Paris- The Eiffel Tower

So guess what I did last week... I went to Paris! My friend Ross lives there so I went to visit. There have to be some perks to being young and single... right? Here are some pictures. Expect more in upcoming days.

THE EIFFEL TOWER

Call me a typical tourist, but I LOVED LOVED LOVED the Eiffel Tower at night. It was all I hoped it would be. Pictures can't capture it... but I tried! :)


Me and Ross


I loved it! So happy.


This is DangeRoss. :)


I loved it. It's blue because France is currently head of the European Union.


And on the hour, it twinkles. :) Magical!


I imagined it to be taller and narrower. But it was perfect.


We smelled cotton candy and followed it to these carousels down near the base of the tower, and got a ginormous cotton candy. You can see it shadowing over Ross' face here. :)

And sometimes you get a sign

I wrote this blog on signs a few months ago, and still believe what I wrote.

Then about a month ago I was praying about what felt like a change of seasons in my life, and I wasn't sure whether my perception was being led by the Spirit or skewed by my selfish motivations.

And the next day, as I cleaned out the dark corner of my closet for the first time in maybe 9 months, I found a bag. And inside the bag, this sign in the photo. I wasn't praying for a sign, but I guess the Lord thought that's what I needed.

God is good. :) Good to provide, good to teach, and good to humble. And most of all, so good and faithful to love. The name of this blog is feeling pretty appropriate right now.

Yeariversary!

Today marks a year that I've been at my job! It's hard to believe. Those who knew me last summer know how gut wrenching it was to not just find a job but think about a career post-Brazil and post- the realization that I didn't want to be a public school teacher.

I remember one friend in particular kept telling me that he had complete faith it was going to be not just okay, but great, and how hard that was to believe at the time. But now, that is so true and then some.

I am blessed to work for my alma mater, Oklahoma Christian University, in the marketing department as a web editor/writer. I love what I do, I love who I work with, and I love the mission of the university.

It is such a blessing to be excited to go to work everyday and look forward to interacting with your coworkers. They are not only incredibly talented, but such good people who I consider my friends, so let me take a minute to brag on them.

Risa (Dean of Marketing)... I honestly believe she is my biggest fan at the school. It gives me so much confidence to know that someone so knowledgeable and experienced in this field has so much faith in me. And she not only cares about my work, but she has been my biggest cheerleader personally and spiritually, as well. She is one of the women I most want to be like "when I grow up."

Judson (Director of Marketing) is a great example of servant leadership. He sets the bar high for not only quality of work but in attitude through his own daily interactions with us and the rest of campus. I like that he really seems to love to learn, and he likes to hear my opinion on things, even though he doesn't always agree. :)

Stephen (Webmaster and my direct supervisor) gave me a chance. I had no web experience (other than this blog) and he believed I could learn and gave me a great opportunity with this job. He's a fantastic teacher, very patient, and remarkably talented. I've known him for years, and the reasons I respected him before have only been proven by working under him.

Wes (the lead editor) is a great writer, and I have learned so much about media writing from him. He works well with all kinds of people and all kinds of hours to do a great job for our university. Plus he is one of the wittiest and funniest people around.

JC (graphic designer) is the creative genius behind so much that looks great at OC. Like Risa, he's really believed in me and trusted me with projects that I didn't think I could handle. He also watches my back, and I appreciate that.

Micah (web team) is one of the hardest working people at our school, probably. When she does something for someone, you know it is top quality. She is also great at working with different people who need help figuring out what is what around our office.

Rachel (graphic designer) is such a pal. She cracks me up and has helped me learn so many of the ins and outs of working in marketing, especially with the technical stuff I'm too embarrassed to ask anyone else.

Scott (graphic designer) calls things like he sees them, which is needed in our line of work. When I see his work, my jaw generally drops because it is so dang good. His skill raises the bar and makes us all want to be better.

I could go on and on to list all the people I work with across campus who I adore and respect. I really do lead a charmed life and am so grateful for this opportunity the Lord has trusted me with. Here's to many more years! :)

Blog Action Day- Poverty

Poverty is so hard to see when it’s only on your TV, or 20 miles across town.

Where we’re all living so good we moved out of Jesus’ neighborhood
Where He’s hungry and not feeling so good from going through our trash.

