Our Journey, His Work: May 2013

Friday, May 31, 2013

May Happenings Part III

If I have not mentioned it before, the weather here has been A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. We have thoroughly enjoyed our time outdoors as much as possible this month.

Jess & Ben Thacker are our new friends and teammates that just recently moved to Robbinsville from Indiana to join a ministry here full time called Eternal Truth Ministries. Rance and I have LOVED having them here the last month and are thankful for the instant bond Father provides when we are all on the same page spiritually. It's pretty crazy that they just moved here from Indiana and Rance and I will be leaving soon to live in Indiana for the summer. Basically, we are all swapping places and enjoying our crazy DADDY!

We kicked off our Memorial Day weekend by grilling out on Friday night with all the Thacker's. It was a beautiful evening so we spent most of it outside.

Ben, Dana and Melissa

Sweet Anna! She has grown a foot in the last 2 months!

Rance riding Andrew & Luke on the 4-wheeler!

Climbing hills and having fun!

SMILE!

My favorite picture of Rance, Melissa & Anna!

Luke & Andrew

me, Jess & Dana

On Saturday morning, we headed out for a LONG bike ride. I love how we get in these DEEP conversations and forget how far we have gone :) We thoroughly enjoyed the quiet, peaceful, winding mountain roads to ride on from our house!

HELLO!!!!!!!!!!!!

Our landlords (who we are so thankful for) had a huge pool party for Memorial Day! We called it "Sunburn & Seafood". We spent the afternoon by the pool and the guys cooked a FEAST of seafood for dinner. You have never seen so much seafood. We felt like we were in the Caribbean yet we were just in our backyard!

Let the cookin' begin
Ignore the date on these photos :)

Meet John - our awesome landlord!

Brothers

Crab legs galore!

low country boil

More of May coming soon :)

Thursday, May 30, 2013

May Happenings Part II

The Friday morning Rance woke up with rashes all over his body is the same morning we jumped in the truck for a weekend road trip back to Zionsville, Indiana! We were both excited along the way that neither one of us once second guessed our trip to Indiana that weekend even in the midst of all the attacks - doctor visits, ER, staph, crutches, rashes, etc. I am thankful to say that Rance's body has been healing and although the staph is not completely gone - it seems to be improving day by day.

Rance and I were VERY excited to get back to Indiana and especially to see the Thacker's - all 6 of em! They have been living in Indiana since the middle of March and will be there until the end of August. We look forward to spending our summer with them in Indiana and growing closer together as a team as we all pursue the same goal in Christ Jesus.

Over the last few months, we have had no idea where we were going to live once we moved to Indiana. It has been fun because Father has grown me so much over the past 3 years in the area of planning ahead and being OCD on details. It's been a process but it's so freeing. I have been 100% content this whole time not knowing at all where we were moving or who we may be moving in with this summer. I surrendered it to the Lord trusting that He could handle our living situation and that I just needed to be willing to live wherever. Rance and I both were not concerned about this. As we arrived last Friday - we still had no idea where we would be living. There had been a couple of options that the Thacker's had looked into but God clearly closed the doors on those. A family within the church graciously offered for us to stay with them since they had an extra bedroom so we assumed that would be where we would be living as of that Friday night.

You must know that one of our main roles in Indiana is evangelism (Rance and I that is). We have prayed much on what that should look like and how we can best build relationships and share Jesus in the community surrounding the church. Our vision was not clear on this yet so we were continuing to seek the Lord to provide clarity on this.

On Saturday afternoon, Father provided the vision for the summer through David & Dana's youngest child, Anna, who INSISTED to go on a walk. Through this walk, led by Anna, a clear vision was given on how we can be most effective at evangelizing and how to go about doing that. Father answers in crazy ways and that Saturday afternoon, He used Anna's persistence to take that walk to provide clarity on our team's many prayers of housing as well as evangelism!

Melissa & Anna - practicing their JUMPIN' pics

Melissa is UP

BOTH are UP!
We will be living in the apartments in the background
of this picture (across the street from the church)!

I had to share this picture because I'll never forget the difficulty of maneuvering this cart around Walmart!

I love these kids! We are in the dressing room in Walmart!

Showing Indiana what rednecks we are! Just Kidding!

That Sunday morning, Rance taught on the Ephesians 3 prayer at the church. If only I could wrap my mind around what it means to be filled with all the fullness of God! Can it be done individually or only together with all of the saints? What do you think? Take the time to read the prayer below and dwell on how we can grasp a love that surpasses knowledge?!

A Prayer for the Ephesians
14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being,17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Wednesday, May 29, 2013

May Happenings Part I

May has been super fun and super crazy and challenging all at the same time! With it being the end of school, the evenings have been filled with end of the year parties, academic banquets, athletic banquets, graduation parties and ceremonies, preparing to move, along with our discipleship groups, etc. On top of all that, Rance suffered several attacks on his body over a 3 week period!

Let's live it up through pictures, what do you say?

We had an end of the year party for the cross country team at Whisper Mountain! Rance and I are constantly encouraging team bonding amongst the runners. The Fall 2013 team will be taking a trip up to Whisper Mountain in August for a 2 night stay to bond as a team and start the season study in Scripture.

If you have never been here, you should come!

It was very fun watching a bunch of runners play volleyball!

Lindy surprised everyone one by being there!

