I'm baaaack!!!!

Hey everybody!!
I just realized that I should probably update everyone and let you all know that I am back in California now!! I actually arrived June 11 but hit the ground running so the blog fell by the wayside! :) Anyways, I am staying at the Bible College in Murrieta for the summer , and as I mentioned in my newsletter, I'm going to apply for a Visa to return to London in the fall. However, I'm not completely sure if the Lord wants me to go back to the U.K., so I would definitely appreciate your continued prayers this summer! God bless you all and thank you so much for following my blog throughout this past year, I'm SO thankful for your prayers and encouragement!! I'll be sure to keep everyone posted on my plans!

Italy and Austria!!

Greetings folks!! Well, I recently ventured from the British Isles over to "the continent"...as you may know, I was asked to teach a class at the Calvary Chapel School of Apologetics in Austria, so I decided to add a weekend in Italy since I have a friend there and I was already "in the area!" Anyways, here are some shots of my little adventure...enjoy!!

To start off, here's a little shot of me in Venice...

...and here are the guys I hung out with! I actually was visiting Dave Downs (left), a friend of mine who is a missionary in Montebelluna, Italy. The Lord is doing a really neat work in that area, and I was able to attend a few Bible studies and such while I was there (unfortunately I forgot to take pictures, oops!). The guy on the right is Daniel, he's a missionary in Hastings, England...we all had a great time hanging out together!

OK so back to more pictures of Venice...for some reason this was the only part of my trip to Italy that I took pictures of, so you're only going to get some tourist shots...oh well!!

This is definitely something you would expect to see in a place like Venice, huh? All I can say is, this guy must have amazing balance! As you probably know, the city is literally built on the water with a system of canals running between the buildings.

Of course, what would a trip to Venice be without seeing some gondolas?

This city has beautiful architecture, like this amazing outdoor staircase!

There also were some unusual sights...like the massive overpopulation of pigeons at St. Mark's Square! If you had any food on your person, you would literally be swarmed by these guys...kinda like this lady is experiencing here! This must be where Alfred Hitchcock got his inspiration for his movie, "The Birds," because it's pretty bizarre!

OK so totally changing gears now...welcome to Austria!! Calvary Chapel owns the castle pictured here; it was originally the first Calvary Chapel Bible College in Europe, but now serves as a retreat center as well as the School of Apologetics. Talk about a prime location--right on the Millstattersee (Millstatt Lake) nestled in the Alps!! What a blessing to be able to go there and enjoy God's creation!

Here's a view of the village of Millstatt...as you can see, we didn't have all sunny days! :)

Here's one more shot of the lake from the Castle!

Of course, I wasn't there to just check out the scenery...I was there to work! :) I actually taught one of my favorite subjects, Missionary Biographies! So here's a shot of my little class, they were such a great group of students! Since the course was condensed into one week, it was a bit of a marathon (two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening), but it actually went very smoothly and I think the Lord used the class to encourage all of us! These folks were definitely eager learners...

...and pretty good ping pong players as well! If there was ever any free time, this is where everyone would be! I definitely improved my skills by hanging out with them! :)

So as you can see, we did get to hang out a bit outside of class...although eating a heavy meal after 10pm at this restaurant probably wasn't the best idea!



So that is my journey to Italy and Austria in a nutshell (believe me, I could show you lots more but I'd get carried away)!! As always, it's such an encouragement to see the work that the Lord is doing all over Europe...and as the time draws near for me to head back to the States, I certainly am thankful to have been a part of the work He is doing over here!!

Here's the latest...

Hey there everyone!! Just thought it was about time to fill you in on the latest over here in London, so here goes!!

Well, I think spring really is here this time...in fact, I've even had a chance to start working on my tan!!

Recently, we attended a "Teach the Word" Conference in Oxford. This was open to all the Calvary Chapels in the area (with mostly southern UK folks attending). As you can see, there was a pretty good turnout!

Here's one of the speakers, David Guzik! All the teachings were helpful; in fact, two people who came with us are new to our church and said that they have been so blessed to get sound Biblical teaching like this since they haven't had it before!!

