Revival in Whitesville

I am getting ready for our 5th and final revival service in Whitesville, a small community near King City, (another small community), near the small community (Maysville) where I live. It is a beautiful little country church on a hill overlooking a valley. The services have been a great experience with God as we heard him speak through Pastor Allan Lane from Calvary Baptist Church of St. Joseph. The people have been warm and welcoming and I hope they have enjoyed the services as much as I have. Our quartet "True Light" sang last night (minus Jeff Noland who was out of town for work.) (http://www.truelightquartet.com/) and we are having a small service at the nursing home in King City this afternoon. God is leading and guiding us and that makes everything easier. There has been a public decision to accept Jesus as Lord and a lot of contacting, visiting, and seed sowing. Here is one of the beautiful windows in the little country church.

Teen College Week

Teen College was the final big event of the summer. Our youth minister and his wife to an outstanding job every year with our teens and this event lets me combine their know-how with our Vacation Bible School. We have a lot of crazy events to attract the teens, then we share Jesus with them through Bible Study and Quizzing, Worship Music, and a guest speaker each night. The crazy events included sledge-o-matic (hit things with a sledge hammer), water balloon battle (complete with slingshots), dunk tank, digital camera scavenger hunt, and a pool party and the country club pool. We had more teens than I can remember ever coming to this event and they kept returning each night. God really blessed the efforts of those participating to reach the teens in our community. We had 45 kids and 21 workers throughout the week and averaged 47 people each night. There were 7 decisions for salvation and we are in the midst of following up with those teens whose lives were changed. God is Great.

Children's Camp

Children's Camp was amazing as usual. The Theme was :FAITH WORKS . We adopted a construction themed approach to the verse James 1:22. "Do not merely hear the word and so deceive yourselves, Do what it says!." As usual for children's camp I was honored to be the worship leader and to write and original song for the week's theme. I will try to link it to this blog entry for you to hear. Also, for the first time, Allie got to go to camp with me. She had a really good time and did great as a first-time camper. There were many decisions made and God really worked among the campers. It was especially noticable on Thursday evening worship time when many children chose to ask Jesus to be their Savior.
I have uploaded a couple of pictures of the coolest camper of all, Allie. What an amazing week.

Ministry Orientation

After Youth Camp, I began a time of orientation to full time ministry at FBC. I am fortunate to have been taken under wing by our pastor and introduced to many aspects of this position that I had not fully considered before. Much of it was just operational procedures related to the "education" element of the ministry, but some was about being a minister and all that it entails. I am blessed to have such and experienced friend helping me. I got settled in to a new office complete with a door plate that reads, "Minister of Education and Music." I still have a lot of things to move out and a lot of things to move in, but it is functional which is good because I have hit the ground running. Children's Camp was just around the corner as well as summer Teen College. I am most enjoying the fact that I can regularly spend time in the Bible without having to squeeze it into a lunch break or hectic workday. I took a cue from the pastor and come to church a half hour early to have my "quiet time." The thing that I have been most surprised with is the incredible amount of activity that goes on around a small town church during the day.
There is always something to take care of and I am enjoying the opportunity.

Youth Camp

Well here goes my attempt to get back on the blogging horse. :) Laura and I both attended Youth camp June 3-7. I went as a coach which meant I no longer enjoyed the luxury of the staff cabins but was at the top of the hill with 12 seventh through ninth graders and my co-coach John. We had an amazing week. John did a phenomenal job of interacting with the boys to ensure they had fun as well as got to know Jesus in new ways. There was one young man that accepted Christ in my cabin at bedtime devotionals and another that was introduced to a life in Christ through his "family leader." John was a great source of information and tireless communicator to our cabin and we have been attempting to keep in touch with the boys throughout the summer. God is GREAT! It was my first full week in full time ministry and I couldn't think of a more worthwhile event to get me started. It was great having Laura there also. I am going to try to upload her singing to youtube so everyone can see the song she sang at the talent show . It is a little too large to upload to this blog.

It was a great week! I will post the link to youtube as soon as I have Laura do it for me. Here is a picture of her at the talent show praise night.