A Not So Brief History, Pt. 7

Cont'd. from 5/30...

I hadn't seen my brother Dennis since 1999 -- 5 years. We had stayed in touch, but hadn't been able to get together for one reason or another. One major reason was that in May of 2001 he became marketing director of UPC, a Europe-based communications company and was living in Budapest, Hungary.

When he found out that we were going to be in Dublin, he told us that he could fly there very cheaply and would love to see us. We reciprocated the sentiment and he made plans to see us there. He found a room at a small hotel in Rathmines not far from where we were staying.

So I called Dennis and we planned to begin walking towards one another, meet up and then go back to our place. As we walked down the Victorian street toward the heart of Rathmines, a figure rounded the corner with a gate that is such a part of my conscience that there was no doubt that it was him. My heart jumped, my throat lumped up, my eyes misted over. It was such a great feeling as we embraced. Do you ever have those moments when everything is right? You know that this is the way it's supposed to be? That was this moment. Five years is too long. This was my brother.

Dennis was only able to be with us Saturday and Sunday and had to be back in Buda on Monday. The weekend was a whirlwind of activities. Saturday we went to Phil and Cheryl Kingsley's to meet them and then to rehearse for Sunday morning worship at City Gates, a church that meets in Cabinteely, a suburb of Dublin.


That evening we spent with Dennis exploring the city centre. We ate at a nice Italian restaurant and then found a trad session (live traditional music) in a pub. Sunday we were at City Gates in the morning and then exploring more of Dublin in the afternoon. That evening, Dennis and I ended up in the city centre looking for another trad session without success, so we ended up in a bistro sipping coffee until we could hardly keep our eyes open.

I got up early the next morning to drive Dennis to the airport. Two days weren't enough, but I wouldn't have traded the time for anything.

So now we needed to focus on our reason for coming to Ireland in the first place. How was the Lord leading us? We had a week to get to know these people we had come to visit and determine God's direction. No small task.

Calvary Chapel (Crosspoint) or GEM? What would it be?

To be continued...

A Not So Brief History, Pt. 6

Cont'd. from 5/29...

One little tangent I forgot to tell. In August of 2003, a month after we had returned from our first trip to Ireland. Beth and I simultaneously decided we wanted to learn to play the guitar. She owned a guitar that she got while in college, lo, those many years ago. So we started learning.

The story of how I got my guitar...

The few month following Hurricane Ivan were extraordinary times in many ways. Here is just one example. Our friend, Larry Williams, who had just bought a new guitar, emailed me to ask if I'd like to take his Taylor with us to Ireland. He said, in fact that he would be willing to sell it to me for $500 (it's a $1300 guitar). I had been on the lookout for a "beater" guitar to call my own, but not having $500 at the moment, I was unable to move on that offer.

However, (and here's where it gets good) Larry and his wife Susan had major roof damage from Ivan (that's not the good part) and their insurance company was going to pay them to rent a place while repairs were made. It just so happened that we had a 26' travel trailer and offered to let the Williamses use it, not knowing about the fact that their insurance would pay us rent for it. In the end, they had our trailer for 2 months and we ended up with $500 and a beautiful Taylor guitar to boot!

And now, back to the story...

We arrived in Dublin on Saturday, November 5. Our long-time friend Christmas McGaughey met us at the airport. Christmas had been in Dublin for about a year-and-a-half, if I recall correctly, working with Kevin Fitzgerald (the Calvary guy) at his church, Crosspoint. We thought that Christmas would have her own car when she met us, but she didn't yet have a car, so she was driven to the airport by a couple from Crosspoint. All was good until we realized that she was planning to ride with us to our apartment. Cars in general are smaller in Ireland and the car we were renting was a Nissan wagon about the size of a Hyundai wagon. We had all our luggage and two guitars. There would be no room for Christmas! Fortunately, the couple who had driven Christmas to the airport were still in the terminal and they were willing to go with us to Rathmines, the community in Dublin where we were staying.

We got to our apartment in good order and settled in. Now get this -- without us trying to do this, with all of Dublin to choose from, the apartment we booked for the week was in the building next to the building where Kevin Fitzgerald lived!

Then I called my brother. "Your brother?" you say. Yes, my brother. What was my brother doing in Dublin?

To be continued...

A Not So Brief History, Pt. 5

cont'd. from 5/23...

Sorry for the gap in posting. It's been a crazy weekend.

