The LePages

It’s been quite a year! It was a difficult year, but I can honestly say it was a good one.

Family. Our one-year anniversary in Kansas was October 1. We can’t believe it’s already been 15 months! We are adjusting well and really enjoy our new (old) home. We love autumn in Kansas and especially enjoyed our first fall in our new home. The picture here of our big oak tree with our house behind it, gives an indication of how much color exploded all around us. It was beautiful and lasted more like three months (instead of three days which is the average length of fall in Texas ).

Beth is great with child (our fifth baby is due February 23), and pretty uncomfortable and tired all the time. She still manages to do more than 10 ordinary women. In addition to Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s, she managed to pull off two great birthday parties (Josiah right after Thanksgiving and Abigail right before Christmas), an open-house Christmas party (attended by about 15 families) and continues homeschooling without missing a beat. She is wonderful and a true blessing to our family and our church. I can’t imagine life or ministry without her. The sonogramist (?), sonographer (?), sonogrammatitionist (?) tells us the baby is probably a girl. This sonogram image (right) was taken on January 15. It was so exciting to not only see such a clear picture of our new baby, but also that for a couple seconds, she smiled for the camera. Modern technology - amazing! We continue to be excited about the new blessing, but sometimes shake our heads and say, “Can you believe it? Five kids?!” Doesn’t seem like such a long time ago that everyone we knew was praying that God would bless us with one!

Each of our other four kids is doing well - growing in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and with people (Luke 2:52). They’re learning so much and growing so much! It seems they change daily. Take a look at their 2006-2007 school pictures.

Hannah is now seven years old and in second grade. She is writing in cursive very well. She got a Shetland Sheepdog named Chloe for her 7th birthday and loves all kinds of animals. One of her favorite places to go on Daddy dates is the pet store where she will hold anything she can get her hands on. She recently held a six-foot Bermese Python. A woman standing nearby was completely amazed and told Hannah she would be screaming if she held that snake. She is very helpful to her mother and even makes breakfast for her younger sisters and brother sometimes. She is a good friend to them and is also good at making friends with other kids. She enjoys playing with Littlest Pet Shops and her American Girl doll, but she really enjoys drawing, coloring, writing and creating. She’d rather be outside riding her bike or playing with friends than sitting in front of a TV.

Abigail is now six years old and in first grade. She loves to read. She got a new Bible for her sixth birtday and loves to do Bible drills (Daddy gives her and her sister a book and chapter in the Bible and they find it as fast as they can). She also got a parakeet for her birthday and named her Crystal. The bird is very sweet and is slowly getting comfortable with us. Abi also loves going on dates with Daddy, visiting the pet store and playing with friends. She seems to enjoy Chloe (the dog) more than anyone and is very good about making sure the pets get fed everyday. She also enjoys playing with Littlest Pet Shops and her American Girl doll, as well as drawing, coloring, writing and playing on the computer. Abigail is helpful to her mother by helping her younger brother and sister sometimes.

Both girls recently enjoyed moving down the hall into a new bedroom with loft beds. Not only do the beds make good use of the room, but they make sleeping more of an adventure.

Josiah is now four years old and learning all kinds of things as well. He has a vivid imagination. We never know from minute to minute whether he will “be” a knight, a cooker (chef) or a bird. When he is a bird, he likes to eat his food off the floor. He got a beta fish for his birthday and named it Blueberry. Sadly, Blueberry has already died of unknown causes. His replacement has not yet been purchased. Josiah plays very well with his sisters, and is especially fascinated with his little sister, Lydia. They share a room and get along very well. They love to make each other laugh. Josiah really enjoys Littlest Pet Shops and playing on the computer too, but his favorite thing to do is wrestle with Dad on the living room floor. He doesn’t really like Chloe because she jumps up on him. We’re trying to break her of that nasty habit.
The big three - Hannah, Abigail and Josiah - continue to enjoy AWANA. Our church doesn’t have an AWANA program yet, so we are participating at another church here in Lawrence. The kids have all learned a lot and made some great friends. I’ve even become pretty good friends with that church’s pastor.

