Teen Revival

Ministry Update

The Lord gave us a wonderful close to our special back-to-school revival at my home church. The first two nights were disappointing as far as visible results were concerned, but God was working. At the end of the second service after I preached on “The Lake of Fire,” a boy vomited all over the floor during the invitation. We had to cut that service short, but the largely un-churched kids held their composure quite well, considering the circumstances.

Tonight’s crowd was especially rowdy during the game and preliminary part of the service. Bro. Jim Ogle (the youth pastor at our church) and I went into a back room during the special music and begged God for a miracle to calm the hearts of these rambunctious teenagers and get them to listen to the preaching. For my part, I was struggling still when I got to the pulpit, wondering what God would have me preach. I felt led to make much of Calvary and so began my message by telling them what the Cross meant to me and how we wanted them to be saved as well. From there, we went to Titus 3 and I preached a salvation message from the first seven verses. At least two that I know of were saved, one of them coming to me afterwards and telling me boldly, “I got saved tonight.” As for the kids’ attention? God worked the miracle that we had prayed for, and the rowdiest ones sat nearly stone still throughout the entire message. It was a miracle in which God’s power was greatly on display. Thank you so much for all you who pray for our ministry.

The last two days, I was also able to speak in the opening chapel services of Ambassador Baptist College. The Lord blessed in those services as well, with some specific victories in the services.

Soon, we will be back on the road again. As always, we appreciate your prayers for us. God is still on the throne and He is still working in hearts.

Charleston

In our last update, we mentioned our upcoming trip to Charleston. The trip was such a tribute to the power of God that we feel compelled to tell everyone about it.

Sarah and I had been on only one other “us” trip in our seven years of marriage. The children’s food allergies are challenging enough for us, without trying to educate someone else enough to leave the children with them for extended time. We nevertheless decided to proceed with our plans to go to Charleston and leave all three children with my parents in Greenville, SC. As I was writing in our last update of our plans to go, I was considering canceling the trip because we did not have the money to go. Despite this misgiving, we went anyway, and the Lord worked some wonderful miracles while we were there.

In order to save costs, I had arranged for us to stay in the prophet’s chamber of Northside Baptist Church in North Charleston. On Monday night, however, the prophet’s chamber was occupied, so we had to get a motel. The church got the motel to give us their discount. After an evening down by the battery of Charleston, we returned to our motel for a night of sleep. The next morning we ate from the motel’s continental breakfast and chose some breakfast things that we could take with us for the rest of the week’s breakfast. From there, we checked out and headed once again for downtown Charleston.

I expected that we would be able to walk around the city and see some old picturesque homes and that would be the extent of our tourism in Charleston. After all, being a tourist costs money and we had none. As we were walking along the street, however, a man stopped us and asked us how we liked the city and so forth. He then told us that if we listened to a sales pitch about a vacation plan similar to a timeshare, he would give us some free gifts. He made sure that we understood there was no obligation and we got the gifts, regardless of our answer to the salesman. We knew what the answer would be, but the gifts were reason enough to listen to his speech. After ninety minutes and our firm refusal to buy, he gave us five gifts: two free tickets to a horse-drawn carriage ride through the city, two free tickets for a harbor tour by boat, two free tickets to the plantation of our choice just outside the city, a $25 gift certificate to any one of several five star restaurants in Charleston, and a $20 gift card. Now we could be real tourists all for free.

Every day, we still parked in the free parking down by the battery and walked – all to save parking fees. We lost weight on the trip and put miles on our feet, all of it in the heat of late-summer Charleston. On Wednesday night we were in Northside Baptist Church for their midweek service. As we sat there, the pastor announced that the offering that night would go to us. After the offering was counted, they gave us over $1,000! We could hardly believe our ears. In addition, someone in the church gave us $40 in cash. The Lord had miraculously provided, again. The pastor specifically instructed us to use some of the money for something fun. Thursday was fun as we finished using the last of our free activities and actually splurged a bit. We went into an old-fashioned candy store and bought some candy, we took a bicycle taxi ride, ate at a restaurant without having a gift certificate, and actually paid 70 cents to a parking meter just so we didn’t have to walk quite so far.

Not only was it a wonderful time for Sarah and me, but it was also a great time to see the hand of God at work in our life. Thank you to all of you that prayed for our trip.

At Long Last

Ministry Update

We apologize for not writing in so long. The Lord has been blessing us in meetings and travel. Every remaining Sunday in August is now full, and we have a couple of other preaching engagements as well during the month. Please continue to pray for our meetings and that the Lord would supply more meetings. We appreciate your prayers.

Family Update

Hey - we are still alive and kicking! It has been a fearfully long time since we sent out an update. The weather here in North Carolina has been stifling - hot and humid. It was well over 100 degrees several days this past week, as high as 106 yesterday! People have asked us how cool we are staying in the trailer. It has been cooler than outside, but still too hot for comfort during the day. The AC just can't keep up when it is this hot for so long. Thankfully, we were able to escape into the church and get some relief on the hottest of days. Today is cooler, and we hope it will stay that way.

Josiah had his sixth birthday this past Tuesday, and is looking forward to starting first grade in a few weeks. He has kept up his reading over the summer, and I don't think he will have any problem getting back into the swing of things. I will have to make some adjustments, though. There is a part of me that dreads going back to school. However, I will grin and bear it!

Abigail has been busy soiling our couch, carpet, bedding, and sundry other items. We hope that this long, dark valley of potty training will be over one day. I am thinking of finding out how many colleges offer Potty Training 101, and applying for a scholarship in her name. She has grown a lot this summer, and is getting to be quite a help around the house. She loves to wash dishes and cook and clean right alongside me.

Esther is finally walking. She is still not very steady, but happily toddles around the house, getting into whatever is available. She has also mastered the art of climbing down off the bed or couch, and backing down the step. She also likes to climb the bunk ladder in the kid's bedroom. I usually keep it up just because of the lack of space, but if I forget, there she is, standing on the ladder, squealing in excitement. She has gotten taller, too, and is now in danger of bonking her head when she stands up under the table. Poor thing still has no hair to cushion the blow, so I have to keep an eye on her. Her favorite word is "Eat," although she does not say it herself. She recognizes it though, and always makes a great deal of excitement when she hears it. Flapping arms, grunts, lunges toward the high chair - it is very funny to see.

We haven't had any meetings the last few weeks, so we have had the opportunity to spend some time with my family in Ohio. We also went to the Creation Museum in Petersburg, KY. That was an incredible place! The kids loved, it, and along with all the dinosaur artifacts, and flood geology, was a very clear presentation of the Gospel. The planetarium was awesome - to think that we are so insignificant when compared to the vast universe around us, and yet, God cares about each one of us in a special, eternal way. While we were watching one of the presentations, it was all I could do to keep from shouting, "Praise the Lord!" I refrained however, since we were in a dark and crowded room full of strangers. Had I "gone off" Paul might have, too, and you can imagine the resulting panic when they realized there were at least two fanatics loose in the room with them. Seriously, though, it was great!

Paul and I are going to Charleston, SC next week for a belated anniversary trip. The kids are staying with Grandma and Papa, so they will be in good hands. We are looking forward to some "just the two of us" time. We have not done anything special for our anniversary for four years. Sometimes, there is just no opportunity or time to do anything. I intend to take lots of neat pictures, and have a wonderful time. Pray that no hurricanes wipe us off the map while we are there. That would be very unromantic!

Sarah