Kathy,

I see I'm quite behind in my email.

I'm Praising God that the meeting went well, and I'm going to continue to
pray for this situation. Praying for you and Greg with many lovings and
squeezings, as you both need them.

Love and Blessings,
Pat Ferguson


At 12:59 PM 7/18/04, you wrote:
>HI Guys,
>Well, God certainly does work in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform.
>I just hope that my retelling of what happened today makes sence to you
>as you read it. Much of our opposition didn't show up at the meeting and
>one of our defenders, who had thought that she wouldn't be able to make
>it, went out of her way to come; so, the meeting went much better than we
>had anticipated. Whoever wanted to suggest that our pay be reduced to
>part time either didn't show up or didn't speak out. Some people thought
>that they were going to be able to call Greg on the carpet for writing an
>email to the former pastor questioning whether or not he wished to
>continue his membership in our church since he has not attended for more
>than five years. Well, Greg did enquire, and Pastor Olson had responded
>that he wished to remain a member so Greg dropped the matter altogether.
>Pastor Olson then proceeded to go behind our backs and show the email to
>the old guard, but it appears that he may have deleted Greg's name making
>it look as though Greg had tried to do this anonymously, which Greg
>hadn't. Anyway, fortunately, Greg kept the correspondence so we have
>proof of what was actually said. But, Greg surprised the opposition that
>was there by simply admitting that this interaction between him and
>Pastor Olson had taken place and Greg spoke the truth about the
>situation. Then, our defenders spoke up for us and pointed out that
>pastor Olson had been the one in the wrong by gossiping and possibly
>trying to deceive and that he was the one in the wrong, by making others
>aware of the correspondence between Greg and himself, not Greg. I did
>fire off a bit about the frustration of trying to grow a healthy church
>and saving souls and the frustration of not getting anywhere when there
>is so much opposition and talk behind our backs. Some people thought that
>I put it pretty well. I don't know, I ended up being mad at myself
>because my main prayer going into this had been that the Lord would help
>me keep my mouth shut. Well, unfortunately, the heavenly duct tape got
>pride off my mouth once, but I did manage to stay quiet for most of it. I
>don't know how in the world Jesus did it, to sit quietly amidst all the
>lies and falsehoods being hurled at Him at His trial. I guess that I
>still need to learn more about letting God fight my battles for me.
>Anyway, our place here is still in tact. I can go back to enjoying
>watching my house being built again. I know that the ugly stuff is still
>there, but at least we, especially Greg, faced it well. Oh you guys, I
>wish that we would see more fruit to our ministry here. The struggle
>sometimes is just so hard.
>Thank you for always praying when I ask.
>God bless,
>Kathy
>
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