During the conference, I also was asked to accompany my friend Amber on the piano as she sang a couple songs, so that was fun!!

The weekend after the Oxford Conference, there was a LeCrae concert that I went to with some of the youth. We had a great time, and a friend that Maxine invited even gave her life to the Lord at the end of the concert! That was the best part!! :)

That same weekend, I had the opportunity to teach a Bible study for the women at CC South London. What a wonderful group of gals they are!!

Here's another shot of some of the women...the Lord really came through and blessed the study, and I was definitely encouraged by our time together!

I guess this picture is pretty self-explanatory...this past Saturday, a bunch of us went bowling! It was a fun time and also a chance for us to continue building relationships with one another! We're planning to do this every other month, alternating with the homeless outreach.

Here I am with Joy, Lauren, Mitchie, and Lucy!

Hey, what would Jasmine's blog posts be without an occasional picture of my nephew?? A few weeks ago, my mom and I were able to take a short trip up to Scotland to see Mattie, Martin, and the kids...so I just had to throw this in!!

I don't know if Luke is praying for Lauren or just trying to palm her head, but he's pretty cute with his baby sister!!

And here's Baby Lauren at 9 weeks!! She is definitely an alert baby, always looking around at something!

So that's the latest here in London!! My next blog post will have a totally different change of scenery, as I head for Italy and Austria to teach a class next week!! Until then, God bless you all and thank you so much for your continued prayers and encouragement!!

April (snow) showers bring May flowers...

Hey folks, time for another post! Well, I woke up Easter Sunday to see snow out of my bedroom window...

Just a few flakes, as you can see! Kinda weird at the end of March, but no big deal, right? Well, this past Sunday (the first weekend of April, mind you), I woke up to this...

And this is out the living room window...

So yeah, I now understand why Londoners say the weather is so unpredictable here! I must say that I actually LOVED having this surprise snowfall, even if I was the only one who enjoyed it!

Anyways, back to Easter Sunday...as I mentioned in my last post, we had to have our Easter service on Saturday this year because the IDEA Store where we meet was closed on Sunday. It went well, but to make up for missing the actual Easter day, on Sunday we had a dinner at our house! Over 20 people showed up and it went really well!

Here's Tola and Mawuse with a couple of Mawuse's friends who came to dinner (by the way, the baby is Joseph, Tola's son--he's a cutie!).

Moving on...for some reason, it seems like everyone is having a birthday this spring! Here we are celebrating Evan and Carl's birthdays...

...and here we are at another birthday lunch the following week!

We've also had several visitors passing through lately...like Emilio and Patty Carbajal (for you Bible College folks, these are Becca Brown's parents)! They were in London on holiday, so I got a chance to spend a couple days with them, it was such a blessing to see them!

Here's Emilio feeding the birds at St. Paul's Cathedral. Why is this significant? Well, for you Disney lovers out there, St. Paul's is the setting for the song "Feed the Birds" in Mary Poppins...so I thought I should take a picture! :)

We also recently had family friends Scott and Bev King visiting from back home in Washington!! So wonderful having them here!! This is a shot on the Thames River with Tower Bridge in the background!

And here we are with Big Ben and Parliament in the background!

Just this week, Cristina Malais also came over for a few days on her way back from Germany...had a good time touring her around the city as well. By the way, that's the Tower of London in the background!

We also met up with the Foxes and Dan Arnold for a meal!

One last thing which is kinda a prayer request...a few of us are starting to go to the train stations in the area to pass out Gospel tracts. This past Saturday we went to the station at Greenwich (pictured here) and it went really well! We expected to see our little tracts littered all over the ground when we were finished, but when we walked around a bit, we didn't see a single one! I saw many people reading the Gospel message, and a few even came up to ask for them! Even if it's just an opportunity to "plant seeds" in people's lives, what a blessing that is! As the Apostle Paul wrote, "One plants, one waters, but it is GOD who gives the increase!" Please pray that the Lord would continue to give a great increase of changed lives here in this city...

...because London needs JESUS!!!! :)