Church Home

Well, at long last we've decided on a church home. After much searching and prayer, God led us back to The Church at the Well. To be honest, I think finances played more a part of my mind that I at first realized. Choosing to become a member of a non Southern Baptist church means that I as a seminary student will not benefit from the tuition aid afforded by the Cooperative Program (which amounts to half off your tuition). It wasn't until I gave the decision into God's hands that the choice became clear for me. This decision is an exciting one for our family! Our church home since Carol and I have been married has been our family. It's been a place of security and friendship, encouragement, and direction in our lives. I think now we both have a sense of belonging and of being at home here in Wake Forest.

I'm into my last week of classes for the semester.  It's been pretty grooling toward the end with increased class demands, papers, etc.  I'll be really glad to have a break between semesters.  Carol will be going to the National Institutes of Health this week for her annual followup with the researchers of LAM.  Her mom flew up and will be with her during the three days of tests.  Carol's sister in Virginia will be taking care of the kids since I'll be working and in class this week.  Please remember to pray for her this week because it can be a stressful time for her, especially since it brings her attention to the disease that she is battling.

Reasons to Celebrate

Carol and I celebrated our 10th anniversary on September 12! I took her to Asheville, NC, to celebrate the occasion. It was really a wonderful trip. Asheville is located in the mountains of western North Carolina. It's also the home of the Biltmore Estate, the largest private residence in the United States. We stayed at the Biltmore Village Inn bed and breakfast. Though we had a bit of an issue with the hot water in our suite, the inn keepers were very accommodating and put us in an upgraded room for the night while they made the necessary repairs. I would definitely recommend them if you're ever in Asheville! We made our visit to the Biltmore estate in the evening and enjoyed a special Flower Garden event under torchlight with the accompaniment of jazz music. Then we took a candlelight tour of the mansion. I've posted pictures of the occasion on our photo site.

As part of our 10th Anniversary, we wanted to commemorate the occasion by getting our portraits made. We had them taken at Sears and we bought the copyrights to them. I have posted them on our photo site where you can download them, order pictures, etc. I truly have been blessed with a wonderful wife and I'm looking forward to posting our 75th anniversary photos!

On another note, Carol is feeling much better now; her partial lung collapse (pneumothorax) is healing. We heartily thank you for your prayers! I'm getting a break this week from classes because of our fall break. I'll probably have just enough time to get caught back up. School is going well and I'm really learning quite a lot. Noah and Grace are progressing well in home school, and Carol has been doing an excellent job in teaching them.

Please continue to pray for direction regarding a church home. We visited a new church this past weekend to help sort out the uncertainty in our hearts about The Church of the Well. I believe God has used that visit to confirm in our hearts just the kind of church he wants for us. We now believe that our decision is going to come down to choosing between these two churches.

Possible Church Home? (cont.)

Well, I wanted to post an update on our search for a church home. We are still in the process of looking at this point. We've been attending The Church of the Well for the past three or four weeks. We've even gone through their membership class where we were walked through their statement of faith and their values. However, for some reason our hearts have been torn over the decision to join. Honestly, I can say the decision has nothing to do with the seminary discount (afforded through SBC churches). I thought in the beginning it would be a factor in the decision. It's not even about the doctrines of the church, for they line up very well with scripture and with the values and truths held by the SBC. Rather our concerns have been with the preaching of the word. The messages delivered have left us scratching our heads at the end of the service and wondering just what the pastor was meaning by certain phrases used and perhaps what was being implied. The series of messages have been a bit unconventional from our Southern Baptist background, yet nothing has been necessarily undoctrinal. Please continue to pray for us in this matter - that we would know if this uncertainty on our part of joining this particular church is of God or not.

Possible Church Home?

We have been searching for a church home for our family since we move to Wake Forest back in July. It's truly amazing how many churches there are in the area! We have visted several different churches in search of the place where God would plant us, and grow us, and have us to serve. Up until this past weekend, we had only visited SBC churches - in part because of the discounted tuition given to students who are members of a Southern Baptist Church (financial aid that is paid for through the Cooperative Program). This weekend, however, we tried something different.


We had heard about the Church of the Well when we visited a coffee house here in town a few weeks back. The church actually meets in the coffee house (called The Well) on Sunday mornings. We really didn't know what to expect, but we were curious. The service was truly a woshipful experience and the teaching was solid! It reminded me of the house churches you hear about in Acts. We are already planning a return visit this Sunday. Please continue to pray with us in this search and important decision for our family.

God Provides

Praise be to God! I have been offered a position of Programmer Aide for Stella Nova Technologies, Inc. in Wake Forest. It's a small startup company of about 20 employees. I've been offered the first part-time position. The pay is excellent compared to the majority of part-time positions available in the area. Money will still be tight, but as always God will provide! I will start work on Wednesday.

I've completed my second full week of classes and I'm really enjoying the studies. I'm starting to knock out the Hebrew alphabet and vowel points and am keeping afloat amid the flood of reading assignments and quizzes.

Carol has kicked off home school this week and the kids seem to be enjoying it. It can certainly be challenging at times, but I admire Carol's patience and care that she has displayed while teaching the kids. Continue to keep her in your prayers as she adjust to this new role.