He says “More than just your cash and coin I want your time, I want your voice,
I want the things you just can’t give me.”

So what must we do? Here in the West we want to follow you.
We speak the language and keep all the rules, even a few we made up.

So come on and follow me. Sell your house, sell your SUV,
Sell your stocks, sell your security, and give it to the poor.

"What is this, hey what’s the deal? I don’t sleep around and I don’t steal."
But I want the things you just can’t give me.

What you do to the least of these, my brothers, you have done it to me
I want the things you just can’t give me.

-Derek Webb, Rich Young Ruler

May we all do one thing today to be better to our brothers and sister in poverty.

I support this message

I'm not going to say much at all about the election. It seems like this year maybe more than others people are getting carried away in mob-mentalities and de-humanization.

Sadly, prejudice and hatefulness is bi-partisan and equal opportunity, so as the campaigns wear on, I encourage you to stay in your right mind. Don't forward hateful emails, don't make blanket statements about either party or their supporters, don't burn effigies (I wish I could be entirely kidding about that statement), don't judge a person's quality of faith or morality or life by which candidate they support.

These are the moments when character is proven, so be holy and be nice. And remember, in the words of Derek Webb, we'll never have a Savior on Capitol Hill.

I'm Sojochick, and I support this message. :) God bless you and God bless the blog-universe!

Through the years

I know this website www.yearbookyourself.com has made the rounds, but I finally got around to playing with it tonight.


1952

1954

1962- The greenhouse effect probably started right about this year... thank you hairspray.

1966- Mousse has been very good to me.

1968

1978- Oh yes.

1986- Who couldn't rock a jerry curl?

1994- Uh oh, starting to hit a little close to home...

1996- Hmm, is this the Jenni Garth look? I think the platinum hair dark eyebrows were common.

2000- WAY too close to home! This is the year I graduated! :) Dear, dear bangs.

Make yourself comfortable

I haven't abandoned the blog, I promise. I have three blogs in the queue. One of which I can't figure out how to finish, another of which I can't decide if I really want to post to the intercyberweb, and another that is scheduled to come out next week.

In lieu of actual thought and content from me, enjoy a video of me with the cat. Gotta love photobooth! If you know how much of a cat person I am not, then you might find this amusing. Trust me, these moments with Penny Lane are rare. PS- For vanity's sake, I look awful because I had just come in from running.



Penny getting comfortable from Ann W on Vimeo.





more animals

Good guys and bad guys

*The term "guys" will be used in a gender neutral sense in this discussion in reference to its colloquial use.

It used to be simpler, I think. At least on TV. Good guys dressed in white and bad guys dressed in black. Bad guys hurt people, while good guys helped people. Good guys were idolized, bad guys were demonized. Bad guys were hated- good guys loved.

Lately new characters have emerged, revealing the deeper complexity of being a true hero. I think of Spiderman who is haunted by the fact that "with great power comes great responsibility" and is oftentimes villianized by those he tries to help. Then there's Batman, who struggles between being the hero the people need and the hero the people want, letting himself be cast as the bad guy so the people can believe in a hero they can understand.

And I think about David. David, the shepherd. David, the musician. David, the poet, who wrote of God's beauty, intense love, creation, and tenderness. David who dreamed of restoring the Temple of the Lord, writing:

One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life,
to gaze on his beauty and to seek him in his temple. -Psalm 27:4

One thing. A life of meditation in the temple of the Lord.

But that wasn't his fate. It wasn't the kind of hero the Lord called him to be. Instead he became a warrior, killing thousands and tens of thousands, enacting the Lord's vengeance and bringing justice to His enemies. David acted within the will of the Lord and as He commanded, but it had its consequences.

King David rose to his feet and said: "Listen to me, my fellow Israelites, my people. I had it in my heart to build a house as a place of rest for the ark of the covenant of the LORD, for the footstool of our God, and I made plans to build it. But God said to me, 'You are not to build a house for my Name, because you are a warrior and have shed blood.'" 1 Chron 28:2-3

I try to imagine David as the Lord revealed this. The pain, the disappointment. I'll bet there were times when he looked at his life, his kingdom, his armies, and wondered how he had come so far from a flock of sheep and a harp. About how times were simpler then, and it was easy to know what was the right or wrong thing to do. Kill a lion trying to attack his sheep? Good. Obliterate an entire people group from the earth? Well, that one's harder to have a clear conscience about at night.

