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Agape Newsletters

 

 

 

 

 

July, 2008

August, 2008

September, 2008

October, 2008

November, 2008

December, 2008

January, 2009

February, 2009

March, 2009

April, 2009

May, 2009

June, 2009

July, 2009

August, 2009

September, 2009

October, 2009

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As you may know, I (Zak) embarked on a long term goal of becoming a US Navy Chaplain after I heard God’s call to make military ministry my career in order to serve where there is an immense spiritual void.  After I completed my bachelor’s degree in Religion in March of 2008 I separated from the Navy 9 months early (in July of 2008) in order to attend Multnomah Biblical Seminary in Portland, Oregon, where I began a 3-year Master of Divinity program on August 25^th, 2008.  Kathy and I feel like we have made a huge step in faith by following God's call - we left our home, our friends, our church family, a steady pay-check, and a relatively certain future to move here to Portland and start completely over.  While we have no idea what tomorrow may bring, we have comfort that we are here because this is where God wants us.

Kathy and I have been given an incredible opportunity to serve with the Agape Church of Christ - a church plant (Kairos Church Planting Ministries) that meets in a high school cafeteria in inner-city Portland.  I have been asked to be Agape's "Recovery Groups Minister" and begin a ministry of small groups designed to assist people scarred by spousal or child abuse, divorce or infidelity, or addictions to alcohol, pornography or drugs.  Not only does this ministry allow Kathy and I to grow spiritually while serving others, it will help me meet the requirements of the Navy to become a Chaplain.  In order to be a Chaplain I am required to have two years of full-time, paid ministry experience.  We are convinced the skills I will learn with the Agape Church of Christ in the Recovery Groups Ministry perfectly prepare me to serve the men and women of the Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard as they deal with some of the very same social issues Agape does.  We strongly believe God has placed us in this job.

 

Since Agape is such a young church (started on Easter of 2007), they are not able to pay us.  For this reason Kathy and I, in conjunction with Ron and Lori Clark (Agape's church planters), are seeking support from other congregations and individuals to raise the amount I would need for a salary from the Fall of 2008 to the Spring of 2011.  This will be our only source of income!  Can you help Kathy, Koa, BZ2, and me with this need?

 

I have two scholarships from MBS as well as the Montgomery GI-Bill from the Navy, which will pay for the entirety of my tuition, books and fees.  We are seeking to raise $36,000 a year for each of the next 3 years ($3,000 a month income for a family of four) and an additional $300 a month for ministry expenses, most of which are necessary because Agape doesn't have its own church building (training, resources, travel expenses, mileage, meeting in coffee shops, use of our own cell phones, printing with our own ink and paper, and so forth).  There are also some big cost items which total around $5,000.  These lump sum costs are needed for our family’s insurance policy which is extremely high because of Kathy’s "pre-existing condition" (pregnancy!) and needs to be paid in a lump sum, and the security deposit for our house here in Portland.

As of 2002 (according to The Barna Group), only 3% of this country gives a tithe (10% of income) to a church ministry.  Instead, the average Christian American household gives only 2.2% of its earnings to a religious organization!  According to the US Census Bureau, in 2004 the average income for an American household was around $44,000, making an annual 2.2% donation worth about $968 ($81/month).  We have sent out around 40 letters to both individuals and congregations asking for support.  If each of our 40 recipients commit to $87 a month, we'd exceed our monthly income goal!  And obviously the more people who donate, the less each will have to give.  As of December 15th we've raised $1,400 a month...so we're on our way!

 

Donations to us are tax deductible (you will receive receipts for everything that you give), so please don't send money directly to us or even put our names on any checks - send your financial support to the Agape Church of Christ and mention somewhere on it the "Recovery Groups Ministry." 

Please send any physical donations (checks, cash) to:

Agape Church of Christ

c/o Recovery Ministry

11124 NE Halsey #635

Portland, OR 97220

We also offer you the ability to donate automatically and electronically!  Simply click on the treasure chest (below or in the sidebar) and you'll be routed to Kairos' online donation system.  You'll need to register first.  After logging in, select "Zachary Zumwalt - Agape Church of Christ, Portland, OR" as the fund you're donating to.  The rest should be self-explanatory.