For you who are receiving this update via email currently, I will now be transitioning over to use our blog to relate all further information. This way you can control whether or not you receive these periodic updates, and you can follow along on the web page at your leisure. I've backfilled the blog with the update emails I've sent over these past months, so if you didn't receive some of the prior emails you can get caught up. My goal is that this blog would be an encouragement to you in your walk and call of God in your life.

שָׁלוֹם (Shalom) - Goodbye

Sorry, just couldn't resist. I think I just revealed the nerd in me!

Beach Retreat!

We took off to the beach this past weekend - over to Wilmington Beach, NC. That's one thing that's really great about where we live; we're right in the middle of the state about 2.5 hours from the mountains in the west and the beach in the east. This was the first time our children have ever seen the beach, and the first time for Carol to see the ocean. She's been to the gulf a few times, but never to the ocean. We really had a blast! Here's a link to the pictures we made on our trip.

I'm still on the job hunt, but we're confident that God will lead me to the right opportunity. It's just a few more days until I go through new student orientation and begin to sign up for my classes (August 11-12). I wish I could go ahead and sign up for my classes because some of the ones I want to take are already filling up, but I guess that's part of the bill for being a freshman!

Cross-Country Move

I've been meaning to send an update for a while now, but we have been fairly busy around here lately. We are now moved into our new apartment in Wake Forest, North Carolina. However, it took a little longer to get moved in than we were initially expecting.

Since our move was for such a long distance, we decided that we would hire movers to pick up and deliver our belongings. The idea of renting a U-Haul truck and pulling my pickup on a trailer behind it for 1400 miles really did not interest me in the least (much less loading and unloading all of that stuff)! We spent some time getting estimates and doing our research and we found a company that would do the move for a pretty good price. The movers arrived as expected on the day of the pickup and we packed up our own cars to begin the long journey.

We arrived in Wake Forest on Monday morning, got our keys to the apartment, and did a bit of cleaning while we waited... and waited... and waited! For almost two weeks we waited! God has a way of testing your character from time to time - I think this one was a lesson in patience and learning to live with little. Fortunately we still saw God through this time: like the fact that the movers "accidentally" left a space saver bag containing sheets and blankets and a box of Legos the apartment. The blankets we used for cover while sleeping on the air mattresses we had packed in my truck. The Legos were tremendously helpful for our kids who had virtually nothing to play with. Also, since we did not have anything to sit on or eat on, we "reclined at the 'table' like the apostles" when we had our meals (the kids enjoyed that!). God also used the time to help us meet our neighbors who sympathized with us, let us borrow a few things, and even invited us over for a couple of meals.

Since moving here, I have been busy with job searching and thus far I have been on four interviews. Carol has put in resumes at some of the local Christian schools, but at this point none of the schools are hiring. We've decided to go the home school route for now because of overcrowding issues in the public schools and knowing how that effects our childrens' learning abilities.

Please continue to keep us in your prayers as we pursue God’s will and calling. Specific prayer request for us are:

1. A part-time job for me to provide for our family while at seminary
2. A church home for our family
3. Pray for Carol as she begins to home school our kids

Also, one final thing. I was asked if there was a way people could donate to our education expenses. I found out through the business office on campus that you can donate money directly to my student account. I believe donations received this way are done anonymously. They are not tax deductible though. You can send a check to:

SEBTS
Accounting Services
P.O. Box 1889
Wake Forest, NC 27588

Just put my name, Allen Sutton, and my student id, 000213404, in the memo field when you send it and they will apply the money to my account. Thanks in advance for any help you provide and most of all for your prayers.

Seminary and The Preparation

It’s been quite a while since I sent out the first of these emails regarding the changes in our family’s life. I’ve had several requests for an update so here goes. Shortly after sending out the previous email we placed our home on the market. We were anxiously looking toward the new year and the possibility of starting seminary in the Spring semester. Carol and I looked at the many different seminaries and limited them down to three that we thought we would have time (and money) to visit: Southwestern in Dallas, Texas; Midwestern in Kansas City, Missouri; and Southeastern in Wake Forest, North Carolina.

After visiting each and prayerfully considering them, we felt that God was calling us to attend Southeastern in North Carolina. There was just something about that place that really captured our hearts. We felt that the spirit of God was really evident there and we believed that is where God wanted us to go.

The ensuing months after making that decision were a bit of a roller coaster ride as we were tossed back and forth with anticipation over the sale of our home. We felt like our home would sale before the new year, but as the months raced by, we were faced with the possibility that God wanted us to wait a little longer than that. God confirmed to us the message of “wait” through songs and messages during the Christmas holidays and into the beginning of this year. I began to feel like God was slowing us down and providing me with an opportunity to explore various ministry opportunities to prepare me for what lies ahead.

Shortly after the new year, just as we were about to take our home off the market, we were suddenly surprised by two separate offers to buy our home! As we prayed for wisdom and negotiated with the potential buyers, God blessed us with a contract.

All these events now bring us to this present week. We close on our house this Friday, February 29. As part of the negotiations with the buyer, we will lease back the property from them until the end of April. After that point, we’ll have to find other housing or extend our lease with the buyer. Our current plans are to allow the children to finish the school year out here with their classmates and then begin looking toward the move to North Carolina and starting seminary in the Fall.

Please continue to keep us in your prayers as we pursue God’s will and calling. Specifically, pray that God will provide a flexible and sufficient job for me as we enter seminary life.