Lydia is now 21 months old and saying new words every day. She loves to make her big sisters and brother laugh and she’s very good at it. She has a knack for walking into a room and instantly spotting the one thing she is not allowed to touch. Just recently she began sleeping in a big-girl bed. Good timing considering her crib is expecting a new occupant soon. She has been very good about staying in her bed until morning, and that’s helpful. Other than that, she is not really very helpful, though she loves to try. She has not received any pets yet. We’re afraid she might try to squish them or eat them. She is somewhat aware of the fact that another baby exists, but she has no idea she is soon to lose her status as the baby of the family. She is quite good around other babies, though, so we have high hopes she will enjoy her new baby sister (or brother). These transitions are always fun and we’re sure she’ll handle it well.

One of the great benefits of living here in Kansas is that we’re so much closer to some of our extended family in Missouri. We had a full house from Beth’s side of the family visit us the week of Thanksgiving and we had a great visit in Joplin over our Christmas break. I even got to have dinner last week over in Kansas City with some of my former high school buddies. Much fun.

Church. Sitting here now and thinking about the difficulty of the first year of a pastoral transition, I am thankful for the peace and unity we have now. We have made several nice updates to the building including a lot of paint in the three most visible areas. We have seen many more visitors than previous years (I’m told) and welcomed a handful of new members into the church. In fact, on the first Sunday of this new year, another great couple told me they wanted to join! We met our 2006 budget (which is significant since we raised it - by faith - from 2005) and we baptized six people in 2006.

Those things are fairly tangible indications that CBC is getting healthy. But all the intangibles - things that can’t be measured are even more encouraging. Our church family is focusing more on outreach, and serving, encouraging and praying for one another. Several specific members are growing in the knowledge of Scripture and making some pretty mature decisions. Many have made a point of communicating their support for the new vision of the church though a year ago they had reservations - that’s particularly exciting to me. We don’t know what 2007 holds, but if CBC continues in the direction we’re headed, I believe God has great things in store for us.

I just completed my first full year of preaching. I have enjoyed it a lot. I began preaching through the Gospel of Matthew about a year ago and especially enjoyed studying and preaching the Sermon on the Mount. We took several rabbit trails from Matthew and studied the Holy Spirit, foundations of a mature prayer life and a few other things. I expect to finish Matthew next fall. We also started a small group ministry, a Men’s Bible study and a doctrinal survey class I’m calling “The Highest Science” (what Charles Spurgeon called the study of God). We revamped the college and youth ministries, so they feel like new ministries as well. All these new ministries are going very well and meeting some very important needs.

Overall, church renewal is a long and difficult process. The more I read about it, though, the more convinced I am that I’ve been gifted and prepared for this type of ministry. I’m also convinced we’re seeing many of the positive signs that God is indeed renewing CBC. “Apart from Christ we can do nothing” significant. But, fortunately, with Christ we can participate in work that will be eternally significant.

We still miss our Coppell Bible (Texas church) family very much and think of you often. On New Year’s Eve, we had a party at the church and I couldn’t help thinking of the fun we had my last few years as youth pastor of Coppell Bible. Those New Year’s Eve lock-ins were exhausting, but so much fun. I was so thrilled when I got a call about 12:30 - this New Year’s morning - from Maura Johnson and several of the best kids on the planet (who still remember me!). I really appreciated that phone call! I’ll never forget y’all - especially since I have that great group photo of you on my office wall along with this group (above) who came up to Kansas in November of 2005 for my induction as pastor.

We hope to come and visit Texas sometime after the baby is born in February, but hopefully we’ll see some of you sooner than that. We’d love to have you all visit us any time. We’d also love to get phone calls and/or emails.

Time passes so quickly! As that great American philosopher, Ferris Buehler once said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you’re not careful, you’ll miss it.” So, don’t miss it! Keep your hearts and minds focused on the eternal - that helps us keep the earth stuff in perspective.
And please keep the LePage family in your prayers. Thanks for stopping by.