A Wee Bit of Scotland!!

Greetings folks!! I was supposed to do this blog ages ago but I've been a bit limited on the internet access...these things happen!! Anyways, as most of you probably know, I was invited to come up to Scotland the first week of October to share at a one-day women's retreat hosted by my sister Mattie's church there (Calvary Fellowship of Carluke). It was a great time and the Lord really blessed it, so I wanted to just give ya a little snapshot of my time there!

Oops, how did this picture get in here? Just kidding! Before getting into the retreat, I couldn't resist sneaking in a couple pics of my handsome 2-year-old nephew, Luke!! :) Pretty darn cute, huh? As most of you probably know, my sister married a Scotsman (Martin) so they live up there.

Oh and here he is again!! OK I have to say that, being a big Seattle Seahawks fan, I in no way condone the Chicago Bears hat he is wearing (that's Martin's team)...but somehow he still looks cute in it!!

OK let's move on to the retreat!! What a sweet group of women this was!! Although the majority were from Calvary Fellowship Carluke, a few other women from neighboring Calvary Chapels attended as well (even a couple non-Christians who were invited!)...so of course that was great! By the way, the woman I'm sitting next to in the front row is Doreen (the pastor's wife who also happens to be Martin's mom!). She's such a neat lady!!

My sister and I were asked to lead worship together for the retreat, which was so fun (plus Mattie is a better singer than me so that helps)!!

Here I am getting ready to teach!! Let me tell ya, the Lord really showed Himself faithful in this! I had lots of spiritual warfare beforehand, so since I was sharing on the subject of FAITH, this was certainly an opportunity for me to step out, put that into practice, and see God do a neat work!! I was definitely encouraged by seeing His hand on the whole event (and also to experience once again the power of prayer)!!

Here's a little shot of the women spending time together afterwards. They don't often have the opportunity to get together for a retreat like this, so times of fellowship with other Christian women is super encouraging!

I thought I would throw in a couple shots of the church in Carluke as well! Here's Pastor Jim Tatton (Martin's dad) getting ready to share from God's Word...

...and here's the congregation singing during worship!

So that's the women's retreat in a nutshell!! As always, I wanted to give you a visual of what I've been doing, but in this case I also want to encourage you to please pray for Calvary Fellowship Carluke (and all the churches in Scotland of course!), that the Lord would continue to encourage and build up His people there, as well as raise people up to serve Him in that country that so needs the love of Jesus Christ! As Jesus said in Luke 10:2, "The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few; therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest."

Baptism PS...

OK that was weird, somehow when I posted this my introduction was missing! So here it is...

Greetings folks!! That's right, it's time for another blog post! This one is special, because the last Sunday of September we had a baptism! This was a really neat time for those making public profession of their faith in Christ...but it was also great for those of us who were able to celebrate it with them!

CC Docklands Baptism!!

Greetings folks!! That's right, it's time for another blog post! This one is special, because the last Sunday of September we had a baptism! This was a really neat time for those making public profession of their faith in Christ...but it was also great for those of us who were able to celebrate it with them!

So here they are!! Gary, Maxine, and Kevin were very excited to be baptized!

First a moment of prayer...

...then they are buried with Christ...

...and raised to new life!! :)

And here we are afterwards (as you can see, I was trying not to get wet!!)!

Here are a few folks who came into the pool area to watch. The baptism really was a neat testimony because some of the people invited to it weren't Christians!

After the baptism, we all enjoyed a meal and time of fellowship. The church body here is such a family, as seen by the fact that nearly everyone in the church came to support those being baptized!




More fellowship...by the way, the guy in the middle is Justin, who leads the homeless outreach!!





Here's Maxine's mom having a nice chat with my mom.





Here's a familiar face to all you Bible College folks!! Denae has been here with us for a few weeks now, it's been such a blessing having her! You might recognize Lauren as well, she was in my last blog entry!


So that's the baptism in a nutshell!! Stay tuned for pictures of my time sharing at the women's retreat in Scotland last weekend (I should get those up and running in the next few days)!!

A Week At CC Docklands!!

Hey folks!!
OK so this is probably the blog post that I should have done when I first arrived, because it has our weekly events and some of the faces at CC Docklands...but I just kept forgetting to take pictures for some reason! So FINALLY I think I have enough for a decent post, aren't you proud of me? :) So without further ado, let's take a walk through the week!!

We start off with Wednesday night Bible study. This is a new, small home fellowship which is across town in West London (we live in East London). When I first arrived, I was leading worship for this study temporarily until Dan Arnold returned from the States.

The study is held at Philomena's house (she's the woman in the middle). Also pictured here is Alejandra (on the left), who is always faithful to come, and my mom, Debbie (on the right).

Those of you who have been to the Bible College in Hungary might see some familiar faces here! Melissa (sitting next to Philomena) and Melanie (far right next to my dad) stayed with us this past week and attended Bible study as well!

Our next stop is the Thursday night prayer meeting! This is a really sweet time of fellowship and prayer for the needs of the church body at CC Docklands. I've been so blessed to lead worship on the piano here and to see God work in and through our times of prayer!

We meet at the home of Evan and Mitchie...

...and here they are!

Next we have the Friday night Bible study in the Prayer Room at Canary Wharf! I've been leading worship on guitar for this Bible study as well, but will be passing it on to Denae Templeton when she arrives this week! I really enjoy Friday nights, and we always have a neat time of fellowship afterwards!

Here are some of the folks who came recently!

And here we are enjoying some food and hanging out afterwards!

And then of course, we come to Sunday!! I know I already posted a couple pictures from Sunday service, but hey it can't hurt to send a few more, right? We have about 40 people that call CC Docklands "home"...plus the past few Sundays have been encouraging, as we have had several new folks who are coming regularly as well!

Here we have some folks setting up chairs and the fellowship area (in the back of the photo). Since the Idea Store (where the service is held) opens at 12:00 and church starts at 12:30, we have to move fast! These guys have it down to a science though!

Guys like Tom (holding the chairs) are faithful to come help set up early...

...while Dan and I practice a bit for worship!

And then we have our little children's ministry! This includes James and Jack...

...and Becky, (who definitely looks better than me in this picture!). :)

So that is a week at CC Docklands!! Now if you'll just bear with me a little longer...I want to show you a few more faces!!

This is Henry and Claire with two of their kids, Becky (from previous picture!) and Omar.

This is Mitchie (again!) with Lynn and Lauren (Lynn's husband, Carl, is in the next picture because I don't have one with all of them together!). I've been giving Lauren piano lessons lately, she's a quick learner!!

Here's Carl (with Lauren)! :)

This is Tom, Claire (again!) and Julia. Tom is wearing a little blue ribbon because we were celebrating his birthday! :)

This is Kevin, Alistair & Gwen, and Mitchie. :)

This is Maxine. We've been meeting on Fridays for a Bible study thru the book of James! She's been inviting her friends to come too!

And last but not least, here's a group photo of some of us at Tom's birthday party (which as you can tell, was a "bowling night!"). Thank you for taking the time to look at these pictures. I hope that it helps to get a visual of some of the things happening here! I SO appreciate your continued prayer for the work that the Lord is doing here and for the precious people that are a part of it!