 

 

Kathy and I have been blessed to see God so active in our lives and to have Him show us a glimpse of His plan for us.  We are certain we have been brought to Portland and placed under these circumstances for a reason.  It is not really a matter of "if" we are finanically supported, but "how" and "when!"  We ask for your prayers during this time, and your willingness to come along side us and experience the exciting work God has in store.  Together we can serve His kingdom!

Blackberries!

Well, Koa calls them raspberries, but I think that is just because it is easier for him to say.  He will say blackberries when prompted and he knows the difference, but for some reason he always asks to go pick raspberries...and he asks regularly.  Since I took his picture after this particular picking party he now tells me when we are finished that we need to go take pictures so he can show his cheeses.  His face was much messier than this picture would lead you to believe.

Our little blackberry bush doesn't provide many at a time, but we get enough for a little snack when we make the effort.  This particular day we went equipped with a step stool, gloves, my rain jacket and half of a curtain rod (to use as a hook to grab the branches).  I had Koa hold the container, but I had to work fast to make sure there were more going in than coming out...  He helped me pick a little, too, but most of them are too high for him to reach.  He's also particular--he only wants to pick them if they are of adequate size!  So, mostly he just eats while I pick. 

We took this batch and made some blackberry mini-muffins for breakfast.  Koa didn't get to help me make them because I got up before him and Zak and made some for Zak to take to school with him.  

I spent this afternoon going through Koa's baby clothes to get things washed and organized for the new littlest Zumwalt.  I can't be sure, but I think this kid is going to be cold--or wear pj's all the time!  It was fun to go through all of Koa's old stuff, but sad to think that a lot of it won't get used again.  I guess that's the dilemma when you try to decide whether to keep clothes for the next kid or pass them on to someone else.  When I packed Koa's up I figured we would still be in Hawaii, so there wouldn't be a seasonal issue.  Well, I was wrong again!

On a bit of a bummer note, we just found out yesterday that the very expensive insurance policy we just bought will not cover the birth of BZ2 if we use the midwife we have chosen.  Even though she is a preferred provider for this particular insurance company (which we were sure to check) they will only cover a birth if it takes place in a hospital and she doesn't do hospital births.  So, now we are in a pickle trying to figure out just what to do about that.  We can try to find a new midwife who will take me just five weeks out from d-day, but that is rather unlikely (I considered it a real blessing to find someone we really liked with space in her schedule when I was already at eight months) nor do I want to.  We will have to see how the Lord provides.  He has shocked and amazed us until now with solutions.  I have no doubt He has a plan. 

Holy Moly (Part 4)

This has been an especially exciting (and humbling) last couple days filled with all sorts of big news items.  First of all, on August 29th we sold our house in Hawaii!

Aloha Halekohana.

We've been in escrow for the past month, which is always an anxious couple weeks, but we made it all the way through and closed on Friday, the 29th.  It was a bit of a pain constantly being emailed paperwork to sign, printing it out, signing it, scanning it, then emailing it back, but that's what we get for doing it long distance I guess!  A couple things to praise God for: Zak read somewhere that the average length of time a house is on the market in Hawaii is 163.7 days (about 5.5 months).  Ours was on the market for around 60 days (and 30 of that was in escrow!).  We sold it at full asking price ($295,000) which is pretty amazing in today's buyer's market.  We sold it at literally the perfect time - if we closed less than a month earlier we would have been charged a $3000 pre-payment penalty, and if we closed 2 weeks later our ARM would have adjusted and increased our mortgage by $400 a month (from $1550 to $1950)!  Finally, we actually made money on the house (a whopping $580)!  This is significant because we were only trying to break even considering how far home prices have fallen nationally.  The fact that we bought a house 3 years ago when prices were crazy high and sold it last week after values have plummeted but still came out in the black is a miracle!  Right up until the last minute we thought we were going to have to write a $1000 check to make up the difference in escrow.  Praise God that we don't have to make those mortgage payments anymore.  This is just one of many examples of the signs we've seen over the past month or two that God wants us to be here in the Northwest.