We face these decisions, too. Maybe we're not called to fulfill the vengeance of God, but we're called to live holy lives, and those decisions aren't always clear. Sometimes it means ending a co-dependent relationship, even though it makes you look cold and uncaring. Sometimes it's reducing your ministry involvement because you're stretched too thin, even though you appear to be "falling away". Sometimes it's rocking the boat when the status quo is calm, but stagnant.

Being a good guy isn't simple and isn't easy. It requires a deep and intimate conversational relationship with the Spirit. It takes the gift of wisdom from the Lord to show you what is right even when it's not what's obvious. It takes rivers of grace and mercy to minister to you when what is right is painful. And it takes trust to know that although you may not be the hero you imagined yourself to be, you are indeed a child after your Father's heart.

Wisdom according to James

Wisdom
-an honorable life by good works through humility

Wisdom from above
-pure
-peace loving
-gentle
-willing to yield to others
-full of mercy and good deeds
-shows no favoritism
-always sincere

Wisdom is not
-jealous
-selfishly ambitious

These are
-earthly
-unspiritual
-demonic

From James 3. So how does this jive (or not so much) with your concept of wisdom?

Sandpaper for the soul

I went to Honduras almost two months ago, and since then I've been praying and thinking about how to put into words how God moved me there.

One word that has knocked around my head since then is re-sensitizing.

Life happens, and it is so easy to be swept away into work, relationships, even ministry. Especially ministry. I had started to forget that to minister and recieve of the love and mercy of Christ is more than logistics and organization and duty. It's more than majoring in minors, appeasing your different constituents, and worrying about how things will work out.

Between the kindness and generosity of the Hondurans, the dedication of the Predisan staff, the hearts of my teammates, the prayers of many friends here and the work of the Holy Spirit, I feel as though the callousness was worn away and I am more sensitive to God and His work in me and the world around me. I feel as though I'm able to love better, keep my priorities in a more kingdom-oriented order, and be closer to His heart.

It doesn't necessarily take a mission trip to clear your mind and re-orient your perspective, but I am so thankful that God found me there and is still completing that work in me.

*Photo of an impromptu worship service of patients waiting to be seen at the Predisan clinic. By Angela Roadman. Buy her book "The Faces of Honduras" by clicking here.

The men in my life...

... for this week, at least. :)

The Antibiotic Effect

Maybe I'm the only one who does this...

If I get sick with some kind of infection (thank you, dear sinuses), usually the doctor prescribes a week or two's worth of antibiotics to kill the infection.

I start taking the antibiotic and within two or three days notice the symptoms going away and start to feel better. Hooray! Healing!

But I also begin to notice the unpleasant side effects of the antibiotics, which are actually quite mild and temporary compared to the original illness.

So what do I do? I figure since the symptoms of the original ailment are starting to fade and I'm irritated by the cure, it's okay for me to stop taking my medicine.

But this is exactly what the doctors warn you against! A half cure is sometimes more dangerous than the original illness, especially when it comes to ridding your body of the infection in its entirety and lowering your resistance in the future.

I can be a bad patient, and sometimes my patience is also pitiful.

How many times do I get motivated to tackle an issue in my life, then become weak once again when I start to become complacent in my progress?

In health, in relationships, in spiritual disciplines... it's so easy to see just enough progress to talk yourself into believing you can quit the treatment. True discipline calls us to work through it in its entirety, not just to our own minimal satisfaction. And oftentimes to cure has it's own irritating side-effects that make us wonder if it's worse than the original illness.

I pray that we won't be satisfied with partial cures and unfinished healings, but allow the process to run its full course and leave us stronger than when we began.

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
James 1:2-4

Some days...

This has been my perpetual pose, sitting in front of my computer for about the past week.



Know the feeling?

Photobooth fun with Penny

And proof that the cat is still alive. :)

Let's see who can come up with the best caption for one of the photos...

Everywhere there's signs...

