WOW, where do I start?!!

WOW, where do I start?!! So much has taken place, both in my life and within my heart during these past 5 or 6 months that it’s sometimes difficult to grasp. Maybe the thought, idea, or vision to what I believe God has now called me to do, has always been around in the back of my mind or has at least crossed my thoughts before but never has God told me to do it…….....until now! And I am so sure that He has. I should mention I have spoken at summer Bible camps for over 20 years; spoken at weekend retreats for church groups; filled the pulpit many times for different occasions; spoken at banquets; taught Wednesday night Bible study for months; taught Sunday school for years; and even preached one revival and two funerals (my precious Momma and Daddy). Still I don’t think God had called me to do what I am about to do until He called me now.
Maybe it got a little more close to me about a year or so ago in the summer of 2006 when my former pastor Greg Naude announced he was leaving the church to go and plant a church in Northern Virginia. He invited me to go with him one day and meet Tony Inmon who helps folks who want to plant churches to do just that and was helping Greg to plant one in the Haymarket area. So I went and talked, and mostly listened, but just didn’t feel it was what God wanted me to do at that particular time. Then Greg left about 6 months later at the end of December to go to the Haymarket area, (I even got to preach for him the last Sunday, December 31, 2006) and I started the new year, 2007, trying to keep up a couple of things God had led me to do at the church and the church started the new year without a pastor.
As the months grew on, I tried to fill in where I could (mainly doing Wednesday night Bible study for a good while) and continued with the “Monthly Movie Madness” on the last Saturday of the months and also with Stage II, a contemporary style service we had also stared about a year or so ago on the last Sunday night of the month. I can still remember one Saturday night in the summer when we had almost 50 people come to our movie night, when we showed it outside on the back of the church wall, sort of like a “drive-in” without the cars. With good hotdogs, snacks, praise songs, and a time for devotions, I felt God blessed, and the evening seemed to go real well despite the rain that caused us to move the event inside for the last portion of it. As the fall months came, things seem to change somewhat and at times get tougher, and I felt God starting to speak to my heart about doing something else.