God Was Gracious

Dacula, Georga (ACN)

So last Saturday we sold Krispy Kreme donuts at the intersection of Hamilton Mill and Braselton Hwy. We purchased 200 dozen, a modest amount for our first attempt and I think we all felt like it would be easy and in no time we would go home.

William and I arrived at the intersection at about 6:00am and everyone else arrived around 6:30am. William and I had driven about 30 miles to pick up the donuts in Commerce and drive them back. I spent $535 purchasing the donuts and as soon as I spent the money I began to worry about whether or not this was going to work. I know, I know it's God's thing so let Him worry. Well God didn't spend God's money from the Four In The Fire checking account, no Andy spent God's money from the Four In The Fire checking account and Andy was worried that maybe God didn't approve.

The team consisted of 9 people, all of whom are planning on going to Russia. We split up into groups on all four sides of the intersection. After roughly two hours (8:30am) I had to go to the restroom so I began to walk uphill across the intersection to the Quick Trip. As I began to walk I could feel my legs not wanting to cooperate (my blood sugar was low), I was wet from the rain (yeah God let it rain on us) and we had only sold maybe two boxes in 2 hours. I was frustrated, down trodden, and still worried, so I began to pray (again) asking God if He wanted me in Russia and if so, why wasn't He helping us sell these stink'n donuts. This went on in my mind for what seemed like an eternity.

As the morning wore on we began to sell and occaisionally we would sell two or three boxes very quickly. At one point when I went to William's truck to get more donuts I decided to count the remainder, I had not done so any earlier because I was afraid of what I would discover. It was probably 10:00am when I counted and if I remember correctly we had something like 35-45 boxes left in the truck. We had started the moring off with 100 boxes in the truck (or so we thought), because we had offloaded two stacks of 50 donuts on the other corners. While I was counting correctly, we had forgotten that there were about 20 boxes of donuts in my car, which was not discovered until the end of the day.

So needless to say I was elated at the thought of having sold over 50% of what we needed to sell at that corner. I had just come from William's corner and he had sold 27 of the 50 he had started with and Ben's stack looked like he had sold a goodly amount also, but I couldn't tell from across the street.

As the donuts began to sell, and it started like a wave building to a crescendo, people began to just give donations and not take the donuts. Well I wanted them to take the donuts, because I was tired and wanted to go eat. Oh well, I had to settle for people being generous and kind.

After the donuts began to sell everyone's spirit began to pick up. And at this point I might add that I am very grateful to everyone who participated, because each person had a role to fulfill and each person did it wonderfully. The girls (there are four of them, all teens) did a magnificent job of running back and forth to the cars and holding the signs that let people know what we were doing.

So to make a long story short (if that's possible at this point) we sold nearly all of the donuts and netted approximately $500. Of course that $500 must be split nine ways so we each made about $55. However, we need $3000/person to go on the trip. We will need a lot of support to come in from all of our friends and family in order to meke the journey to Russia.

For our part, Stephanie and I will be donating all or nearly all of any bonus she might receive this year to help pay our way. We also have not had a vacation in years, until we recently drove to North Dakota. The reason for that is that we do not spend money on vacations but rather we commit our money to the mission trips. I say this not to garner any praise, but so that you know that when we ask for your help we have done our part.

Now we must wait on God to bring in the rest of the money. He sold the donuts this past weekend so it is on Him that we will depend for the rest of the funds.

Andy