London in the Fall!!

Greetings my friends!! Well, it's about time for some more blog posts! Since I got back from Wales at the end of October, we've been enjoying the change of seasons (yes, it is possible to enjoy cold weather!) along with various activities, so I thought I would do a quick run through!

Hey, why not start with a bit of scenery? Here's a familiar shot from Greenwich Park looking out over the city and Canary Wharf (on the right). As you can see, the leaves were just starting to change color here!

Here's a little shot of the falling leaves from our side of the river...if this huge ship wasn't in the way, you could see Greenwich from here! :)

As you can see, walking through Greenwich Park has some nice scenery this time of year (although you can't stand around out there for too long or you'll get frostbite)!

...which is why we've started bundling up a bit! :)

As many of you know, this month we had a girls' sleepover with a few of the young gals in our church. One of the neatest things lately has been spending time with them--Maxine and Lauren (pictured here) also have a Bible study with me and Denae on Friday evenings.

Speaking of Denae, I realized I hadn't posted any pictures of her leading worship...so here she is at the Friday night Bible study!!

Along with our regular Bible studies and prayer meeting at CC Docklands, another neat thing this fall has been our monthly women's meetings! I actually had the opportunity to share at our most recent one last week, and it was such a blessing! Here's a group photo from October's meeting. All you Santa Barbara friends will probably recognize a couple familiar faces--Karen and Malia Amling! It was so nice having them visit recently! :)

Here are a few more friends at the women's get-together...including Claire and two of her daughters (who might be familiar from previous posts!).

And here's a little shot of Julia, Mitchie, and Philomena!!

Last but not least, here's a "bonus photo" of something very familiar to us all...the beloved Krispy Kreme donut! This truck was randomly driving through King's Cross train station so I figured it was worth a picture. Of course, one little donut costs almost $2 here so this photo is about as close to Krispy Kreme as I'm going to get!! :)


So there's a very brief look at autumn in London...coming later this week will be a post of our Thanksgiving extravaganza!!

Cymru Am Byth!!!

Greetings folks!! In case you're wondering, that was a Welsh phrase meaning "Wales forever" (I think!). I just spent two weeks there so believe it or not, I did learn something! I learned how to say "oatmeal" ("uwd") and "disgusting" ("uch a fi")...so you know that's gotta come in handy someday! :) Anyways, as most of you know, I was asked to come teach Church History at the Calvary Chapel Bible College extension campus in Cardiff, Wales. We did a two-week "block class," which included 3 hour lectures each morning (and homework of course!); this made it a more intensive class, but the students did quite well and I was really proud of them! So with that, let's get into some photos...

This is Church Street, so called because (obviously) there's a church at the end of the street! Just to give you an idea, this is right across from where the Calvary Chapel Cardiff church office/Bible college classrooms are located.

This is the High Street, where the church office is located (on the left hand side). As you can see in the background, Cardiff Castle also just happens to be right downtown, so we got to walk by it every day on the way to class--kinda neat!!

Here are my wonderful Church History students--Stacy, Melanie, Shannon, and Kelly!! These gals are the full-time students who came over from the Bible College in Murrieta; it's neat because there are also several part-time students from the church/community who attend evening classes (a couple people actually sat in on our class occasionally, so that was fun)!

Here's another shot of the girls in one of the rare moments when they weren't doing homework! :) This particular afternoon they took me down to Cardiff Bay and we walked around down there and enjoyed a surprisingly sunny day, it was fun!!

But of course, we did have to get some class time in as well!!

This shot is for those of you who have taken classes with me before and know how much I love to talk with my hands! :)

A nice bonus to being in Cardiff was getting to know folks from the church there and being involved in their weekly activities, such as the Thursday night Bible study at the Vickery's! Pastor John Vickery has been going through the Book of Revelation, so one night we watched a video on the situation in Israel as it related to our study.

This is my friend Amber Rios, a former Bible College gal who is now a missionary serving at CC Cardiff and the Bible College. I was so blessed to be able to spend time with her (I actually stayed at her flat!), and to see all that the Lord is doing through her as she serves at the school, leads worship for church, etc. I actually had the opportunity to play piano with her for worship, which was fun!!

This is Melanie (one of the students) with Eleri, Amber's "flat mate." She and Amber were great hostesses during my two weeks there! By the way, Eleri is the resident Welsh speaker, so she taught me everything I know! :)

As a little bonus before heading back to London, we spontaneously decided to go to a professional rugby match! This particular match was between the Cardiff Blues and the Sale Sharks (a London team). Cardiff won, which was probably a good thing so we didn't have to avoid any angry fans afterwards!

Rugby is kinda sorta similar to American Football, but I have to tell ya, it seems alot more brutal when they're tackling and jumping on each other without padding and helmets! As you can see, it's not a sport for wimps!

Here's Steve Vickery and Amber watching someone get clobbered during the match. By the way, Steve is also a former Bible College student (and John Vickery's son) who is now a teacher and the director of the Bible College in Wales. He also teaches the young adults' Bible study for the church on Tuesday nights. We've been good friends for several years so it was nice to spend time with him as well (plus he taught me the basics of rugby so I wouldn't be totally dazed and confused)!

While I was in Wales, there was a leaders' conference at Oxford for the Calvary Chapels in southern England and Wales. It ended up being a fun little reunion for those of us from the Bible College back in California! So I thought I would throw in a random "bonus" photo of Steve, me, Amber, Denae, and Dan!

So there you have it--a little taste of my time in Wales!! I really was blessed to be able to teach there and also to be a bit involved in what the Lord is doing in Cardiff!! Please keep Wales in your prayers, that the Lord would continue to open doors and hearts to the Gospel, as well as bless and grow His church there! "Pray also for us, that God would open to us a door for the word, to speak the mystery of Christ" (Colossians 4:3).

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!