Signs Signs
Everywhere there's signs
Blocking up the scenery
Breaking up my mind
Do this, don't do that
Can't you read the sign
-Tesla

About a month ago I went to a fantastic class on listening for the voice of God. One of the participants asked the teacher what he thought about "signs" from God, to which the teacher responded that he felt signs were the most unreliable way to hear from God. He said he's seen too many people drive themselves half-mad looking for signs, seeing contradictory signs, or waiting on signs to act.

He did qualify that he does believe God speaks in signs, but probably not as often as we would like, expect or think.

When I examine myself and the times I have asked for signs, I have to cringe a little. There have been times when I have been genuinely, absolutely at a loss for what to do and asked God for a sign. There are other times when I have asked for signs when really, my conscience was screaming at me what to do, but I was looking for a way out of whatever I didn't want to do.

But, like with every message from God, the first opportunity for error comes in our interpretation. So often we're quick to identify and interpret "signs" in ways that would benefit us.

I'm not hating on signs. I believe I've received them and been blessed by them. I also just recognize the margin of error due to my bias.

I'm actually more interested in hearing what you all think or have to say on the subject than expounding on it myself. So, let me know what you think.

Honduras video and book

We were extraordinarily blessed to have a professional photographer go with us to Honduras. Angela is not only amazingly talented, but was a pure joy and blessing to get to know. Here is a video she made with some of her shots.

It chokes me up every time, and really catches the essence of our experience.




Also, my friend Amy made a book of the photographs she took. It's stunning! Check it out by clicking here.

Quiet time, Honduran style

The Lord spoke in all kinds of ways and means during my week in Honduras, but this was my favorite place.

I would jump out of bed as soon as I woke up and it was light out (usually about 5am), take my iPod, Bible and journal and have some good quiet time in a hammock before the day began. I'm thankful one of my teammates snapped of a picture of me there.

Here are a series of verses the Lord gave me to meditate on throughout the week:

Revelation 22:17:
The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” Let anyone who hears this say, “Come.” Let anyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who desires drink freely from the water of life.

John 4:10 & 13-14:
Jesus replied, “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water... Those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life."

John 7:37-39:
"Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’” (When he said “living water,” he was speaking of the Spirit, who would be given to everyone believing in him. But the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet entered into his glory.)

From Misty Edwards, Lovesick:
Happy am I to live a hungry life
And blessed am I to thirst
My desire for you is my gift within
And I am blessed, I am blessed among men!

Honduras 2008

Last week I had the great privilege of serving with the Predisan Mission in Olancho, Honduras. I've been to Honduras once before, but never to this area and not with this organization. For years I've heard about the amazing work Predisan does to serve remote villages with health care, and now I know why everyone who works with this mission is touched by it.

A little background on our trip. I went with a group of 27, mostly from Quail Springs Church. We had a medical brigade of about 8, and the rest of us were work crews. The medical team saw 340 patients in the 4.5 days we were there, and our work teams helped install 12 latrines, paint several buildings, and entertain at local schools in local villages.

There are no words to describe the blessing this trip was. I feel as though God used it to shower me with mercy and joy and rekindle the passion for the world and different cultures that is so deep within me. To see the love and peace of God through the lives, hearts, and kindness of the Hondurans we worked with was incredible.

If you have a heart for medical missions, I encourage you to check into Predisan. They are changing lives for the glory of God.

Now, some pictures. :)

This is what a lot of our work looked like- mixing and hauling cement. We worked alongside the Hondurans whose homes we were working on.

Some of my work team. It was a bonding experience.

Gorgeous, isn't it?

I got really dirty. On this day we were moving cinder blocks.

We spent one day in the schools. The children were precious.

I was taking a picture of a flower when this butterfly landed. God is good. :)

Honduran mountain traffic jam.

These are the children who live in one of the homes we worked on. Too precious.

Medical team hard at work.

Tegucigalpa, Honduras

To see more of my pictures, click here.


Crossing the River from Ann W on Vimeo.

Cow crossing from Ann W on Vimeo.

The difference a year can make

On the left, June '07, on the right, July '08.
30lbs. difference.
I promise I've only photoshopped the blur. :)

Although it may be hard to believe, at times my words fail me. I've re-written this post more times than you'd believe, because there's so much I want to say.