So we sent in our initial interest form. Within a day or so, we received an email from a Lois Pankratz. She is the "welcome" person for GEM. We then talked on the phone and the next step was for her to put us in contact with Phil Kingsley, who is the Field Director for Ireland. Phil and I emailed back and forth a bit and then spoke on the phone.

At the same time, we had been in contact with Kevin Fitzgerald, a Calvary Chapel pastor who had begun a work in Dublin. Both Phil and Kevin seemed interested in the prospect of working with us, or shall I say having us work with them.

Its seemed at this point that the logical thing to do was to take a trip to Dublin and sit down face-to-face with both these guys, plus see first-hand what each ministry looked like and felt like. So we started checking into flights and lodging. It was August when we started this process and we were looking at going in November, less than three months to get the money together.

Beth is a wonder when it comes to planning trips and planning how we'll get the funds together. She came up with a plan that would get us the money we needed, when we needed it. The second week of November seemed to work well with both Phil and Kevin, so we forged ahead.

We hadn't yet bought our airline tickets when September 16 came along -- and with it, Hurricane Ivan. We evacuated to Nashville for almost a week and didn't have any work for two weeks. In short, the money we had saved was gone. I told Beth we would need to plan to take our trip after the first of the year.

It wasn't long after that, when Beth came to me with a plan she had devised, saying, "I think we can still go in November." I didn't believe her. She showed me the figures. I still didn't think it was possible. She showed me again. It took several tries, but she finally convinced me that it was possible. We can't explain how it worked, it just did. In addition to what we planned to save for the trip, we had several people who, when they found out what we were doing wanted to help out. One couple blessed us with $1000! In the end, the trip would not have been possible if it weren't for the gifts we had received.

So now all we had to do was wait for November. I was like a kid waiting for Christmas. I could hardly stand it.


To be continued...

A Not So Brief History, Pt. 4

cont'd. from 5/22

But for now, more practical considerations were at hand. We had to sort out how we were going to make a living. Beth put pen to paper and figured that if she would take on some more piano students, her income would cover our mortgage. Having a background in construction and knowing how to handle people, I put in applications at Lowe's and Home Depot. With my experience with things technical I also spoke with management at All Pro Sound. None of these panned out.

Then, without any effort on my part, I began to get call after call asking if I was back doing carpentry, the trade in which I was engaged before entering the ministry. Thus began my foray back into the world of construction. I also realized that now I could do what I hadn’t had the time to do for the past 14 years – teach voice lessons. Even now, 22 months later, I have had very few days without work and we have never been in want.

I often think back to, "...if you step out of the boat, I have you." He indeed has held us and sustained us.

Back to the aftermath of my resignation...

I resigned on Thursday, July 1, 2004. Sunday, the 4th was our last time to lead worship at Calvary Chapel. It's probably a good thing that we didn't know it at the time, as it would have been difficult to keep it together while leading.

Molly arrived home on Tuesday from Cork, Ireland. We sat her down that evening, knowing that word of my departure from my position would be made public Wednesday night at church. It was hard news for her. She had grown up in that church. For as long as she could remember, I had been the Worship Pastor at CCGB. She loved Ireland, but the thought of actually moving there didn't settle so well.

From that time until now, I knew in my heart of hearts that God had a plan. God's plan is always good. "All things happen for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose." If it was His plan for me to resign and if it was His plan for us to go to Ireland, it was a good plan and it would be good for everyone affected by it. It was a hard sell at times, and I felt callous reiterating it, but I was convinced of this truth. That's what kept us looking ahead, seeking Ireland.

We are just now really seeing that plan take shape before our eyes -- but more on that later...

On the GEM (Greater Europe Mission) website, we found an initial interest form. We filled it out and sent it.

Now we just had to wait...


To be continued...

A Not So Brief History, Pt. 3

cont'd from 5/21...

Is this getting too long? Boring? I mean, we have nearly three years to account for and I'd like to get caught up to the present in as few posts as possible. Stay with me. We'll get there one day soon and life will be cheery.

From the day I resigned until now, I have never doubted the decision. I've always had a true peace about it. Call it what you will, but I call it "the peace that passes all understanding" -- the source of which is God.

So here we were with no idea as to the direction we were to go. We weren't yet at liberty to share with the general public what had transpired. We went to choir and praise band rehearsal that evening, having tendered my resignation earlier in the day. Wow, that was hard! The weekend following my resignation, we met with good friends of ours to gain wisdom and counsel. Their word to us was, "It seems obvious that Ireland is where your heart is. Start moving that direction and see what God does."

Interestingly, our daughter Molly was in Ireland at that time on a short-term mission trip and would return the following Tuesday.

