Category: Traveling

Vacation Week: Weekend Piñata

We spent last week in Orlando enjoying time with the family. I am going to post a series of posts that cover the week. Instead of one long post that will be horrible to read, I will feed this out a little at a time.

“The Family” included my two brothers and their wives and children. They only have one wife each, but there is no better way to say that. Then my parents were there as well as my maternal grandmother and my wife and kids. In all, there were 17 of us hanging out.

PiñataWe drove to Orlando on Saturday (13th). Mom and Dad rented a house for the week. We contracted for a 3 bedroom house that 13 of us were going to use. But when assignments were made, they gave us a 5 bedroom, 4 bath house. Woot! That allowed everyone to sleep in a bed or air mattress. Our two kids were in our walk-in closet each on their own twin mattress. Big closet.

Sunday we went to church with my younger brother, who lives in Orlando. Later that day my older brother arrived with his family.

We celebrated my birthday a day early by eating cake and beating up a piñata. The kids had fun with it. I assumed that the rules were somewhat understood, but we had a bit of confusion. One of the rules that the Mexican kids surprisingly obey is that you don’t take candy from someone eles’ pile. Amazingly I don’t ever remember seeing a Mexican child steal candy from another child’s pile. They dive in to rake up the candy and once they have it, it is theirs. I had to do a bit of biting and punching to keep my brothers’ and nephews’ hands off my candy.

Thanksgiving and Geocaching

Today we went over to Newton’s house for Thanksgiving. I don’t use names a lot here, so you probably won’t know that Newt and family are our closest friends. You know, the kind you sit around talking with until 2:00 in the morning for no particular reason. Just to be together.

My parents were there too, along with a total of 23 people. It is tradition that we usually spend one or both holidays with Newt and family when we are in town. It looks like this year we will be spending Christmas with them as well.

We had a good time and ate too much.

After everyone left Newt and I went out to find our first geocache. Geocaching is a worldwide scavenger hunt. You look up on the website where people have hidden a small cache to be found. Then you traipse out into the wild to find it. I have read about the game for several years, but have never participated. Today seemed like a good day to start.

We went out first to find one near the house, but we did not get an early start. By the time we got there, it was already dark. We looked, but was not totally convinced we were in the right spot, nor real sure what we were looking for. So we gave up and went back home to the computer to see what we might have missed.

Not to be dissuaded though, we searched for another one nearby and headed out again. This time we found the cache and were able to sign the log book. The cache was damaged and we played good Samaritans and repaired it mostly to be as good as new.

Now it is time to search for other caches and really get into this game. It is something fun to do in new locations. With our traveling, this could be a fun way to explore the towns we are in.

Grace Baptist in Columbus, GA

Saturday we drove up to Columbus, Georgia. It is about 4 1/2 hours from Pensacola. We were there to be at Grace Baptist Church. This church has been a partner in our ministry for 7 years.

Everyone knows where they were on the morning of September 11, 2001. For us, we were at this church. We taught a sign language class at the church to help them reach out to the deaf community.

I preached there last night. They recorded the service.

[audio:http://www.amazingrace.net/ra/112308pm.mp3]

My part starts about 8 minutes into the recording.

My Thought Spot 24: NaBloPoMo

In this episode I talk about some of my recent posts as well as include some audio from my second meeting with PlaneT3rry.

Show Notes:

My Thought Spot 24: NaBloPoMo [ 17:50 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Observations from a week with missionaries

Monday through Wednesday of this week I was in a conference with other missionaries and pastors who are closely associated with our mission board. While we are independent Baptists, we depend greatly on one another to accomplish our work. It was great getting together with a group of friends whom we had never met, but because of association, are immediate friends.

Preaching
We had some great preaching during the week. We had a main speaker and several other men who preached during the time there. One of the preachers was the doctor who spoke on gluttony that I posted previously.

Singing
We had some great singing primarily provided by Evangelist Bill Blount. I have always enjoyed his company. He is a generation or two older than me, but out of all the guys in our group, he is one of the most technologically advanced in our group. He was sporting a Samson Zoom H2 that he set up for recording our sessions. I told his son that when Bro. Blount makes his exit from this world that I wanted to be in the will for the recorder.

Reporting
One of my frustrations of the week came from the missionaries when they spoke. Having spent so many years in camping ministry, I see the need to keep things moving on schedule. We had one session where the missionaries were given 5 minutes each to give an elevator pitch of who they were, what their ministry is and what they are doing to accomplish that.

Remember that we were missionaries in a room full of pastors. These pastors are men who are there partially for the purpose of seeing which missionaries they would like to align themselves with and financially support. The missionaries needed to do everything they could to make an impression on these pastors. While support will not be determined on this 5 minute speech, it could affect whether the missionary got a meeting in churches for possible support.

Every missionary went over his 5 minute limit. Some went over by as many as 3 minutes. Pastors are very jealous of their time in the pulpit. When a missionary can’t stay within the time limit imposed on him, a pastor is going to be less interested in having the missionary in his church. I have been told by some pastors that if I went over, by one second, the time limit I was given that it would instantly mean I would not be supported.

One of the missionaries proceeded to talk about how he has been in churches in which the pastors have lied about their willingness to support missionaries. Also how some pastors have put on a show in front of other pastors to look good, and then privately told the missionary he really was not interested in missions. Basically he spent his 5 plus minutes disparaging pastors across the board. Not real smart when you are in a room full of them. Those are things you may experience and think, but you should never say out loud. And certainly not to a group of pastors that you want to support you.

Fellowshipping
I had a great time getting together with other missionaries and pastors. Many of these men I have known for 8 years. They have become friends by association.

Though I was there as part of a conference of missionaries, I was able to see PlaneT3rry again. He was “in the neighborhood” and took time out to drive down to the meeting area and take me out for dinner. (Thanks again for supper!) This was only the second time we have met in person, but it seems like we have been friends for years.

Driving
When it was all over on Wednesday night I loaded up my stuff and started the 11 hour trip from Pigeon Forge to Pensacola. I left about 10:30 at night and was able to drive until 2:00 AM. When I am alone, I am somewhat of a minimalist. Hotels are over-priced for just one person. I slept about 5 hours in my van while shivering myself awake occasionally. I had on 2 shirts, a sweatshirt, 2 jackets and a suit coat. I misplaced my sweater, which would have been my best defense against the cold. But, I got the rest I needed and made the trip home without any problems.