I could talk about why I gained weighted or how I'm an emotional eater. I could talk about how gaining and losing weight has a lot of screwed up emotions and memories in my life. I could talk about when it finally clicked that something was really wrong, and I needed to be proactive in dealing with it. I could tell you about the highs and lows, successes and victories. I could tell you about my inspirations and frustrations. I could talk about where I am now and where I see myself going.

And I would more than love to talk about all those things with anyone who's interested or is going through a similar struggle.

But the one thing I do want to say is that this journey is one that God's hand has been in from the beginning. It was His voice that stilled the lies about myself. It was His strength that enabled me to do things I thought I couldn't do. It is His creative mercy that has re-knit me back together more times than I can count. It is His love that has enabled me to love myself.

So all glory to God who has begun and sustained this work in my life. Thank you to those who have encouraged me through this journey so far. If you have any questions I'll field them in the comments.

To read more about the specifics or see some of my goals, click here.

Chop chop

Sometimes it's time for a change.

Before

After

My cousin (center) cut my hair. Me, Cousin Mary, Sister Molly.

She hasn't gotten much blog play, so here is a picture of my sister and me.

And what's a trip to Texas without a picture of the dog nephew, Rowdy.

Let's keep talking...

One of the greatest blessings of my life has been the ministry of Let's Start Talking. I can't begin to list the ways it has enriched and blessed my life.

Long story short, what LST does is use the Bible, generally the book of Luke, to teach conversational English classes.

As I add up the years, I think I'm going on 8 years of being involved in some kind of LST work. I went to Brazil twice with them, did 3 years of classes at MRCC, did classes in both Japan and Brazil while I lived there, and now have been studying with some new friends from the Cross and Crown Mission in OKC since the beginning of the year (you may remember the tamale story).

If you want to see the Word of God as living and active, then read it with those who haven't grown callous to the stories many of us grew up with. Without exception, I have learned so much from each of the people I've read with. They open my eyes to new perspectives and new insights, and I thank God for all of them.

Sometimes I'm foolish enough to go into my classes with the attitude that I'm the one ministering to my readers, but the truth is that they show me God's love so powerfully. Today my friend, Juan, gave me this beautiful glass he etched.

God is so good. I pray He continues to give me opportunities for my eyes to be opened and for Him to show me more of His love toward me and the entire world.

Healing

Part 2 of 2

Healing. If you want to talk about a bitter-sweet word in my life, that would be it.

If I were asked to define "healing" free from context, I would describe it as a coming back to wholeness from a state of brokenness. In theory, it has such a natural, soothing sentiment and conjures peaceful feelings within.

But once you start to unpack what healing is to different people in different circumstances, you find the path to wholeness comes in different venues.

In my own life, this was more or less the path of healing over nine painful months.

1. My illness growing to the point that it was undeniable something was wrong and needed treatment
2. Doctor consultations
3. Endless tests (CT, x-ray, scopes, blood tests)
4. Medications (again, too many to list)
   
5. Central line IV nourishment in place of eating
6. A chest tube
   
7. Surgery
8. A feeding pump
9. Blood transfusions
10. Prayer- didn't necessarily come last, it was interspersed throughout the process

If you were to ask me what healed me, I would say the sovereignty of God*. If you were to ask me how I were healed, I'd elaborate into the aforementioned process.

I believe firmly in the supernatural power of God to heal. I know those who have experienced it and within a moment their afflictions were gone. I believe the Lord not only wants us to pray for healing, but commands it in James 5. And I believe when we pray for healing we should pray boldly and with faith (I have written about this before here).

Sometimes healing is instantaneous. Sometimes healing is a process. Sometimes a medicine, a surgery, a diagnosis. Sometimes it is death.

When healing is talked about in the church, it seems that there are two scriptural aspects to physical healing that we sometimes forget.

One is that healing, even when performed by Jesus, was always incomplete. Everyone Jesus healed, even those He raised from the dead, died again. At this point in the great story, only Christ has received the complete healing that conquers death. But it is because of that promise and hope that we know we can receive our complete healing at the end of time.

The second forgotten aspect of scriptural healing is that even once we're healed, we still show the scars. Jacob limped after wrestling God, Jesus' scars remained after his resurrection, and even Paul claimed to bear the marks of Christ on his body. And it seems to me that rather than being marks of shame, they were marks of victory. Like I said in my last post on illness, trauma changes you. Maybe it's supposed to, and the scars you carry are the witnesses to your testimony.

