June 2010

Greetings, I hope this note finds you doing well.  We are doing good, getting ready for a week of vacation up to Horn Creek family Camp where we will get to 'assist' Billy Thrall, who is the camp speaker for the week.  He has assured me that I will mainly get to play and be with my family and I am looking forward to this, it has been a busy six months with the arrival of Elyana and two intense overseas trips and all the growing pains that come from a thriving and young ministry.
Poland Trip (still processing) It has almost been a month since returning from Poland.  (In this photo Hanna is in front of the gravestone that was erected in Gemund in honor of her parents.)  The trip was an intense trip full of experiencing the power of God's amazing ability to redeem and restore even the most extreme evil and darkness.  I am not ready to give a full report on this trip, I am still processing much and look forward to sharing with George and Hanna and Megan in a few weeks that will help crystallize the main themes and messages we sensed God speaking to us through this trip.  I am very grateful for the prayer for this trip and ask that you would continue to pray for what God wants to do through Hanna's book she is finishing and the  ongoing fruit from this trip.  Apprenticeship to Jesus Kids Carnival Last month Shannon Murphy gave leadership to a kids carnival in our community.  It was such a great time, we had a great turnout, more that 40 kids plus their parents.  This built on the many events both formal and informal from the past two years that are building trust and friendships as we work and pray to see God's transformational Presence come to this neighborhood.    click to see more kids carnival photos  Next Steps As we finish up our second year we are looking ahead to the future.  The summer will be an important time for us to come together and assess all God has been doing and the convictions he has given.  We are trusting God that out of this intentional time of discernment we will enter into a new place of communicating the vision of Apprenticeship to Jesus that will allow a greater way to partner with other organizations and churches and allow for other young people to participate in the A2J training program next fall.  Please pray with us in this important season.		Living as Jesus' apprentice I have been pondering these two quotes lately, the first is by Friedrich Nietzche and the second by Eugene Peterson, from his  book  "A Long Obedience" The essential thing "in heaven and earth" is...that there should be a long obedience in the same direction, there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living.  "One aspect of 'world' that I have been able to identify as harmful to Christians is the assumption that anything worthwhile can be acquired at once.  We assume that if something can be done at all, it can be done quickly and efficiently.  Our attention spans have been conditioned by thirty-second commercials,facebook and twitter updates.  Our sense of reality has been flattened by thirty-page abridgments." "It is not difficult in such a world to get a person interested in the message of the gospel; it is terrifically difficult to sustain the interest.  In our kind of culture anything, even news about God can be sold if it is packaged freshly; but when it loses its novelty, it goes on the garbage heap.  There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue, little inclination to sign up for the long apprenticeship to Jesusin what earlier generations called holiness." -Eugene Peterson
Noleen and I are grateful for the ongoing love and support that we receive from you!  Thank you for your investment in our live and this ministry