on selling Bullet for scrap metal, he offered to repair Enya in exchange for Bullet. He intends to fix up Bullet to sell and has offered to give us a share of the sale price as well.

We are incredibly grateful for the Lord's timing and provision for us through all of this. Even in the midst of these events, He gave us an awareness that He was in control and that the timing of these troubles was intentional. We have seen His hand sustaining us though it all and cannot think of a better way He could have orchestrated what happened.

Praise the Lord.

2007 - The Year in Review

2007-12-30T18:54:00.000-05:00

2007 was full of changes!

On January 1, 2007, Nathan was 4 weeks old. We were certainly still getting used to being parents and caring for a newborn. Those first couple of months were hard for me in particular mostly because of sleep deprivation and raging hormones. Yet I have grown into motherhood and it is one of the greatest joys of my life. Nathan has developed beautifully and become quite the active little boy as he walks around the house playing with toys, reading books, and giving hugs.

Over the summer, Tim came to realize that his job at Alphagraphics, while it paid the bills, was not a good place for him to be employed. The demands of the job were wearing on him (as he worked an average 60 hours a week in an extremely high stress environment), and by extension, our marriage. We knew something had to change. The same week Tim make the decision to start looking for work elsewhere, a friend who works at Life Action asked Tim if he would consider raising support (again) to come work at the ministry in their print department. After prayer and consideration, we said YES! and Tim has been working there full time since September. We are still putting our financial and prayer team together, but we are encouraged to be at 30% financial commitment.

In August, my younger sister, Sarah, moved away from Harrisburg, and into our 2nd bedroom here in South Bend. While it has not always been easy to have another person living in our house, it definitely has been a blessing to have her here. She has a quick wit and a wry sense of humor. She adores her only nephew and delights in taking care of him so that Tim and I can go to music practice or small group. We are very thankful to have her here with us.

December itself has been very busy, as Nathan turned 1, both my mom and her fiance and my dad and stepmom were out to visit, and we celebrated Christmas (and boy was it fun with a one year old!). We were extremely happy to receive the gift of a car from my mom. And it came just in time, too, because within the next two week, our grey car died and our blue car needed some serious work! Thankfully a man at our church was able to fix the blue car for the price of the grey car; we are now a two car family again: the new car and the blue car.

2007 was a year of ups and downs, privileges and struggles, but the Lord has seen us through. As the year ends we are very optimistic about the coming year and are excited to see what the Lord has in store for us!

Our prayer for you for 2008 is that the Lord would richly bless all of you and that you would take joy in the God of your salvation.

Merry Christmas!

2007-12-24T13:31:00.000-05:00

I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
God, the Lord, is my strength;
he makes my feet like the deer's;
he makes me tread on my high places.
-Habakkuk 3:18b-19

I was actually looking for a different verse when I came across this one (and realized the verse I was looking for was really a lyric from a Chris Tomlin song).

This has been a crazy month, but the Lord is our strength and I will take joy in my Savior even in the midst of hard times. I am in wonder still that Christ Jesus was fully God and fully man. He understands humanity better than we do, and so I can find comfort in His sovereignty and awe in His grace and mercy.

Merry Christmas, friends and family, and Happy New Year!

It's Been Too Long

2007-12-01T11:16:00.000-05:00

Wow, it's been a while since we've posted to this blog. So much has been happening that it's too much to cover in one post.

Immediately after getting back from our trip in October, I found myself in the middle of Life Action's year end campaign. This is an incredibly important campaign for us since a large percentage of the financial support that the ministry receives comes in during the last two months of the year.

This was also the first major campaign under the umbrella of the iMedia group so we were implimenting some of the principles that we built the group on, namely integrating the efforts of the different media departments. The campaign consisted of a major mailing piece that was sent to all of the ministry's donors shortly after Thanksgiving. This was preempted by an email that went out a few days before the mailer was set to arrive in people's homes, letting them know it was coming. This email included a link to a webpage that we built for the campaign that included a video message from our Executive Director, a slideshow of testimonies from the past year and a downloadable version of the brochure from the mailing as well as a link to where people could contribute the the year-end matching challenge.

Our senior designer, Tom Jones, created the print pieces for the mailing; Lauren Davis, another of our designers repurposed some of those graphics for the email and the website; Aaron Paulus, the Director of iMedia, worked with our Audio/Video guys, John Wreford and Kirk Jensen to produce the Video; and the website was pulled together and coded by a web-house that we contracted. Overall, we ended up with a campaign that we felt was very well coordinated and that really captured and communicated the heart of the ministry with regards to the past year and the year to come.

Please be praying that the Lord will bless the efforts of all of those involved and that there will be a generous response to this campaign.

Why "Servant Knights?"

