Meet Naomi Linda

Yep, it's a girl! The ultrasound we had on Monday confirmed that and also that she is healthy and developing just fine. Our revised due date is September 29th. Above is our favorite of the pictures we got from the appointment. You can see her spine and the sillouette of her head with her lips slightly parted as well as her left arm raised up near her face. We can't wait to meet her!



We decided on the name for a girl within a few weeks of finding out Emily was pregnant. We like that Naomi isn't too common (outside of the top 100 girls names) but is still known enough as to not throw people off too bad with spelling or pronunciation. We also really like how it sounds and it's meaning (sweet/pleasant/beautiful) as well as it's biblical origins. The Naomi of the bible (Ruth's mother-in-law) is a beautiful example of the grace God shows through family relationships. Our prayer is that we would be that kind of channel of grace to our daughter. Linda was Emily's birth mother's name and we wanted to honor her memory. We like that our daughter's middle name will have a meaningful story behind it as well as a pleasant sound.



Sorry it took so long to get this posted. I had some difficulty finding a scanner and then getting the scanned images uploaded. Thanks for all of your prayers. We will keep updating this blog with relevant news and photos including updates about our coming move, Naomi's continuing development (and it's impact on Emily) and Matthew's ongoing job search. We hope to have some photos from Matthew's graduation and our visit with his parents later this week.



We will leave you with an image of Naomi's tiny little foot (sorry it got scanned crooked)

Big Week!

So it has been more than a week since we updated this blog and a lot has happened in that time. It has been one of the biggest weeks of our lives. We've enjoyed good times with friends and family and personal milestones. It is going to take a few days to catch up a little with all the exciting things that have been going on in our lives so keep checking back over the next week or so. We'll have news and photos posting rapidly for the next few days.

Good Times

Matthew finished his last Seminary class last Tuesday. It's been a good week since then with a mix of productivity and fun. Emily still has to go to work but has been able to get in on some of the fun as well. Here is a brief review of what we've been up to.

Wednesday - Matthew celebrated academic freedom with breakfast with friends followed by a couple of hour playing Nintendo Wii before hitting the Internet again to resume the job search.

Thursday - Matthew sent out 14 new resumes and had a phone interview with a church in Indiana. In the evening we both enjoyed good times with friends and good food at our friend Mike Pace's birthday party.

Emily and our friend Virginia Thomas hamming it up during a game of shuffle board at Saturday's Masters Class Retreat at Canby Grove.

Friday - Matthew finally crashed and spent most of the day resting in some capacity. We enjoyed a quiet evening at home and went to bed early.

Our friends Erin Searight, Luke Thomas, Ford Jordan & Virginia Thomas at Masters Retreat

Saturday - After getting some chores done in the morning we headed off to the Multnomah Master's class retreat where we ate large amounts of good food and had good relaxing fellowship with many of our friends from school. We enjoyed visiting and playing mini-golf, Foosball, shuffle board, etc. The day was capped off with a time of singing around a campfire.

Sunday - Yesterday we enjoyed a rare Sunday with no afternoon or evening scheduled activities. We took a long afternoon nap, had time to visit and pray together, Emily cut Matthew's hair and we got to call out mothers. Our neighbors the Thomases also hosted us for dinner feeding us yummy homemade pizza.

We're looking forward to the coming week as well. Matthew's parents will be visiting from California (arriving Tuesday evening). We are looking forward to spending time with them and to Matthew's ordination interview (Tuesday), Graduation (Friday), and our Dr. and Ultrasound appointment (Monday) among other things. Check back next week for more updates.

One Day Left

Sorry I haven't been very good about keeping up with the blog lately. It's been a hectic finish to the semester the last couple of weeks but we are doing well. Tomorrow is my last day of classes at Seminary. Next week my parents are coming up to visit and will be here for my graduation on May 16th. We're looking forward to having some time over the next few weeks to celebrate the completion of my seminary degree and spend some time with friends who will be starting to go their seperate ways soon.

I should be able to do a better job of keeping things updated during the next couple of months. I'll keep busy enough looking for a job and preparing for our transition but I'll still have some time to relax and hopefully stay in touch a little better.

