Today has been a good day. You won't understand how good unless you know a little bit of background.
Two years ago when Jonah was 3 years old, Adam and I began praying about what kind of schooling we wanted to do for our kids. We discussed homeschooling, public schooling, private schooling, all the usual models. We both come from public schools (I taught in public schools) and feel that both of us received a good education from public schools, but we felt that God was calling us to do something different educationally with our kids, but what? We agreed that the "ideal" situation for us would be a school that had a challenging educational program, a chance for frequent socialization, but still have more time to spend as a family and instilling the values that we desire for our kids to grow up with. This sounded ideal, but we had never heard of such a thing.
As I began researching school models, I came across a model called a University Model School. I spent hours looking up different schools. It was a relatively new idea that developed about 15 years ago in Arlington, TX. The model involves the best of all the educational worlds. Kids go to school and receive instruction from a trained teacher 3 days a week in a Christian environment and the other 2 days they are homeschooled and receive one-on-one instruction based on lessons that the teacher sends home. As they get older they move to more of a college type schedule and mindset. As I read about all of the successful schools, this model intrigued me but most of the schools were in large cities so I just put the thought aside and just prayed about what the Lord wanted us to do.
When Jonah was 3 we went to visit a local preschool, but just didn't feel like that was the direction we needed to go. One day we were getting our oil changed at a local Bonham Quick Lube and there was a sign advertising Forerunner Christian Academy. It was a new school in Bonham and I grabbed the flyer and told Adam we should check it out. We laughed about how it was probably a bunch of crazy people and how could a good Christian school ever pop up in Bonham. Oh ye of little faith. I went to the website and it looked pretty good so we decided to attend a parent meeting.
Skeptical, we walked into the parent meeting, which at that time the school was being held in an older church in Bonham. The people were so nice, we left feeling good about putting Jonah in preschool there.
Jonah started preschool there almost 2 years ago. We just fell in love with the ladies who started the school and their heart and passion for what they could see this school growing into. It was such a leap of faith for them - all 3 founders had very small children and growing families but they listened to what the Lord told them to do. Since then they, and many others, have spent countless hours, unpaid might I add, to make our school what it is today. Adam joined the board back in January and we have been so blessed to be apart of watching God bless our school in countless ways.
One thing that makes our school such a challenge is the heart that we have that no child should not be able to come to our school because of lack of money. Most of the students in our school (their parents) are on a Work-Study program working off hours to pay for tuition. Many teachers volunteer their time. We still have to pay many positions out of necessity, without much money coming in each month. Many months have been a step of faith, praying and seeking out the funds that we were in need of - and lo and behold a check would come in randomly or someone would help us out in some way. God has kept us going and God ALWAYS provides.
So now we come to about 6 weeks ago. Our school has been meeting in a local church and we were informed (8 weeks until school started) that we could no longer meet there. They were very clear that it was nothing that we had done, they just had some internal problems in the church that were making it impossible for us to be there. We were stunned and wondering, what was next? We were too big to fit in most of the churches in Bonham and really did not have much of an option from there. After leaving that deacons meeting, the board decided not to go and try to fix the problem, they decided to be silent about the situation and pray for 7 days before talking about it. And they did.
At the end of the 7 days of prayer, one of the founders of the school, randomly remembered a building that someone had told her about two years before. She called up the board and asked them if they wanted to go and check this building out. They walked in this vacant building and it was amazing! It was like it was made to be a school - classrooms already set up, an abundance of space to grow, gym space, cafeteria space, it seemed too good to be true. Then we were told that the building was owned by a very prominent Christian man in town. Maybe he would give us the building or let us use it for free. This had to be it, so they set up a meeting.
The next day they met with this man - and he informed them that he would be glad to help them with the building,---- if he only owned it. He had sold it several years back to GE and he pretty much said good luck with that one. This was crushing news, the board was sure that this was where God was leading, what now?
They went to GE immediately and thought it wouldn't hurt to ask them about it. Amazingly the man they talked to seemed pretty open to the idea and said to put in a proposal and he would have to push it through to the CEO's. This was GE!! We just kept praying that God would provide for our needs, whatever the outcome.
Three weeks went by and we had still not heard anything. We had placed a proposal for GE to allow us to lease the building rent-free or for them to donate the building to us. -- In the meantime, we find out that the man we had been in contact with from GE had actually looked into our school at one point and come to a Parent Meeting. He was really impressed but his family had chosen to homeschool. God placed him in the right place - and he was pulling for our school. This has been such a test of faith, more than you know. We pushed school forward two weeks as we waited for the news. Our whole school and extended families had been praying that God would open the door.
Today we get a call from GE saying that the CEO's had approved for us to use the building rent-free!!!!!!!!! We are still waiting on the paperwork to get all finished, but God had favor on us and in His lovingkindness provided this school for us. We have been praying at home for this for weeks now, when we got the news today Jonah's immediate response was "Isn't God a great God!" And He is. He would be a great God even if He had not provided this for us, but out of His grace and mercy He showered blessings on us! I wish you could understand what a relief this is for our family and to know that we have an awesome space for Forerunner Christian Academy to call its own. This will also open up doors for our school to grow in numbers, being in our own facility and able to fulfill some of the educational dreams that we have all envisioned. I could go on for days about the vision that we all have for Forerunner, but that's another day.
I just wanted to praise God and share with you my testimony of His provision. I have to admit that there have been days that I didn't know what God was doing this time, but I just kept hearing Him whisper in my ear, "Trust Me". And now we must trust God - with furnishing a building, paying for utilities each month, paying teachers, and much more. We are in the process of some major work on establishing a donor base and getting the funding that our school needs. It is a daunting process, one that none of us has ever even attempted, but we KNOW that God is with us and has set this school here for a purpose! We have a huge list of things that we need in order to furnish the school and we have 3 weeks in which to do it and no money! We know that God provided this building, so we are going to trust Him and work very hard to glorify Him in our efforts. Please, please, please pray for us in these next few weeks and year to walk in obedience and honor Him in our school.
Okay, I'll stop rambling - I feel better now! If you want to check out our school go to
www.forerunnerchristianacademy.org !
Here's his baseball cupcakes at his small little party. We just invited a couple of friends to simplify the party, and we all had the best time!
MMMM! Pizza!!
Cameron, Olivia, and Caleb playing on the video games at Jump N Land in Sherman.
Even Hannah enjoyed the party. She climbed and crawled and tried to stay up with the big boys! She is definitely not afraid to join in on the fun!
Olivia - isn't she sweet?
Caleb & Gus having a conversation - wonder what that was about?
This was a gift he got from Mama Gina and Papa John. It's a SuperHero headquarters. He has not stopped playing with it since. I think he enjoyed looking at the box as much as the toy!
These are the baseball cupcakes for the party! My first try looked like a 2 year old did it - so this was the better version. Of course we had to have baseball cupcakes!