This is my inaugural newsletter since our move to Kentucky. Our first eight weeks have been as full as you might imagine. There's nothing like moving everything you own from one place to another—thank goodness! Someone said, "You don't think the Lord has blessed you with much until you have to move it all. Then you wonder, 'How did we get all this stuff?'" And I never dreamed there were so many places I had to notify of my change of address. Then there's locating a new doctor, dentist, barber, mechanic, bank, etc. I meet people who tell me they have moved something like ten times in the past twenty years. I don't know whether to admire them or pity them. I think I would have died or gone insane if I'd had to move that often. On several occasions I had to stop and remind myself, "As bad as this is, it's nothing compared to losing everything in the tsunami, a hurricane, or tornado." And though we still have a garage filled with boxes (e.g., I won't be able to unpack my library for weeks or months), the worst is over.

We are very happy with our new church home. We inquired about it carefully before we put an offer on the house. Since our lives revolve so much around our local church, we did not want to put unnecessary distance between us and our place of worship. We're pleased to be just half-a-mile from the meeting place, the closest we've been to our church since 1980 when we lived in a parsonage next door to the church.

I'm thrilled to be at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I am honored to serve with such wonderful colleagues. If you or your child are considering college or seminary, come visit the campus in Louisville sometime, or check out the website at www.SBTS.edu.

Caffy is nestmaking in our new home, beautifying it as only she can. Some wallhangings have been tried on at least half-a-dozen walls. Some chairs have been pushed around the house like bumper cars. Just this evening I realized, "I haven't seen that chair in this room before." Lately she's focused on getting her art studio set up, all the while trying to get some smaller art projects completed. Despite our three-week drought, she's kept a couple of ferns thriving on one corner of the porch, each plant flanking a white wicker chair. Next month she'll start gearing up to teach an evening class for student wives at the seminary.

Laurelen has had her hands full with Roscoe. He's a black cat "we" (strictly speaking, I had nothing to do with it, rather it was the girls acting without my knowledge before I arrived in KY) adopted just before we moved into our new home. He's about three months old. His mother died delivering Roscoe's litter, so he was fed from a bottle. Not growing up around brothers and sisters to wrestle with, he thinks everyone and everything (including any passing foot) is a playmate. Lazy eight-year-old felines Samson and Taffetta rarely find him amusing. Laurelen has quickly made several new friends at church, and we're grateful she hasn't had to go through a lonely period following the move. Despite her involvement with church and friends, she's been motivated by a Louisville library reading program to read as much as a book a day in the past couple of weeks. Earlier this week she enjoyed The Bandit of Ashley Down, historical fiction about a young thief who encounters the great nineteenth century man of prayer and faith, George Mueller.

Please pray for us. Though we love our new home, we have a major water problem. Thankfully, it's a completely different kind of problem than we had in Kansas City. Still, it has the potential to be both stressful and costly. This is before us daily at present. Second, please ask the Lord's blessing on my new ministry at Southern, as well as my itinerant preaching/teaching (see the "Speaking Schedule" button on the homepage). Third, I need the Lord's help to resume and complete a major writing project. Finally, pray for the Lord's blessing on the nationwide broadcast of my message on family worship, scheduled for August 29 and 30 on FamilyLife Today. Go to www.FamilyLife.com, and then to the "broadcasts" link to find the station nearest you and the time of the broadcast.

The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you.
2 Timothy 4:22