2007-11-12T22:07:00.000-05:00

We had the idea of starting this blog very shortly after Amanda and I began the process of gathering together a support team. Amanda had started another blog in order to interact with the books that she reads and we quickly saw how uniquely suited the blog-o-sphere would be for communicating with our Ministry Partners.

The process of deciding on an address for our website actually turned out to be rather difficult. We wanted it to be personal since it's purpose was for personal communication but all of the variations we could think of along the lines of www.ritterfamily.com were either taken or just sounded stilted. Amanda suggested that we include "knights" as part of the address since the name "Ritter" is a German word meaning knight and the ideals of knighthood and chivalry have significant meaning for us. We gave the problem considerable thought for two or three days without much progress.

Then one morning I was reading through the next section in my plan to read through the epistles this year and this is what I came across:

Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. 2 But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. 3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing. 4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

This passage just seemed to resonate me and crystallized what had been a hodgepodge of disconnected thoughts and feeling about ministry that had been fluttering around in my head. It has been a growing desire of ours to spend our time and use our resources in ways that advance the gospel and kingdom of Jesus. Recently, God has been bringing me to a place where I could honestly say that I was willing to do whatever he wanted me to if it would bring Him Glory. The idea of ministry being an act of service, that is, something done for benefit of another without thought to your own benefit, coupled with the imagery of knighthood fit perfectly with the vision we had for the role we fill at Life Action and within our church. That's when we came up with servantknights.com.

Drinking From A Fire Hose

2007-11-08T16:24:00.001-05:00

This morning, we had chapel at Life Action like we usually do every Tuesday and Thursday morning. Mark Bearden was teaching and he shared a message about faith. As I was sitting there, having my understanding of faith and how it works completely reoriented, it occured to me just how much excellent teaching I am exposed to in the course of a week.

Besides the morning service every Sunday at church, Amanda and I also attend a small group on thursday nights and I attend two chapel services at work. Also, the Lord has, in the recent past, enabled me to begin regularly reading Scripture in the morning before work. I'm also working through two different books, one on Christ-Centered Preaching and one on Biblical Parenting. Add to all of that the engaging discussion that occurs on a number of blogs that I try to keep up with and the result is like trying to drink from a fire hose.

So this morning I was greatly thankful that the Lord has provided me with such an environment in which to grow and mature. Ephesians 5:26 tells us that Christ sanctifies the church by washing us with the water of the word. Although I would like to be able to process and absorb everything that I hear, it's wonderful to know that at least I will have no problem getting wet.

Photo credit: http://www.chicagoclout.com/

Trip Statistics

2007-11-06T17:05:00.000-05:00

Here are a few random statistics from our recent Ministry Partner Development trip to the Mid-Atlantic states.

24 days
8 states and 1 District of Columbia
7 different beds
15 households
91.7 gallons of gas
52.5 hours of driving
2460 miles
70 meals
180 diaper changes
4 dogs, 6 cats, 3 horses and a couple of dozen fish

3 people really glad to be home.

Thank You!

2007-11-04T13:11:00.000-05:00

We arrived safely home around 2:30 yesterday afternoon. I unpacked most of our things while Tim kept an eye on Nathan. Sarah made us pizza fondue for dinner last night and has lasagna in the oven for lunch today. (I think she missed us!) We had a good trip, but it was exhausting and we are glad to be home.

We wanted to say "Thank you!" to a number of people who helped and cared for us both physically and spiritually:

*Thank you to Mom and Dad Ritter for the use of their vastly more reliable car. Thank you to my Dad and Stepmom, Cindy, for the use of their vehicle to travel around Pennsylvania and to attend our 5 year reunion at Messiah.
*Sincere thanks to those families who let us crash at their homes for a night or two and especially to my Dad and Cindy who let us use their home (and who fed all three of us night after night) as our "base of operations."
*Thank you to those family members and friends who invited us into their homes and lives so we could share Tim's work with Life Action with them. It was awesome to see all of you and to reconnect.
*Thank you to Sarah and Brian who so graciously took care of our cats, Ginny and Sophie, while we were travelling. More thanks to Sarah who took care of the house as well, taking out the trash, returning library books for me, etc.
*Many thanks to those who were praying for us on our trip. We are confident that the Lord honored your prayers and we are grateful for them.

(I hope I haven't forgotten anyone! Thank you!)

It is so good to be home!

Homeward Bound

2007-11-02T20:52:00.000-04:00

Well, we're camped out for the night at a hotel just outside Akron, Ohio. We left Mamaw's (Amanda's Grandma's) place in York around mid-morning after stopping in to visit Papaw (Amanda's Grandpa) in the nursing home.