It is much easier to write these things two and a half years out of my last health crisis. There are so many questions I still have and things I don't know. To give the impression that I have reached complete understanding and peace with my own physical trials would be a lie. But two of the things I know for sure are that God has given me a testimony to share and scars to always remind me of my healing.

*I have come to answer this when I talk about the whys of why I survived. One thing I was firmly convicted of throughout my illness and still is that God was good, merciful and gracious regardless of what happened to me, so I will not attribute my healing to His goodness, but instead His sovereignty.

Illness

Part 1 of 2

July always gets me thinking about my own mortality. Probably not the typical thought you expect to hear from a 26 year old, but since when am I the typical 26 year old.

July 2 is a big mile-marker, Ebenezer type day in my mind. In 2003, it was the day I was released from the hospital after a six week stay. In 2005, it was the day that I flew home from Japan to seek more medical treatment. Ironically, I call July 2 my independence day, although the truth is that the hardest times came post-July 2 in both cases.

So for the past 3 years, when July rolls around, I start thinking about hospital stays, doctor visits, and those times when I didn't know what was going to happen with my illness.

I have written some about the spiritual implications my own illness has had for me (reference- here). At some point I need to write more, because I feel like I have a testimony of how God worked and is continuing to work through a very painful time.

Trauma changes you. I envision it as something changing within your personality's DNA. Maybe your soul's DNA, I'm really not sure. I think it holds true for all types and varying degrees of trauma, but certainly illness. In our very emotionally-aware society, I think it's tempting to elevate emotional distress (which in many cases is valid), but also diminish physical distress as some lesser suffering, since it's "only physical pain."

Anyone who would say that hasn't been in pain. Anyone who would say that hasn't seen their death as imminent. And those moments change you.

We live in a world of decay. Everything around us is in a state of decomposition, because we live in a fallen world. Illness is part of that. I don't believe illness is God's will for our lives, although I do believe he brings redemption to our falleness.

To be continued in Part 2- Healing.

With much credit to Edward Fudge's statement of faith concerning healing.

Psalm 139- a fresh reading

God is in a season of building intimacy with me, I believe. This weekend I was blessed with Psalm 139 to meditate and keep on my heart.

The Spirit moved me to try this exercise to make it more personal. It was born out of thinking about Yahweh, the personal name of God, and what that should mean to us. Then I envisioned the Lord speaking my name to me when he talks to me.

So I took Psalm 139 and switched the voice around to make it read from the Lord to me. The result stirred my heart so deeply that I thought this type of exercise it might bless others as well.

Maybe the Lord is wanting to reveal his love letter to you. Take this and replace the "Ann"s with your name. Let me know if you are blessed with any other scriptures read in this way.

Ann, I have examined your heart, and I know everything about you.

I know when you sit down or stand up.
I know your thoughts even when you're far away.

I see you when you travel and when you rest at home. I know everything you do.
I know what you are going to say even before you say it, Ann.

I go before you and follow you; I place my hand of blessing on your head.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for you, too great for you to understand!

You can never escape from my Spirit! You can never get away from my presence!

If you go up to heaven, I am there; if you go down to the grave, I am there.
If you ride the wings of the morning, if you dwell by the farthest oceans,
even there my hand will guide you, and my strength will support you.

You could ask the darkness to hide you and the light around you to become night—
but even in darkness you cannot hide from me.
To me the night shines as bright as day; darkness and light are the same to me.

I made all the delicate, inner parts of your body and knit you together in your mother’s womb.
I made you so wonderfully complex!
My workmanship is marvelous—how well you know it.

I watched you as you was being formed in utter seclusion, as you were woven together in the dark of the womb.
I saw you before you were born.

Every day of your life was recorded in my book.
Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.

How precious are my thoughts about you, Ann.
They cannot be numbered! You can’t even count them!
They outnumber the grains of sand!

Freedom and Faith Festival

One of the coolest things our church does is the traditional 4th of July celebration with Quail Springs Baptist church, right next door to us.

Raising holy hands in prayer without anger or disputing... imagine that.

Quail also has a pretty rock awesome praise team. Here they are performing. We have instruments, but they just enhance an already incredibly talent group of singers. :)




Mourning into dancing from Ann W on Vimeo.