Life & Ministry Update June 2022
Forgive me. It’s been a really long time since I’ve written anything on this blog and I realize for some people that it’s been a better way to keep up with my life, and now Alex’s as well, but life gets life-y sometimes and some things just fall off the plate.
Anyways, we are officially in the month of June, which means next month Alex and I will have been married a whole year. It’s been a crazy year full of plenty of ups and downs. I’m also pretty sure that everyone who had the statement that your first year of marriage is the “honeymoon phase” is a liar. The first 6 months of marriage for us was rough. We didn’t know how to communicate well which means when one of us was upset, the conversations stopped. We didn’t have a support system outside of our families (we do now through our church which has been one of the best changes we’ve made), and we have had to navigate career changes for both of us. Thank goodness it’s gotten a lot better since we started 2022.
As some people know, Alex and I left First Southern in January. It is a long story and I won't get into all the details, but we are so thankful for the meaningful connections the we still have with some of the people there. We visited two churches, and settled down at the second which happened to be Cornerstone Church in Fort Smith. We have loved every minute there. Since it is technically a church plant, it has a smaller congregation but with smaller churches comes really genuine connections and lots of ways to serve. While Alex and I were dating (both times if you know our story lol), we never had the opportunity to attend church services together. Sure, we would occasionally be in the same building during church, but never got to sit beside each other during preaching or were really able to discuss the sermon after because only one of us was in there. Even during our time at First Southern, those opportunities were few and far between. Sitting together during a service now under some fantastic teaching has been one of the things we’ve really enjoyed about being at Cornerstone.
With that being said, when we left First Southern that also meant that Alex needed to find a new job. Ministry jobs are hard to come by, and typically only happen because you know the right people. God provided through a church member and Alex ended up working in the warehouse at Arkansas Mill Supply. While Alex still very much feels called to ministry and this isn’t exactly his dream job, he’s there working for the glory of God while waiting for that ministry door to open again.
Since last December, I had been talking with East Side Baptist Church about working for their daycare as a receptionist as they navigated some staff issues. That process started rolling out about February and by March I was working there. While that was enjoyable, it was also stressful, but with some staff changes on the church side of the building, I was able to move to handling the graphic designs for church events, their social media, their weekly newsletter, and sermon note slides. I’ve enjoyed this so much over the last few months that I decided to quit teaching piano lessons to pursue this more and explore the idea of offering these services to other churches.
Also, Seminary is getting closer to ending for me! I switched my degree from an MA in Leadership to an MA in Theological Studies, which was a slightly shorter program meaning I’ll be graduating sometime next year! I’ve loved attending The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary over the last few years but I am ready to finish this degree and start getting used by God in a whole new way.
To keep this from getting any longer, there have been a lot of changes in our lives but we are so thankful to be where we are and with the people we are with now. This isn’t where we had pictured ourselves being at this stage of life but until God opens a door for us to do ministry in a more full-time capacity, we’ll just praise him in the hallway.
Do good. Don’t sin.
Crystal & Alex