I met my wife, Terri, in the youth group at Central. After we were married, we lived in Dallas for a little while and I just couldn't bring myself to go to any other church but "my church". We went back on the weekends until we eventually moved back to my home town to raise our new son, Dylan, in a small town with a great church. As soon as we moved back, Terri and I got immediately involved in Caraway Street as actor/puppeteers and we fell more and more in love with working with kids, especially me. As an added, wonderful bonus, we got a chance to work with a wonderful couple there for over 15 years, Steve and Ali Wittmer. To say we became friends is an understatement. Family is a much better word! Talking about them is actually hard because we miss them so much. Anyway, Caraway Street was such a blessing and I eventually got the opportunity for about 5 years to be in charge of our graded children's church program. I learned so much in serving and leading that it was only natural when I felt God calling me into full-time ministry to children. It was also an amazing blessing that my 3 boys, especially my 2 eldest sons, had the opportunity to serve with children and were very good at it.
In 2003, I was given the chance to work full-time at "my church" as custodian. They were in between custodians and the youth group was actually working off camp money by helping clean the church. Pastor Rhoades gave me the opportunity to try it out for a weekend and make sure I could handle it. So I came in ready to make a great impression and run circles around all these teenagers. One of the first things I got a chance to do was mop the restrooms. On my way out of the first restroom I mopped, I proceeded to spill about 4 gallons of mop water directly onto the carpet just outside of the church office. I could only hope that no one would see it but I was horrified when our youth pastor walked around the corner just as the last bits of water gushed into the carpet. What happened next made a lasting impression on me even to today. He didn't yell at me or make a huge deal out of my mistake. He didn't belittle me and tell me how it should've been done. He didn't even tell me to get out and never try cleaning again. What he did do was help me immediately with the most generous servant's heart one could have. At least that's how it see it. If you asked him, he was just helping the idiot out that spilled all that water on the floor. He never ever made me feel that way, though, if that was how he felt. As far as I know, he didn't even tell the pastor about it. We just got it cleaned up and moved on. In case I've never said this before, I'm an idiot! The next week, when I took the job for sure and was just getting started, I spilled the bucket again! I never did it again for eight years after that as I served as custodian there, but I can't remember ever hearing our youth pastor, Derald Gautier, bring it up again. It's not that he wouldn't have but I think he was just so busy that it never came up. I loved working at the church, even though I loathe cleaning. I loved working around everybody and the servant hearts that everyone seemed to work with, especially Derald and our music pastor, Tommy Starrett. Their examples went a long way in teaching me how to be a minister which is simply to be a servant leader.
In 2004, my wife felt led to call our church's preschool director about becoming a teacher. The director had been praying that God would send the right person. At the time, Terri was director of a day care in town that was doing very well and she was making great money. It sounded like a bad idea from a practical perspective but God stirred both our hearts to the point where we knew that she should make the move. Working for her new boss, Penny Gautier (Derald's wife), Terri was so happy.
In 2007, Derald & Penny made a huge decision. Derald accepted the pastoral position at his home church in Lakewood, Colorado. But it was in very bad shape. A series of events had taken place to where a fairly large, thriving church for many years had been reduced to about 40 members with a massive amount of debt. By anyone's standards, it was not a good idea to sell your house and move your family across the country to work for a place that can't even support you. But Derald & Penny were faithful to God's call and they did exactly that. God blessed them because of it and Belmar Baptist Church is still around after 5 years. They now have an average of 125 and counting as well as a full-time youth pastor, Brandon Dobson. Both of Derald's younger brothers, Micah and Zach attend there with their families.
Last April, God had stirred Penny again to reach out to Terri and offer her a job at her daycare center as a teacher. At the time, Terri was director of our preschool at the church and it seemed like a bad idea to move. Sounds familiar, huh? God had been faithful before and we knew we could trust Him if it was what He called us to do. So we left "my church" to move to Colorado and serve alongside a man and a woman that God had shown them to be faithful servant leaders. Following Derald and Penny was the easiest part of this entire ordeal. There was no doubt that God had arranged our reunion with this couple and we are still so thrilled to be working with them again!
I may not be working full-time as children's pastor at Belmar Baptist, but I'm about as close as you can get to it. Derald gave me the opportunity right away to get involved in the older children's church. He recently has asked for my help with the younger children's church as well. We just started a Wednesday night program for the 1st through 6th grades and it is becoming a great outreach already. I wanted to give our kids an identity and we settled on the idea of "B Kids". It's pretty basic when you consider that they are Belmar Kids but the meaning goes deeper into what I believe about children's ministry. I personally believe, whether anyone else agrees or not, that children are the most important group in the church to minister to. They are the ripest field of harvest because of their ability to believe most of the time without seeing. Jesus made it very clear that it is easier to believe as a child and enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Even deeper than that belief is my thought that kids need to "be kids" as they learn about God. They will have plenty of time to act like adults when they get there. In the mean time, they should enjoy the time they have as children, play games, sing kid songs and fellowship like kids do. We can teach them about God and how to serve, but we shouldn't expect them to do it like the grown ups do. B Kids! I got together with Brandon Dobson and came up with a logo idea. He made it look awesome!!!
Anyway, I'm so excited where God has led us! I never thought I could call another church my home, but God did the changing, not me.
God even brought a family from Central, the Wright's, to join us here and help start a school at the church. They have been such a blessing and their story is also one of how God was moving things before they even knew it. There are so many wonderful families that we've gotten to know here and it feels so warm and inviting. Our kids really enjoy it here and have made some amazing friends. God has been so good to bring us to this place to call home!
I just wanted to share some about that in case anyone was interested.
