2008 was quite the year for my wife and I. I was 3 months shy of working at The Oklahoman for 25 years when the news came, I was layed off. Wow, my head was spinning. I had always worked, never been without a job. God was always in my life, I had always tithed, helped out at the church, Sabrina and I host a Connect group.... I kept thinking, how could this happen? I never quit believing in God, but still how could it happen. We never quit tithing, in fact we made several "extra" offerings believing that God would take care of us. We never pulled back. Sure, there were questions and dark moments, but in the end after being out of work for 13 months, I had a job. It wasn't THE job, but it was a job. The cool thing is that we came out of those 13 months being 2 months ahead on our home mortgage and after 2 years at that job, I was promoted back into I.T. and now make more money than before. I truly believe that God rewards faithfulness and I praise my wife for always supporting me!

In 2009, two weeks after my first time at Harvest, I was laid off from my job. The job market for my style of position was in a huge downtime. I needed God more than ever. A very close friend sponsored me to go to my first Men's retreat. I wanted to crawl in a hole and fade away but at the retreat I was encouraged and pressed in. Financially I was a mess. Then I saw Danny Chambers teach on a Sunday night. He taught on tithing. As soon as we got right with our giving my wife's business started growing. I believe God sustained us and used my time while unemployed to teach me to trust Him. It was amazing to see my faith confirmed. Through that whole time we were never late on a bill. Money just came in. We tithed and paid bills. Plus because I stayed connected, I found my biggest mentor and best friend, Andrew Morris (even if he does like the Packers). I don't ever want to imagine a day without God or my COTH family.

I came home from my honeymoon to find out I'd lost my job. Over the next 8-month period of unemployment, God continued to provide for us and for ALL of our needs - He even took care of some of our wants and desires. In His infinite faithfulness, I was given severance pay, qualified for unemployment benefits, and was able to make some money on the side. I decided to be faithful in serving. I got involved with the Emerson Girlfriends Club and we now lead the FCA ministry at UCO, which has become our passion and a key role in our calling. During this season, I continued to trust, pray, cry out, serve, fast and worship God through my situation. God always sent someone my way via my family and church family with a word of encouragement to prompt me to keep trusting because my breakthrough was right around the corner. I now have my dream job at UCO as an Academic Advisor & I LOVE it! God's timing was PERFECT! I am so thankful and He is SO faithful!

We have been working on refinancing our home since November. During the process we were told we would need anywhere from $500 to $1800 at closing. Bottom line, we didn't have any money for closing but we were trusting God. It was tempting to not tithe thinking, if we saved that money we could meet our closing cost, but that was just not an option. Tithing is never an option. We went to closing this week. We decreased our house payment, took 5 years off our mortgage AND actually got $600 back! Yep. God is getting his 10% and more every time. God is faithful!