A Report from Alabama

This weekend, I traveled down with a group from my church to Frazer Memorial UMC in Montgomery Alabama. I must say it is warmer here than it is in TN. Much more humidity. I had the pleasure of being woken up at 1:15am by the fire alarm at my hotel. It was a false alarm but it added a tired feeling for the rest of this day. I went to several meetings/seminars today and it gave me several things to think about when I return home. I will process this outloud through this blog. Here are a few insights I learned:

1) How much do we want to grow?

I bumped into a staff person who had been at the church for over 30 years. He was a lay person who when he retired, joined the staff in a part time capacity. As we looked over the buildings over the years, I asked him to remember when it was only one or two buildings and when the church was much smaller. One of the things about that church was a willingness to try new things and inconvenience themselves for the sake of growth. For example, they had Sunday school at 10 and Worship at 11am. They decided to add an additional worship service for 9:30, change Sunday school to be at 9:30, and launch and additional Sunday School at 11am. This meant Sunday Schools had to split and leaders had to be raised up. But they were willing to be inconvenienced for the greater mission.

My church has services at 8:15, 8:50 and 10:45am with Sunday School at 9:30am. One of the things we have to do in September is to change my contemporary service to an hour length. This weekend I detailed 10 possible options. All of them involve change. For the most part we don't like change. We want things convienient for ourselves. As we explore these changes, I pray that our church will make decisions based on our mission and not on what is convenient for me.

2) How important is prayer?

I went to a prayer ministry training today. It was good but made me think, How am I praying as a pastor. I am a leader in prayer or is prayer assumed. Am I seeking to be an example of prayer? Am I inviting others to join me in prayer? I know for sure that I need to grow in this area as a Christian and as a pastor. Will my church support me or is that seen as "waisting time"? These are questions I wrestle with.

Guess what, the fire alarm has just gone off again and the fire truck is arriving. I must go outside to see what's up.

Save the Date - Aug 27

This was passed on to me by a reliable source. Thought you might be interested.

Planet Mars will be the brightest in the night sky starting August. It will look as large as the full moon to the naked eye. This will cultivate on Aug. 27 when Mars comes within 34.65M miles of earth. Be sure to watch the sky on Aug. 27 12:30 am. It will look like the earth has 2 moons. The next time Mars may come this close is in 2287.

This Week

This past week has been a full one, except for blogging. We bought our house on Monday and have been working ever since. There was lots of wallpaper in the house and we spend at least two days on the downstairs so we can paint. Here are the kids with the one big strip we got.


Unfortunately, that was the only strip like that. Friday and Saturday were all about painting and ripping up carpet for the entire house. We still have at least six rooms to paint but it has come a long way. We'll have some more pictures later. We've been eating on the floor and making due.

Friday I head down with several with our church for a Visioning Retreat at Frazer Memorial UMC in Montgomery. I am looking forward to the teaching but most of all the fellowship and getting to know the persons in the church better.

I will blog more later. Just finished 3 worship services and they each were good. I need food.

Anna Turned Four

Friday July 13th was Anna's four year old birthday. These years have come so quickly. I remember when she was just a baby. Anna picked out a ice cream cake at Baskin Robbins and she told us she wanted to go bowling for her birthday. Here are some pictures from the day's events:

Life In Morristown

We close on our house tomorrow (can't wait). It is tough (and expensive) to live a nomadic life. It has been two months since I have not had my stuff in a suitcase. We plan on doing work on the house over the next three weeks and hope to move in the first weekend of August. Here is the kids making a fort on our bed.

Morristown has a great wet park at Fred Miller Park. It was set up by the Rotary. It is entirely free and our kids had a blast. I had never seen one before and it is a great thing to cool off a bit and not drop $20 for a family.

Last week at Church we the band "Overflow" lead us in worship. They performed the night before at the local park. They are a good band with thought proking lyrics. I was impressed how they got the crowd into the concert on Sat. Night. Max took this picture.

Tale of Three Trees

This week was Fine Arts camp at church. About 60 kids participated including Aiden Max and Maggie. It was based on Max Lucado's book "The Tale of the Three Trees". It involved drama, music, solos, the whole bit. Yesterday the kids did the performance for the parents. This was the invitation they made.

Once again, camara phone pictures. You probably can;t tell but in the middle was Max. He was a soldier and a king.

Aiden was selected to be Jesus. He carried the cross well.

The volunteers who put this on do a lot of work. I was very impressed with their gifts and dedication.

Max and Anna after the show.

For Moms Everywhere

This Video was sent to us by a fellow BP mom! Perhaps you might relate to this funny commentary on momhood.

This upcoming Sunday I am preaching from Luke 15. In doing research, I found this video on the internet. It's about 2 minutes long. Hope you enjoy

This first picture is from going to the 4th of July Parade in Kingsport. It was hot and long. I am amazed how many people and organizations go through the parade route. When the Tanning booth group (advertising their latest special) and the Skate City Group went through, we knew it was time to call it a day.


We took the kids to Dollywood on my day off yesterday. It was hot, muggy, and filled with people (a great combination). We took in a lot of shows but I took Anna on some of her favorite rides. She likes to ride the Carosel and ride on the Dragon.

She loves to drive the Old Timey Cars. We stood in line three times to ride them.

They had crafts for the kids to do.

Dollywood is a great place for the kids to go. I didn't go to amusement parks as a kid as much as they have. I guess we never really know how good we have it.

Hanging at Lake Junaluska

These are some cell phone pictures from Lake Junaluska with the kids. I was clearing out my phone and came across them. Thought you might like to see them.

Final Night of VBS Pictures

These are some cell phone pictures from Friday Nights Last night at Bible School. They are not that strong in quality. The kids loved the waterslide. Thought you might be interested to see it.