Amazing Kids Fall 2014

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Amazing Kids Program begins 2014-2015 program year!

Dear Friends and Family - Please add to your prayers today - right now - the first day of the 2014 Amazing Kids after-school program.  Rohan, Rebecca, Emily, Elsa, Lorinda, Ellis, and many others who work with these children and their families in Lethbridge.  The excitement of a new year with new goals and plans is ahead of them and we want to pray that our strong and powerful God will be with them as they share Jesus' love with these children.

Enjoy this video from the current year and years past:

In Praise of Amazing Kids:

“The Amazing Kids Program is important to our school community because it targets school age children in need of mentorship. It promotes healthy attitudes and gives our children opportunities to be part of a sense of community outside school hours.… I believe supporting children in a spirit of community is crucial for their social, emotional and physical development”

 Nancy Brown       

Principal of Westminster Elementary School

Time line Tuesday!

New information for you!

So just how did we end up getting called to Lethbridge, Alberta?

    How did we end up getting to Nigeria, West Africa 29 years ago?

        How did we meet?

              How did we end up living in 17 different houses through the 33 years of our marriage?


These and other "timely" questions will be answered and revealed to inquiring minds - On Tuesdays!

  -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -

  Spring of 2013 - it's time to acquire a new group of calves for the farm - they are so cute when you first get them - but to keep a calf alive when it has been separated from it's mother and bottle feed them grow them to grass-fed beef status is quite a job.  Last spring we lost 5 of the 9 we purchased. It was a hard time for Howard.  You expend a lot of time and effort and yes, love, into raising them.  After a rough couple of months, Howard started wondering if the part-time farmer might not be where God wanted him.

  March of 2013 - Sandy puts in her resignation to the law firm she worked at - she and Howard had been working opposite schedules and missed spending time with each other - we really do like to spend time together and there had not been enough days off at the same time to go for motorcycle rides. In addition - and Uncle Sam had taken too much of their money that year.  We did not need to have 2 incomes at this time in our lives.  Sandy had also started wondering what else to do  -  a nagging sensation that there was more to life than sewing, reading, enjoying the grandkids (which we do very much), and working in our local church.



  June 2013 - Howard starts exploring other Counseling jobs available with different mission organizations and finds that there are many places in many parts of the world that need 50+ year old people with our skills.  We feel that God is giving us a restlessness about staying in Tennessee at this time. We had always kept in our future plans the possibility of returning to mission work after we returned to the states 26 years ago from a term of service in Nigeria and see this as a good time to explore that opportunity.

  We started praying and put the farm up for sale!  



The next Time Line Tuesday post will give you more information -                                                             Stay tuned!

 

Amazing Grace Community Church is 4 yrs. old today!

Amazing Grace Community Church website

Check them out on Facebook: 

Amazing Grace Community Church - Lethbridge

We are planning to spend birthday 

#5 

with them next year!!

Muppet's Happy Birthday.

Living in Grace

This past week found Howard and I at Ridge Haven camp in Brevard, North Carolina.

We came to attend the Living in Grace conference held for all short-term and long-term missionaries serving with Mission to the World.

It was a great time of learning about ourselves and how to prepare ourselves for the work in Lethbridge. A whole week of studying God's grace shown to all of us.





What is the Gospel? the message of Grace
 The Love of God - the foundation of Grace
  Surrender - the response of Grace
   Humility - the reflection of Grace
    Repentance - the posture of Grace
     The Holy Spirit - the agent of Grace
      The Love of Others - the sign of Grace
       Living the Resurrected Life - the way of Grace
        Prayer - the language of Grace
         Good Works - the life of Grace




We spent 5 days on this outline - obviously we cannot share with you everything we learned - but just reading through the heading of our lectures, you can see what the emphasis was on

GRACE

What a marvelous gift. We look forward to sharing it with those we go to work with in Lethbridge.

We would like to leave you with these thoughts -

 "We must lose ourselves in order to see His Grace in us - flowing through us - 

showing His power through our weakness"

"The one condition for spiritual progress is that we remain sincere and humble" John Calvin

Pray for us as we continue to prepare in this way for our service in Alberta.

September Road Trips

We end this first week in September with a summary of our one-day road trip and an itinerary for you!

We spent yesterday visiting several good friends that we haven't seen in years or months. 

Drove to Lenoir City,

Drove to Philadelphia (TN), 

Drove to Maryville,

Drove to Englewood,

Drove home!

 It was a great time of fellowship and catching up on each other's lives.  

(Great time of singing with our small group too!)

Thank you to the friends who welcomed us into their home and joined our support team.  We were awed to watch God working to get us closer to Lethbridge.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              On Sunday, September 7 we head off to North Carolina for a week immersing ourselves in study of God's Grace.           This print by Ann Voskamp is a good way to remind ourselves of the goodness of God given to us that we look forward to sharing with others.

After we finish the conference here is our plan, But we will let you know as the weeks move along what actually transpired and who we saw.  

(I will also work on getting better car photos - ha)

September 7^th  - Living in Grace – Ridge Haven, North Carolina

September 12^th – Driving to Indiana - overnight somewhere

September 13^th – Niece Christy’s wedding - spend 2 nights with family

September 15^th – Monday - visits with friends in Michigan

  Monday night drive to Hammond, IN stay with family for 2 nights

September 16^th – visit friends in Lansing, IL  

September 17th - drive to Rockford, IL – stay with friends and visit Hope Church friends

  

September 20^th – Hope Church reunion 

September 21^st – speak at Kishwaukee EPC church in Stillman Valley, IL

September 22^nd – Head to Ohio to visit the Elliott family!

September 23rd or 24th - head home! 

Time to see how big the grandkids have gotten while we were gone!

Carson by his 1st grade class

Emily and Charlee

Mary Kate and Finn

Please pray for our safety as we travel,

our brains as we absorb knowledge about our Lord, and

For those who we share our calling with - that they will join our support team.

(If we are heading in your direction on this trip,

 send us a message and we will add your home to the GPS!)