The next big news is that Zak has finally started seminary.  He had orientation on August 22nd where he registered for his classes, bought his textbooks, got his ID and intranet access, and took a pre-seminary Bible exam to be compared to another exam he takes 3 years from now to see how much he learned while at Multnomah.  Last Tuesday (August 26th) was his first day of classes.  Zak is taking 5 classes (totaling 16 credit hours) this semester.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays he has "Genesis through Song of Solomon" and "Acts & the Pauline Epistles."  On Wednesdays and Fridays he has "Christian Theology 1," "Principles of Spiritual Formation," and "Principles of Inductive Bible Study."  Yikes!  He didn't do much in class the first week other than introductions and going over all the syllabi, but he says after seeing all his assignments he's going to be very busy for the next couple months (and probably years).  Fortunately all of his professors stressed the importance not of getting straight A's, but of growing spiritually and deepening relationships with God and each other.  To that end, we've already been to a professor's house 3 times and to 5 different student functions - just in the first 2 weeks!  We find it comforting to know that grades are Multnomah's #2 priority after our spiritual well-being.

Still on the topic of Multnomah Biblical Seminary, on Thursday (September 4th) Zak became his graduate class' Student Body President!  What a shock that was to all of us!  During orientation a sign-up sheet was posted where students could volunteer for any of the 10 positions on this year's Student Body Cabinet.  Zak eventually signed up to be considered for the position of Married Students Representative since no one else had volunteered for it after a couple days.  Imagine his (and then my) surprise when a couple days later one of his professors came up to him before class and asked that he consider and pray about being this year's President, even though others had actually signed up for it!  So we took some time, prayed about it, talked it over with some people, tried to figure out why God would bring this opportunity along, and in the end decided that any chance to grow through serving others is a good one (it certainly won't hurt his resume and Commissioning Application either!).  So, all day last Saturday (September 6th) he and the rest of the cabinet went on a retreat (that Zak had to put together) to build relationships and to create goals, a mission statement, and a verse for the class.  One of Zak's "relationship building exercises" was the game Lap Stack.  I guess there's no better way to get to know a stranger than by sitting on his/her lap for a while!  Zak's secondary duties as President will be to facilitate weekly cabinet meetings, meet weekly with the Dean of Students (the same professor who asked him to be on the cabinet), ensure the rest of the cabinet members are doing their jobs, and represent his class when all the class Presidents from the college and seminary get together to organize Multnomah University activities.  However, Zak's primary responsibility will be to serve and care for the other members of the cabinet as they serve and care for the class.  It's another Small Group ministry!  Our minds are boggled by how every little experience seems to prepare us for the next step in God's plan!  Who would have thought it!

But the story of God's provision in our lives these past couple months doesn't end there!  Three days ago during our Sunday morning worship services Zak (and family) were brought to the front and blessed as the new Recovery Groups Minister for the Agape Church of Christ.  Yep, Agape hired Zak to be a part-time minister while we're here attending MBS!  He will be responsible for (get this!) overseeing all of Agape's forthcoming Recovery Groups.  Isn't it amazing how God prepares us with past experiences for future ministry!?  Our church is going to launch groups which provide safe places for people to support each other as they experience problems with different kinds of abuse, addiction, depression, and infidelity.  From now until January leaders will be trained to facilitate each of the different kinds of Recovery Groups, and then next year the ministry will launch.  Please thank God for giving Zak a job with a church family that we love, and ask Him to bless our future endeavors in Agape's Recovery Groups Ministry.

A Fun Story

I know most of you read this blog for information on the under-aged in our household, so I figured I should give you a little update and one fun story just to keep you interested!

When we got our first small shipment it was partially ours and partially the Couser's, so there were a few things here and there that were starting to look familiar.  When Koa went in to use the potty one time he noticed that he recognized the bath mat.  He looked at me and said, "Is this ours?"  I said, "Yes."   He asked, "From our green house?"  I affirmed that and added, "This is our new house and soon we will have all of our stuff here."  He said, "This is our new house?  CONGRATULATIONS!"

As you can see from that little story, his vocabulary is really exploding and he says all kinds of interesting things now!  He is quite the little evangelist, too.  He will sing or talk or shout about Jesus whenever he gets a chance!  Sometimes he will be out on our front steps all by himself just telling anyone who will listen about Jesus.  Yesterday we were at Ikea rummaging through the scratch and dent section and the whole time we were there he had a lamp he was using as a microphone and he was singing/yelling, "Run to Jesus!  Run to Jesus!" the whole time!  I kept asking him to lower his voice and he would for a time, but the message just could not be suppressed and in very little time he would be yelling it again.  Can you really discipline for that?

