my second home

In three short days I will return to a place I wish was my second home.  You know how some folks have a house or two on the coast, one in Europe, etc.  If I could do that my home away from home would be in a village in Romania!

Even now I wish I could live part of the year in the States and part of the year in Romania.  Maybe one day we will.  

In three days I cross the ocean again and on the fourth day I will finally arrive to Romania.

I woke up with butterflies this morning I am so excited.

I get to stay at Matthew's Place and see the finished product. 

The place my sweet husband served three days a week.  His most favorite things, 

building and sweating and digging with Aaron and the other men.  

Laying a foundation for a home that would hopefully lay a foundation in the heart of so

many orphaned boys... a foundation of a hope and a future in Jesus Christ!

We can't describe to you the joy we have that we got to be a small part of all of this!

That Steve got to be a part of something for the Kingdom of God that will go on and on 

for generations of orphaned boys becoming men of God!  We pray!!!

The purpose of this trip is with different eyes.  

We are now back in Knoxville, but can't shake this ministry, these people out of our hearts and minds. 

Often, we talk of what we can do and how we can help them even while here in Knoxville. 

We are now starting a church campus of Fellowship Church out in North Knoxville area. 

Fellowship has four focus areas for missions. We are praying for Romania to be the missions focus area for the North Campus.  There are two villages in particular that we are visiting more and praying about investing in long term: Salucea and Rontau. 

I have a soft spot for Salucea. The family we support lives there and we spent a lot of our time there last year.  I have already felt a pull to Salucea being the village, but I want to have clarity and discernment from the Lord about where!  

Will you please pray with us about this?!!  

We want to do the Father's will, not our own!

This morning I received an email from the missionaries there and Aaron went today

to buy a house in Salucea!!! Robin said she would give me all the God details when I get there!

I can hardly wait!  God is such a faithful Provider! 

We may have a house to stay in! How crazy would that be!!??!!

Please pray for the four of us:

Jennifer Wilson

Jessica Geist

Justin Geist

Cali VanHorn

Pray for our families and especially my two children and Jennifer's two boys and our husbands while we are away. 

Please pray for:

-protection from the enemy

-safety in all travel

-pilots to be awake and alert while flying

-physical health--that no one would get sick

-that we would adjust to the time change quickly

-wisdom and discernment from the Holy Spirit on which village 

we are to invest in long term and in what ways

-the Gospel to shared and heard very clearly and for many to 

believe

-pray for our children and families

-missionaries

i could post a thousand pictures more, but i will stop. :)

HIs Presence is Enough

Yesterday morning, standing in sea of chairs, I am silent....I am watching.

Hundreds are singing words about how the presence of God is all I want, all I seek because without it, without it I have nothing.  The presence of God is all that I long for because without it, life has no meaning.

Do I really live like that?  Ouch!  Not every moment of every day, I now that for sure.

My eyes scanned around the rows in front of me and to my sides.  What I saw?

An elderly gentleman sitting at the head of the row, cane in his left hand and his right hand raised in praise to his Lord.  He couldn't even stand up next to his wife because he lacked physical strength, but so much spiritual strength.  He sang these words of longing for God's presence and he had a huge smile on his face.  It seemed he had learned over many years how true these words were.

I saw mothers raising a hand in worship, while the other hand wrapped around her children's necks. No daddy present with them.  Mommy showing them the way to the Father.  Showing them to worship in spirit and truth and her longing for His presence..desperate for God to bring transformation.

I saw others who though they looked fine on the outside, I know they are battling cancer. Others whose friends son just found out cancer is all over that twelve year old body and only God knows when and how and what.

They all still were praising HIM! The One who knows all the in's and out's. The One who allows tragedy and blessing, who gives and takes away, the One who loves unconditionally and whose compassion never runs dry. He allows things to happen that we don't understand why. His ways are so much higher than mine and I am thankful!

Oh, I want to live like this every moment of every day. Knowing that He is enough. Life is meaningless without Him.  We literally have nothing if we don't have Jesus!

giving yourself away

Jovie, my female rabbit, just gave birth to a litter of six on Sunday evening.  We thought she wasn't due for four more days so when we walked out to feed and saw a nesting box lined with fur we were shocked and super excited!

