The Holidays Wind Down

OK, the last three weeks have been hectic. Emily & I met my family in Orlando for a week at Disney, which was great. We were back home for about 48 hours, including hosting an open house. Then we were in Tennessee with Emily's family for Christmas. The day we got back, we began the post-Christmas closet cleaning (kind of a tradition for Emily & I). I've got a J-term class in a couple of weeks called "Major Living World Religions." If you don't know how that works, I spend 8-5 each day listening to lectures for five days. After that, I've got about three weeks to finish any assigned papers or work. The bad part is that for a week, everything but class is largely ignored. On the good side, that's one less class I have to take this semester. Right now, I'm trying to finish up the assigned readings so I don't have to push quite so hard during the class.

I'll post a link to a few pictures on the right side of this blog.

What a Morning

This is what I woke up to this morning. If you can't tell, that's a large tree branch that has fallen across the white fence that lines the church property as well as the metal fence that lines my back yard. Its been a while sense I got to spend my first hour of the day standing ankle deep in mud, while I used a sledge hammer to drive a couple of fence posts into the ground. Needless to say, it wasn't the best start of the day.

Enough whining. I got to do some visits to members of the church today, which is always an enjoyable day. I better get back to work. I need to write a few letters before I call it a day.

Finally Giving an Update

I promised I would put an actual update about what all is going on when I finished finals. I took my last three yesterday. For those of you curious, my professors were rather gracious in how they tested. I was underprepared because I spent Monday & Tuesday sick and in bed. I was rather relieved the exams were relatively simple. By no means did I make a high A on them, but I didn't do poorly enough to hurt my final grades for the semester.

Since I actually have a break from class for about a month, this is the plan. In two weeks, Emily & I will be meeting my family in Orlando for a week. On Christmas Eve, we will leave early in the morning to spend a few days in Tennessee with her family. In between all of that, I hope to get a little ahead in my reading for the class I'll have in January. On top of this, I'll have the usual church responsibilities.

Speaking of church, all is going well. God is blessing our little church, and several young families have been attending. As always, I stay a little confused and nervous when God is doing things. I know that sounds a little odd, but I don't understand why God chooses to bless us. There's nothing really different that we are doing as a church, but God is moving. My nervousness is simply the fact that tensions normally arise with growth in a church. Some of these are natural with any change, but Satan also is going to attack the areas God is moving. As a pastor, I try to anticipate these things. That's where the nervousness comes from. However, I'll take a little nervousness and confusion if it means God's kingdom is growing.

Ok, those are the big picture things going on in our lives.

God Bless you

Thanksgiving

Its been a few weeks, so I thought I'd drop a quick line. My oldest brother and his family came to our house for Thanksgiving. This is the first holiday that Emily and I have hosted. There is a link to some pictures to the right.

Drought in the Southeast

To show the extent of the drought in the southest is, I've posted a couple of pictures from former hiking trips. The top picture are from Savage Falls in 2005. The third picture is the same place taken last week. Below is Greeter Falls in 2004 and again last week.

Savage Gulf Backpacking Trip

This past week, my brother and I spent a couple of days hiking in the South Cumberland area of Tennessee. As always, time in the woods is a good thing. For those whom Robert is trying to convince of how difficult things were on Thursday night, he's probably telling you the truth. Email me and I'll confirm things.

I have a much better understanding of water shortages now. I've hiked all of these trails before, and all of the waterfalls are dry or practically dry. Even with a water filter, finding drinking water required at least one hike out to a ranger station. In a couple of days, I'll try to add some pictures showing how low water levels were. In the mean time, there is a link to the right that will show you all the pictures I took.

Getting Started

OK, so here's what this is basically for. I am using this to update friends and family about what is going on in my life. If you've stumbled across this on accident...read, look at pictures, or do whatever. I hope you enjoy. There are enough people ranting about things they can do nothing about on the internet, so if you're looking for arguments or discussion, there are plenty of other places to find it. I'll try to update more later.