The Harbuck Family
We are Kevin and Heather Harbuck and we’ve been at C3 for about 7 years now.
After we finished our degrees from Texas A&M in ’97 and ’98, we met at Second Baptist Church in 1999. We noticed how both of us had a desire to love the Body of Christ by serving others and soon began a whirlwind dating adventure- engaged after 7 months, 1 year engagement and married on June 30, 2001.
Our plans to work up our careers and start a family after 5 years were not part of God’s providence as we were pregnant with Tyler only 6 months into marriage. 2 years after that our second son Trevor was born, and 11 months later our daughter Ellie was born. We also brought home Emery from Ghana about 7 years ago… so today they are 17, 15, 14, and 11 years old.
Those early days were tough. Not only having 3 kids in 3 years, but Kevin’s career in software sales was just getting started and Heather was finalizing her nursing degree that she finished right before Trevor was born. Heather was then called to home school the kids and she did that for the next 8 years. They are now all in public school which brings new challenges, but also opportunity to be a light for Christ.
That’s probably the theme of our marriage – as we have gone through hard things, we have allowed God to use those difficulties to make us rely on Him, and also teach us how to serve and support others going through similar hard times as well. Despite the challenges, we knew to never isolate ourselves. God brought wonderful Christian friends and mentors to help us through it as we desperately needed to rely on their support and guidance. There is no way we could have made it alone.
Other ways God has helped our marriage and family is by listening to various podcasts and reading some important books including: Podcasts – Wretched Radio, Ask Pastor John, Bible Q&A with John MacArthur, Pray the Word with David Platt, The Briefing with Al Mohler, among others and great books including Ray Ortlund’s Praying for your Teen, Answers in Genesis Magazine, Reset for Parents by Todd Friel, Leading with Love by Alexander Stauch and countless others.
Our current focus is on helping others pursue God through a strong marriage. We’re leading a group of friends and neighbors through a study on Tim Keller’s The Meaning of Marriage. We could all use some encouragement, tips, and a complete reset on what marriage is all about – if you haven’t read that book, I’d encourage you to get it.
With three teenagers and a 4th not far behind, our ride today is a bit of a roller coaster week by week – but thankfully we rest in a God that does not change. He is constant and desires to be near us. We see him hold us tightly in our failures, and we rejoice with him over answered prayer in our victories.