The Friday that I headed out for Trinidad was the day all the attacks began on Rance's body. Rance is allergic to both poison oak and wasp/bee stings. On that Friday, he was with a group of guys on the way home from visiting a church plant in Ducktown, TN only to come upon a tree that had fallen in the middle of the road. (Let the spiritual attacks begin). Since it was close to midnight and very dark out, Rance had no idea that this tree was covered in poison oak at the time. By the next day, his body was covered in it. A couple of days later, he was stung by a wasp in our bedroom. I got home from Trinidad and the poison oak was not much better but the wasp sting was. A few days later, Rance began limping due to the pain in his leg/foot. Was this still poison oak? Nope, he now had a STAPH infection except it was not in the beginning stages - it was severely infected, irritated, very red, and swollen. He visited the school nurse the next day and she prescribed him an antibiotic. By the following evening the infection was much worse so we ventured off to Murphy urgent care. The doctor there refused to cut into the staph because it was so close to the bone and muscles in his foot and she did not want to spread it. She prescribed a 2nd antibiotic and gave us precautions to take to monitor if it was getting worse. By Monday, Rance's foot was huge, in so much pain, and very scary. Father made it clear in my prayer time to head to the ER. He winked at us BIG in the emergency room that night when we were told Dr. Castor would be in to see us ASAP which was the SAME doctor that cut into my leg 2 years ago when I had Staph. I could have jumped into his arms but that might have been weird. He ended up cutting into Rance's foot in 3 or 4 different places. We left hours later with Rance on crutches, more antibiotics, and lots of bandages and things to care for this nasty, wicked thing. By Friday, Rance woke up in rashes ALL over his body. What on earth? Ends up, one of the antibiotics he was taking was a sulpha drug which he is allergic to. We are thankful that during all of this we both clearly recognized that these were spiritual attacks. Our prayer was that the genuineness of our faith would be found to the PRAISE OF HIS GLORY.

In the Emergency Room

boo bear on crutches

waiting on my little patient

On a random side note - this is a typical day going over the mountain in Robbinsville. Motorcyles, hikers, tourists, kayakers are EVERYWHERE!

We had a family date with Marla, Devin, Kenleigh and Rance's mom too that we thoroughly enjoyed!

Our sweet niece after eating TONS of pickles and oranges! She LOVES both.

Tearing this pickle up :)

May Happenings Part II coming soon...

Thursday, May 9, 2013

2 Brothers & a BIRD DOWN...

I am really big on writing down things I am praying for and recording and remembering how God answered those prayers. It may be years later when that specific prayer gets answered but I love rejoicing in God's provision and His sovereignty over it all.

Psalm 77

And I said, “This is my anguish;But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High.”
¹¹I will remember the works of the Lord;Surely I will remember Your wonders of old.
¹²I will also meditate on all Your work,And talk of Your deeds.¹³Your way, O God, is in the sanctuary;
Who is so great a God as our God?
¹⁴You are the God who does wonders;
You have declared Your strength among the peoples.
¹⁵You have with Your arm redeemed Your people,
The sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah

Psalm 77 encouraged me years ago to be intentional about "remembering the works of the Lord" and meditating on all He has done. There is no doubt that Father does not promise this life to be easy and free of hardships. But even in those valleys, in those trials and tribulations, we can count it all JOY and meditate on who Father is and what He has done :)

When I look at my brother's relationship with my husband - that in and of itself is an answered prayer. My brother was never very 'friendly' to anyone I ever dated. In fact, he didn't really give any of them the time of day. I know in his 'big brother' heart - he wanted the best for his sister. Even when he first met Rance, he threatened him with a gun (not kidding) because Rance mentioned marrying me within the first 2 times of meeting him. That was unacceptable to him. Once my brother began seeing who Rance really was - he fell in love (hehe!). These two share a bond and a love for one another that is more than I ever prayed for.

Just recently they have began a discipleship study and accountability with one another and to say my heart is overflowing is an understatement. The last weekend I was in Trinidad, my brother had ventured to the mountains to bond with Rance solo and to begin this discipleship study! Outside of studying God's Word, they did do a little turkey hunting and Father blessed my brother with killing a turkey.

Please enjoy the photos...

Thank you Father for the bond that these two share!

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

A blessing of a weekend

Rance and I headed east a couple of weekends ago and it was a sweet time with my family! Rance had not been to Nahunta since Christmas and I had only been once for a quick weekend trip so it was super fun that we go to spend a few days 'extra' there since Rance was on spring break at the time.

Father blessed me with some fun things and divine appointments while we were there for example:

I ran into Holly, Mark & Scott while my mom and I were shopping at Sam's. This was a total divine appointment because my mom and I went to Sam's looking to buy LOTS of strawberries yet we left there empty handed. I am convinced the only reason we drove to Goldsboro to go to Sam's was simply to run into The Gentry family :) They have become super special people in my life over the last couple of years and Father recently blessed them through adopting that sweet baby boy in the picture below.

I also was able to see my cousin Abigail and Oliva off to their prom. It was super fun and I usually miss random things like this so God was totally winking at me allowing me to see Abigail head off to her SENIOR prom and Olivia go to her first. These two sweet girls love Jesus so much and I could not be more excited about how they are constantly growing in their walk with Him. Plus, can I give a shout out to their MODESTY?? Thank you Jesus!

Abigail, Uncle Craig, Olivia

Abigail, me and her best friend Meredith

The reason we were heading east to begin with was because my family was throwing an engagement party for my Roozy (aka Dee). Dee and I met in 6th grade and were inseparable after that. We both headed to NC State after high school where we lived together for the next 9 years. Yep, I said 9 years. Freshman year in the dorm room is where the name Roozy came about :) Anyways, I thoroughly enjoyed the time with my family while we made this party come to life! It was a blast and Father gave us beautiful weather the entire day.