It's amazing what a difference turning our car towards home has done for our moods. We had a great visit with another of my roomates from college yesterday and it was good to see Mamaw and Papaw one last time. We had a pretty good travel day today which is a great blessing since we noticed that Nathan is cutting a new tooth again. (Fever on the way out, teething on the way back; what a way to travel.)

We got into our hotel around 5:00 which gave us time to settle in and unwind after a day of driving. We're also getting a chance to check e-mail and blog a bit (obviously). Sweet and glorious free wi-fi. One more day and about two hundred and seventy eight miles to go.

Feeling Much Better

2007-10-28T10:05:00.001-04:00

We are feeling much better today.

We were able to relax yesterday, take naps, and the sun finally came out after days (and about 5 inches) of pouring down rain. My mood has risen with the sun. Yea!

Our plans for the rest of our trip:
1. Visiting with college friends today in New Jersey.
2. Visit with my Mom and her fiance, Chuck, one last time before we go home. We'll spend tonight with them.
3. Hopefully see another college friend/roommate of Tim's.
4. Possibly give a presentation at a prayer group whose members have a heart for revival on Wednesday evening.
5. Meet with another of Tim's college roommates and dear friends on Thursday, the friend's day off.
6. Leave from friend's place and spend Thursday night with my grandma in Pennsylvania. Leave PA and drive into Ohio on Friday, where we will spend the night.
7. Be home Saturday!!! Sleep in my own bed (I miss you!).

Cheers!

Two weeks down...

2007-10-27T09:20:00.001-04:00

...and one to go. I'm just about ready to come home. We've been super busy and have met with lots of family and friends, which has been great.

But I'm tired of travelling (I don't know how the Norris family did this for two months!). It took us 7 hours to get back to my Dad's from Virginia yesterday (it took us 3 and 1/2 hours to get there). We thought we left early enough, but with bad weather and accidents, we managed to hit Washington, D.C. and Baltimore at rush hour. NOT fun! And I can't neglect to mention that Nathan was most displeased the majority of those 7 hours. But we managed to survive the traffic and each other and arrive at Dad and Cindy's by 8:30 (instead of 5:00 like we'd hoped). We are taking today to rest and possibly see Sarah and AJ and Katelynn as they travel out East for a support raising trip of their own. Tomorrow we're off to New Jersey to meet with college friends of Tim's.

Our Weekend in Pennsylvania

2007-10-24T09:11:00.000-04:00

Our weekend went by very quickly as we were quite busy. Our trip to homecoming was fun and it was great to see old friends. We also spent lots of time with my grandparents and other family members.

Monday was rather interesting, though, a Murphy's Law sort of a day. One of my grandmother's toilets broke on Sunday and maintainence didn't want to fix it on a weekend (they'd have to be paid overtime) even though my grandma had company. So they were set to come Monday (and actually the toilet was fixed fine). But Monday morning, I was rinsing out a bowl in the kitchen sink and the faucet handle broke off in my hand, with the water still running! I had to wake up Tim, who then turned off the water under the sink. The maintainence man did come, but had to leave to get a part for the sink. When he got back, we left to go visit my grandpa in the nursing home. Sarah, Tim, Nathan, and I went back to my grandma's so that grandma and grandpa could visit together with the intention of picking up my grandma later on. Well, we got back to the house and the front door was locked. No big deal, it usually is. But we'd forgotten the garage door opener with my grandma, so we drove back to the nursing home (about a 2 minute drive) and got the opener. Unfortunately, the door to the kitchen was locked, and so we were locked out. It was nice outside, so we just waited in the backyard until 3 when we were going to pick up grandma. Sarah was playing with Nathan and a windchime. Nathan accidently pulled off that middle, sort of "clapper" part of the windchime. Oops. I managed to fix that part while Sarah went to pick up grandma. Well, this was the one time that grandma left the house key on the hutch and the maintainence guy locked all the doors. We were still locked out! But we called the help desk and they sent someone to open the door for us. :) Thankfully, it was beautiful outside! Later on I was doing some laundry and the washing machine started dancing around as the load became lopsided. It is located behind those accordian type doors. The washer had pushed the door open part way, so I stopped the cycle. Well, I couldn't open the door because the washer was part way out and I couldn't move the washer because it was too heavy. So, I woke Tim up again to move the washer (he was taking a nap). The rest of the laundry commensed without incident. :)

What a day!

God Is Always Good

2007-10-19T13:45:00.000-04:00

We recently recieved this update from Steve Canfield, the revivalist for the Blue Summit team.

God Is Always Good.