He is getting pretty good at using the potty all by himself.  When we are out somewhere he will insist that I carry on with whatever I am doing and he will do it by himself.  There is usually some part of it that he can't quite do completely by himself (sometimes it starts with getting the door open to get in the bathroom).  I can't really suppress myself from going in and keeping watch, but one day he went in the men's room and Zak was perfectly willing to let him try.  We were sitting where we could see the door and when Zak did go in, the only thing Koa couldn't do by himself was reach the paper towel.  However, you should have seen the look on the poor guy's face who walked in on the little two year old sitting on the potty!  That was priceless!  There have certainly been some adventures along the way as we make this transition to independence.  I will have to blog about some of them for posterity sake at some point--mostly to remind me to just wait until the next child is 18 before we embark on this milestone!

Koa is really loving the new way of dressing that the rest of us are hesitant to adapt.  He loves to wear long pants or "hot pants" as he likes to call them.  He reminds me to bring his jacket when we go out the door even though he doesn't wear it for long when we do put it on because he usually gets too hot.  We got Koa a pair of galoshes (Locals) before we moved to Portland and packed them with the rest of our belongings, but he did not forget in the month that he did not see them!  He asked for them multiple times and when he saw me putting on covered shoes one day he insisted that he needed his "bootses".  We got them out and he started wearing these bright blue boots everywhere we went!  To Zak's dismay he doesn't even want to wear slippers anymore!  So, I went to a second hand store the other day and bought him a couple of pairs of regular shoes and he danced around like a crazy man with only one shoe on while Zak was trying to see if they fit.  For the rest of the day we could hardly get him to take them off.  Surprisingly, he can put them on by himself and gets them on the right feet.  I thought that was just a product of wearing slippers all the time, but apparently not.  I can't tell you how grateful I am to not have to bend over and put them on him!  

Speaking of not being able to bend over for any length of time without almost passing out...I am certainly getting rounder!  I have had a bit of a cold for the past week which makes breathing even more of a challenge.  Other than that, I am still feeling pretty good.  My weird back issue rears its ugly head from time to time, but I cannot even begin to tell you how thankful I am that it hasn't been any worse during our move!  With all of the plane flights and different beds and moving things from place to place I know it could have been SO much worse, but I have really done very well.  I haven't been exercising as much as I would like, but I do some stretching every now and then and it seems to help keep everything working relatively well.  Praise God!

Little BZ2 is getting slightly less busy.  I don't feel him or her moving all day and all night anymore--there are occasional breaks is the action, but when he/she is moving it feels like there is furniture being re-arranged in there!  Sometimes I feel my entire upper body move in response.  I don't remember Koa ever keeping me awake at night with his movements either (there's isn't much that will keep me awake at night!), but this kid can definitely do so.  One night at like 3 AM it actually felt like my whole belly was vibrating and then the baby was running laps on the inside.  It was the weirdest thing I have ever felt--and I could NOT go to sleep!  Koa likes to tell me what the baby is doing in there--it's usually a sport.  "She's playing baseball!"  (Yes, he still insists the baby is a girl and she will have green eyes, green hair and a green shirt.)

We have chosen a doctor/midwife very close to us.  She does home births and birthing center births.  We haven't totally decided which we are going to do, but I think it will probably be at the birthing center.  We figure you kind of lose the "comfort of your own home" benefit when your own home still feels a little foreign.  We'll see.  We still have a couple of months...

We're still not certain on a first name for a girl or a middle name for a boy, so if you have any ideas we are still open to suggestions!

Fair Winds and Following Seas

It is now 0000 in Hawaii, which means I (Zak) am out of the Navy and officially a civilian.  Nine years is a long time, and now it's over.  My departure was certainly a little anti-climactic - I got out of the Navy while asleep in bed at 3:00am (Pacific time) so that I could get up and go to class with all my other campus mates this morning.  It's a weird feeling.

So now I leave the seas behind and operate on dry ground.  On to uncharted territory!

Holy Moly (Part 3)

I know this post is long over-due, but as you might imagine, these have been some very busy weeks!  When we arrived in Portland we stayed for a couple of weeks in Beaverton with our friends Clint and Marla, whom I have known since the day I moved to Portland the first time 13 years ago.  They were very generous to let us stay as long as we needed.  The first two Sundays we were here we went to church with them once out at the beach (coast!) and once in the building of the Southwest Church of Christ.  That is where I was a member when I lived here before and it was really neat to go back and see so many familiar faces.  What was even more incredible to me was that most people remembered me and a lot of folks knew where we had been and what we have been up to for the past eight years!  That was amazing to me!