This is the first time I have ever had rabbits so I didn't know what all happened when they gave birth, but I have learned that it is quite a neat and efficient way God created these little creatures to handle this process.

Right before delivering the babies the mommy rabbit pulls tons, I mean tons, of fur out of her very own belly.

We then gave her soft hay and she took it and made a little nest in her nesting box with that too.

And then, she pulled even more fur out to top that off.

Why?

Because this is how the babies will keep warm.  These little ones that are totally dependent on her for safety and survival.  She knows she has to care for them; and how else will she do it, but by giving herself away for them?!  Pulling out the best of herself to make a soft bed and blanket for them to sleep and gain strength.

In her most painful laboring moment, she is giving herself away.

As I watch her belly contract and hear a bunny plop into that soft nest she made I marvel at how it is when we give the best of our selves, we are given life too!

It may have been hard and she had to be in pain, but after the hurt and after the giving away, there is life and she is rewarded with six babies.

How good it is to give ourselves away--for the sake of the Gospel and for the sake of God being glorified!  We give ourselves away everyday around here.  So that children are fed, to teach our little ones the way of the Father, so that those in our community may know God, so that we may know the deep love of the Father, to feed a family that lives 6,000 miles away from us and so we can go and share the good news with them!

We are convinced that it is very life-giving to give our very lives away for the sake of Jesus Christ! 

If you are a Christian and you are wandering why you should give your life away I want to share this with you.

"...because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." ~Romans 5:5

"but when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior."
~Titus 3:4-6

God gave His very best, His only Son, Jesus, for you and for me.  While we were enemies of His, floundering in our sin and loving it, He came down and dwelt with us! He came to save us because He knew there was nothing good in us and that we couldn't save ourselves.  He lavished us with grace and His kindness leads us to repentance.

Through Him giving away His life thru a scandalous and humiliating death on the cross, we can have life to the full!


In 2 Timothy 4:6 Paul talks about his life being poured out like a drink offering.  If we are in Christ our lives ought to be being poured out as a sweet offering to Jesus every moment of everyday in hopes of bringing the hope of new life to those around us.  He is worth our very lives and our time and all our energy.

New Office for North Knox

Today Steve and Michael move in to their NEW office space in Fountain City!! :)  They will be moving all week and transition from working at the west campus to the North!

Next: find a meeting place for church on Sunday's in the N. Knox area.  Please join us in praying for this space. That Steve and Michael would have wisdom and clarity, discernment from the Holy Spirit about where this will be.  Also, that it would be very affordable.

Back in April when we went to the church planting conference there was a time for those who were church planting to go to a map and press their thumb in ink and mark on the map where their church would be.  We did this with the Thomas' and it was a neat time to just seal it and confirm together that this is the Lord's church and this is the place we believe we are to spread the Gospel day in and day out.

It made me think of times in the OT where kings had a seal in their signet ring and they would put it on important documents or when rules were made.  When it had dried there was their seal--their signet--that was theirs and no one could change it! Well, we didn't have our very own signet ring, but we had our very own fingerprint right on Knoxville. A city that God has drawn our hearts to love.  To love all these 100,000+ folks in North Knoxville who don't have a church community and may not have heard the truth of the Gospel just yet.

I was thinking about how God has sealed us with His Spirit. A year and a half ago I blogged while canning jam about the Holy Spirit and how we are sealed with Him and no one can snatch us from the Lord's hands!  I was reminded of that and how His seal is permanent and irrevocable!  Once we admit that we are sinners and need the mercy and kindness and salvation only found through faith in Jesus Christ we are redeemed from ourselves and from the stronghold of sin!  NO ONE or NOTHING can snatch us out of the hands of our great God.

We are saved by grace.

Our community groups are growing! Fountain City group is busting. Steve and I are praying and hoping to start a community group in our home this fall. Hopefully we will have four groups meeting in homes throughout the week by September.  Only God knows...but we are trusting and excited!