The fact that "God is always good", is certainly no new revelation, it just seems that it is easier to see that when things are going well. We just finished a great meeting at
Covenant Presbyterian Church in Palm Bay, Florida. They had never held a week of
meetings much less two weeks and although we were scheduled to end on the second Wednesday, we extended through the third Sunday. The healing of hurts and bitterness took center stage as the church had experienced a split less than a year ago and the wounds were still raw. I have been in few churches that were as responsive as this church was in attendance, openness and obedience. There were hours of testimonies shared during the summit and hundreds of written and verbal
testimonies were shared in addition to those shared publicly. Here are a few excerpts from the written.

..."God has broken me in area of moral purity, forgiveness towards parents, tithing, devotions and maintaining purity in my dating relationship. God has also used you to help confirm His call on my life to seminary and full time ministry."

..."I was struggling unsuccessfully with lust. Over the past two weeks, God has begun to teach me about brokenness. I've committed my life to Him all over again. I've lost the desire to lust. I have not watched a TV program with any immoral content. I have only eyes now for my wife. Also, my devotional time is now daily and I'm looking forward to my Lord..."

..."I have dishonored my husband...I am prideful - I've controlled him with subtle guilt and have manipulated him in so many ways - I asked his forgiveness...now by God's grace - I have to live out Jesus...and let God change him."

..."Two weeks ago, I would have told anyone who asked that I was 'Fine'. However, that was not the case...I had become numb to many sins or even unaware of others...only He could change my life - and He could start that 'renewal' process, now I have a broken spirit. He also impressed upon me that I needed to give Him the first fruits of my day. For the last two weeks I have spent over an hour in prayer and in His Word. He has spoken to me during those times in ways I have never experienced..."
..."The 12 step morning prayer times is the first time in my life (I'm 60 yrs old) that I've gotten up early to spend time with the Lord..."

..."Your team started 2 weeks ago with my family that was coasting in their faith and going through the motions of religion. You have shown us a higher standard and have breathed new life into my family..."

A Couple Days of Needed Rest

2007-10-17T08:36:00.000-04:00

Our time in Southern Maryland went really well. We were able to catch up with college friends and talk philosophy and just hang out.

We drove back up to my Dad's house (a hour and a half trip) for dinner and to repack our suitcases. (My Dad and Cindy have been kind enough to let us use their house as our base, so to speak. We've dumped all of our things there, and then we'll take smaller trips to the surrounding areas.) We'd driven about 925 miles in 4 days.

Sunday evening through Tuesday evening, we spent time with my Mom and her fiance, Chuck, at their house in Hockessin, DE. It was relaxing and fun. We were able to get to know Chuck a little better and to share our work with Life Action with them. It was a much needed break.

We have three meetings in the next two days and then Friday we are going up to York, PA to visit with my grandparents and to attend our 5 year reunion/homecoming at Messiah College. We're certainly looking forward to that!

One leg down

2007-10-13T11:35:00.000-04:00

Well, we made it. As I write this, we are enjoying a little down time at Amanda's Dad and Stepmom's in Colora, MD. Our first two days on the road were . . . interesting. We got off to a slightly late start from our house (we had some packing left to do because of being at the doctor's) and then we missed our exit off of the Indiana tollroad. Not a big deal but it meant that we ended up taking a state highway south through Ohio which took us literally through Hicksville (a lovely town of about 3,500 people).

After a wonderful lunch with some friends in Bellefontaine, we headed east towards Columbus where we got stuck in a traffic jam. We didn't arrive in Pittsburgh where we were spending the night until after 9:30 (we had planned on 7:00-ish). We spent the night at my Uncle Steve and Aunt Adele's who made us feel very much at home. Yesterday we took it easy getting out the door and, after a lovely day driving through the gorgeous mountains of Pennsylvania (still feels like home), we pulled in here around 5:00.

Nathan is doing much better. His fever is gone and after a day of slow eating yesterday, his appetite is back to normal. We're setting up camp here this morning and will be heading out shortly after lunch to visit with some close college friends in the D.C. area.

And we're off!

2007-10-10T21:54:00.000-04:00

And we're ready! Mostly... I think. :)

It's 10 pm and we're nearly packed. We plan on leaving around 8 am tomorrow morning.

Poor sweet Nathan developed a fever this morning and we've been trying to bring it down. He definitely feels much better after he's taken some medicine. Hopefully he'll be feeling better for our trip.

Well, I'm off to finish packing and to get a good night's sleep. :)

It begins.....

2007-10-05T14:55:00.000-04:00

Amanda and I have started this blog as a place where we can share what is happening with us and our family as we serve at the headquarters of Life Action Ministries. We will be using it to work through issues that come up, run ideas past our ministry partners and share prayer requests. Our prayer is that the Lord would use this blog as an encouragement to us and to you.

On a technical note, to help quickly distinguish between our individual posts, Amanda's will be in a light green while mine will be in this light gray.