So we got on the Internet and began exploring missions opportunities in Ireland. I did a Google search - "missions ireland" - and one of the first hits was an organization called Greater Europe Mission (GEM). We had never heard of them, but upon exploring their website quickly realized that they were a solid organization. They had been working in Europe since 1949, yet their approach to ministry was edgy and innovative. We subsequently kept going back to the website looking for any red flags to pop up. None did.

During our first visit to GEM's website, we discovered a section entitled "Country Spotlights", and wasted no time finding and clicking on Ireland. After reading about Ireland and the great need there (which we had seen first-hand a year earlier), we saw a list of needs for Ireland -- a list of types of people they were looking for. There in the list, sticking out like the proverbial sore thumb, we saw it.

WORSHIP TRAINERS

My heart jumped. Could this be it?


To be continued...

A Not So Brief History, Pt. 2

cont'd from 5/19...

We couldn't get Ireland out of our minds. In fact, I thought maybe I was going out of my mind. Finally, I told Beth that we needed to consider the possibility that God may be calling us to Ireland.

At the same time this desire to train worship leaders was growing. So now we had two things tugging at our hearts -- Ireland and Worship training. This was so beyond us that we knew that either we were crazy, or it really was God, and could only happen if He were orchestrating it. We thought that maybe we were to start a school of worship in Ireland. But that's nuts! First, neither one of us could be in any way described as the administrative type. Second, how does one go about moving into a new country, with a new culture, new government regulations, having never done anything like establishing a school and have even a hope of doing just that?

We prayed.

And prayed some more.

The one thing that kept resonating in my head was, "God doesn't call those equipped. God equips those called."

So I began my research. I contacted people in Ireland who might have a feel for the validity of a school of worship. I contacted people who had schools of worship in the US. I looked at ministry plans of various ministries. I took notes. I began to formulate a ministry plan. But it still just seemed ludicrous.

Then it occurred to us. What we needed to do, if this thing was going to fly, was to move to Ireland and assimilate into the culture, do our research over there, instead of from Florida.

It was now the summer of 2004. After 14 years as the Worship Pastor at Calvary Chapel Gulf Breeze, I felt that God was moving us out of that position to move in a new direction.

So July 1, I resigned. No plan. No job. Just this -- I pictured myself in the boat with the apostles. Jesus was out on the water and he said to me, "If you step out of the boat, I have you."

So I stepped out...


To be continued...

A Not So Brief History

So it occurred to me that we didn't have down in print anywhere, just how we got to this point (missionaries -- going to Ireland, etc) in any sort of detail. You may find this extremely boring and give up after one or two posts. Or you may find it intriguing and have a hard time waiting until we get around to the next post. Hopefully, you will find it entertaining, encouraging, maybe challenging (if you are a Christian and you feel that God may be calling you to a new ministry).

This may take a while. After all, the entire process really started about 3 years ago. So I guess we should get started.

I (Gary) was at a point in my carreer as a worship leader (13 years as Worship Pastor - Calvary Chapel Gulf Breeze, FL) where I was beginning to feel a bit restless. I felt that there was a change coming, whether that be in the next few months or next few years, I wasn't sure. I began to ask God what the next thing would be. What was the next ministry focus that He had in mind? As I prayed about it and thought about it, I realized that my heart was really to train worship leaders -- to bring up the next generation, grounded in the Word and focused on the presence of God. This excited me -- I love to teach and I love to lead worship. It seemed natural. But what form was this to take? A school of worship? A traveling ministry? Not a clue.

Beth and I were asked to go to Ireland and be on the leadership team of a short-term mission trip to Cork. I'd always had a soft place in my heart for Ireland, always loved the music, the scenery, the accent...

That trip took place in July of 2003. We were in Cork for about 12 days, doing various forms of ministry from music concerts to skateboard demos (no, you don't want to see me skate). Our focus was the music, and providing the sound system for the street events. We fell in love with Ireland, as most who travel there do. We loved the people, we loved the countryside, we didn't love the weather. Well... I loved the weather -- Beth didn't. She's rather cold-natured and the weather is anything but hot in Ireland.

As we were flying out of the country, it occurred to us -- there was too much work to be done in Ireland and not enough people to do it. I thought of Jesus' words, "...the fields are ready for harvest, but there aren't enough workers." What were we doing? We came into Cork, set off our fireworks and left. Okay, there was more to it than that. We did see fruit from the efforts, but we had only scratched the surface.

The next few months were excruciating.

To Be Continued...