In the mean time I wanted to let you all know that I have a phone interview with a church in Crawfordsville, IN on Thursday. I don't know a whole lot about the church or job yet but it is still good to see things moving along. We'd appreciate your prayers. Thanks!

God Closes a Door

We heard from First Baptist Church of Clovis today. They've decided to go in a different direction with regard to their staffing plans (which I took to mean they're not going to add a full time associate pastor right now). They didn't elaborate beyond that which is probably just as well.

As you might expect we're feeling kind of disappointed right now. We were pretty excited about this possibility the church was healthy and growing, the position sounded like a great fit for Matthew, it was close to family and as a bonus we already had good friends at the church. We've been praying that if God had something different in mind for us that he would close this door so that is how we're trying to look at this decision but we're still a little bummed out for now.

Please keep praying for our job search. We've got some conversations started with a few other churches but nothing is very far along. We're continuing to look around for other possibilities as well. Thanks for all of your prayers and words of encouragement.

Our Trip to Clovis

Here’s a quick overview of our visit to First Baptist Church or Clovis (FBCC) this past weekend. We had a really good visit. The church treated us like royalty not only flying us down but renting us a car, putting us up in a nice hotel, feeding us tons of wonderful food and on and on.

Matthew flew down Thursday afternoon and spent the evening hanging out with his friend Nick (the youth pastor at FBCC) and a bunch of high school students who come over for Bible Study every Thursday night. Friday morning he got a chance to tour the church and get to know most of the staff in an informal setting and over lunch. Friday afternoon Emily flew down and that night the Sr. Pastor and his wife took us both out to dinner where we had a chance to get to know each other a bit.

The folks at FBCC were thoughtful enough to keep most of our Saturday free so we could have some time for ourselves. We took advantage of the opportunity to meet Emily's immediate family in Turlock (halfway between Roseville and Clovis) for lunch and a short visit. Then Saturday night we had pizza with the staff and some of the church board members and had a chance to answer questions on a whole range of topics.

Sunday we got to church early enough for Emily to get a quick tour and then attended the first service. Between services we met briefly with a couple board members who couldn't make it Saturday so we could answer their questions and then we got to hear our friend Nick speak at the youth service which runs concurrently with the second main Sunday service. After all of that the Sr. Pastor took us out for one last fabulous meal and we all had a chance to ask a few more questions and offer some impressions in a kind of debriefing session.

We don't expect to hear anything for at least a couple of weeks which gives us plenty of time to continue to process our experience and get whatever insight we can about this decision from people that we know and trust. Of course we don't even know if we will have a decision to make, there is no guarantee they will make us an offer but so far we're feeling pretty positive about the possibility of joining this church if they do. It is a healthy and growing church and seems to have some needs that fit Matthew's skills and interests. We continue to appreciate your prayers for wisdom for both us and the leaders of FBCC in considering this possibility.

FBCC Visit

This weekend Emily and I will be visiting First Baptist Church of Clovis (FBCC) near Fresno, CA to discuss the possability of my joining their pastoral staff. I will be flying down Thursday afternoon and Emily join me on Friday. We will stay through Sunday evening but don't have the details on how exaclty we will be spending that time yet.

One of my very best friends, Nick Bradley (he was Best Man at our wedding) is the youth pastor FBCC so we know a little about this church and they know a bit about me through him. The church would like to create a new pastoral position to oversee discipleship and small groups and help out with some teaching ministry. Right now this sounds like exactly the type of position that I've been looking for. In addition the idea of being on staff with Nick and being only 3 hours from "home" (Roseville, where our families live) is very appealing, plus some of our very best friends from Seminary (Luke & Virginia Thomas) would only be 45 minutes away in their new home. With all of this in mind we are very excited about this possability but are trying to keep an open mind and really seek God's will in this.

We will let you all know how things go and when we have any hard information we will post it here promptly. In the mean time we would really appreciate your prayers for God's peace and clear guidance both for us and for the leadership of FBCC as we explore this possibility together. I continue to be in various levels of contact exploring possible Associate Pastor positions with a number of other churches but right now this potential opportunity is front and center in hearts and minds.

P.S. If you're curious about FBCC you can check out their website at http://www.fbclovis.com/