Alpacas, Chickens & Music Used by God: Part 2

Now, to explain where the idea to go full time in the music ministry came from: (EDITOR'S NOTE: The Eernisse family began their ministry by playing music for a nursing home. If the demand is great enough, I'll be happy to also post the story of how they got started.) put simply, God. That's it: God Himself. He didn't use some outside, physical thing to urge my dad to consider it; He told him Himself. My dad said he had had Psalm 16:3 impressed on his heart for a while; it says, "Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established." Well, my dad certainly wanted to do what the Lord wanted him to do, and it was extremely obvious that He wanted us to do something fairly drastic, considering the circumstances. As time passed, he said his thoughts continued to move from moving our farm up to Kentucky (where we had been hoping to move for several months in order to expand the farm) to going full time with the ministry. I can remember the afternoon when he called my sister and me into his bedroom and told us about the seemingly absurd idea that he had been impressed with. When I heard that he had been seriously considering living in an RV and traveling the country performing, I knew right then that that's what we were going to be doing, if only because it fit the circumstances perfectly. Both my dad and I had lost our "secure" jobs instantly and very suddenly. We were, after three months of total inactivity, getting all KINDS of showings on our house. I had Providentially been prepared for CollegePlus!, which couldn't fit better with a traveling student. My parents would be able to pay off ALL their debt, something they had been really trying to do for several months, and all at one go, too. There are a whole lot more reasons, including the unimaginable impact it would have on every one of our lives. From that day on, I couldn't WAIT to see how the Lord was going to work this all out.

Since then, I've been able to watch many things happen, including Satan's attempts to derail us before we even get started. We haven't sold the house yet, but have a VERY interested Christian couple that we discovered that we know in a kind of round about way. So far, other than the normal attacks of discord that the devil normally tries to sow when we're walking into a building to perform, he has tossed some financial problems in the mix lately. My mom was boiling water a couple weeks ago and heard a POP. She looked around in confusion since nothing was there to pop and, not finding anything, didn't think about it again. The next day, I was looking at the cooktop as I was cleaning it and found a weirdly curved scratch in it. As I looked closer at it, I discovered about nine other "scratches" in it, all converging at one point: the center of the eye my mom was boiling water on. Yep, the cooktop cracked for no apparent reason. That was a pretty good chunk to replace (and is one reason why I wasn't able to participate in the prayer call tonight; I had to help my dad put the new one on). But, as always, God gave us the money to pay for it.

Another DIRECT answer to prayer - back in December, we got a booking at the Senior's Center here in town on the 7th of this month. The problem was that there was no piano. I'm sorry, but, while we can sing acapella, it's hard to play solos with no accompaniment lol. Well, we started praying that God would give us a good keyboard that we could take with us on our travels since this wouldn't be the last time we'd need it (like when we do concerts at the RV parks we stay in, something my dad plans on doing). Guess what: we got another booking on the 27th of Dec. at a church an hour or so north of us. The love offering we got there (we don't charge anything to perform, btw) was just enough to cover the cost of a keyboard and all the accessories we'd need.

I don't type fast enough to list all the different things that the Lord has done for us ( :P :( ), but He is surely helping us through this.

One more thing I need to mention: a week or so ago, a lady in our church approached my mom and told her that she and her husband were wishing to start an all-natural store. Basically, she was wanting to know if we would be willing to raise chickens for them if they cleaned up some land of theirs and set it up for a trailer hook-up, complete with water and septic. They know a man that owns a large dairy down the road who is willing to let us use his land to raise them on, too. The really neat thing here is that my dad had been struggling for a while wondering if the Lord wanted us to raise poultry for a few months in the summer to help cover costs, much like Paul made tents to cover the costs of HIS ministry. This seems to be a big answer to his prayer in that way. We still don't have it all worked out, and it may not, but it sure does look promising.


SO: here are the basic things that we are praying for, and we would all greatly appreciate it if you would join us in prayer:

* That God would give us a spirit of harmony and that we would all be able to resist Satan's urgings to fight and squabble. It's hard enough to get along with six people in a 3000 or so sq. ft. house; try living in an 800 sq. ft. RV for two years... YIKES!
* That God would give us a buyer for the house soon.
* That God would give my parents wisdom to know which fifth-wheel and truck to buy, and also that He would provide us with one of each in great condition for a good price.
* That He would continue to provide for our needs in this time with no steady income.
* That He would give us grace and mercy as we adapt to the COMPLETE lifestyle change that is going to be taking place here in the very near future.
* That God would work everything out with this chicken deal.
* That God would give direction on what kind of RV to buy.