On our first Sunday my friend, Kara, whom I haven't seen and have hardly talked to since I left, offered us the use of their extra car.  She said they just keep it around in case someone should need a car.  It's the same one she drove while we were in college.  What a blessing to get to catch up with Kara and her family.  We certainly have been well taken care of as far as having a place to stay and a car to drive, that's for sure!

On August 2nd, Zak celebrated his 27th birthday!  Woo Hoo!  The Honolulu Crew: Tracie, Jessi, Wes and the Zumwalts all went out to a Portland Beaver's game (a AAA farm-team that feeds the San Diego Padres) for the evening.  Since baseball is Zak's favorite sport and he has missed it so much while living in Hawaii, I think it was a fun and fitting way for him to spend his birthday.  He even got Koa a giant foam finger indicating that he's the Beaver's #1 fan (I'm not sure how they verified that). 

About two weeks after we got here we got the message that our first small shipment of air mattresses and kitchen items was here and that our MDX was in Tacoma ready to be picked up at about the same time.  We thought we would try to make the trip to pick up the car an adventure and visit our friends, the Lewises while up there.  So we were going to take Amtrak up and drive the car back, but since we needed to be here in Portland to receive our first shipment we had to make it a rush trip.  We signed the lease for our house and picked up the keys the night before and left at around 5AM in one car the next day and were back in Portland with 2 cars by noon!  The Cousers actually went and opened our house for us and met the movers when they came.  August 8th was our first night in our new house: Mult-Home-Ah.

Our yard was in desperate need of some aloha when we moved in so we borrowed some lawn equipment from the family the Cousers were staying with and started working on our lawn.  We discovered we have an apple tree and a cherry tree in our yard.  Zak and Wes spent a whole afternoon trimming the cherry tree so that hopefully it will produce next year.  It didn't do so well this year.  Since that day we have also discovered some blackberry bushes nearby!  I'm making a plan for my garden, too, but I haven't had a chance to get it started yet.  I can't wait to start growing things!

We were camping in our house for a few days before we got our second shipment containing the majority of our household goods.  It only took the movers a couple hours before we were totally surrounded up to our necks in boxes!  Only a day or two ago (some 2 weeks after the delivery) we finally sent off the last of those empty boxes (thanks to Craig's list!).  I'd say we still have more things to put away than not, and each day we get a little closer to being settled in, but it is going very slowly.  Probably the room we've gotten farthest along in is Zak's office.  He is very excited to have all the bookshelves in one room and have his own space in which to study over the next couple years.  Zak was given an old desk in Hawaii that fits perfectly in the closet, so that's where he set up our desktop computer and printer and wireless network to get them out of the way (he calls that closet his server room).  He also found a dark green leather couch on Craig's List for 50 bucks that goes great in the office.  He says all he needs now is a faux fireplace with a mantle and he'll be all set!

The other big news from a couple weeks ago is that we have a new church family!  It's the Agape Church of Christ.  It's a church plant that started about a year and a half ago and meets in a high school cafeteria in inner-city Portland.  There's about 60 of us on any given Sunday but if everyone showed up at the same time, there'd probably be over 100 people.  We really feel like God brought us to Agape to learn from some very genuine and service-oriented people - the church is very welcoming and evangelistic.  Most of our congregation's efforts are focused on the unchurched or those in need, so we open our doors (the school's doors!), set out some food and coffee, and invite in anyone who comes along.  We have quite a few homeless members, a couple people fresh out of prison, and quite a few folks who've been hurt by other churches in the area and have found acceptance with us.  There's no dress code so everyone just wears t-shirts and jeans to services and everyone is welcome to take communion.  Ron Clark, our minister and church-planter, and his wife, Lori,  are very passionate and professionally trained in dealing with social justice issues, so we do a lot of work with the homeless, the addicted and the abused.  Two weeks ago we were at a shelter serving dinner to the homeless and last Saturday we were at Dignity Village (read here and here) replacing some tent structures with little wooden buildings we made out of plywood.  Kathy and I have already grown spiritually and have seen what it takes to be a Christian in a whole new light just in the 3 weeks or so that we've been attending.  We are so blessed to have found Agape, and we pray that we can be used to serve the folks here in Portland.

We're almost caught up, so stay tuned!