Category: Friends

Leaving on a jet plane

“My sister” Kathryn left Saturday afternoon for a trip to Uganda, followed by a trip to Russia.
I just got this email in an old email account (apparently she hasn’t updated her address book):

Thank you so much for your generous support! All your donations, prayers, and
encouraging words have been such a blessing. Although you will not physically
board the plane with me today, you will be apart of spreading the Good News of the
Kingdom of God to the people of Rakai, Uganda.

Jesus says in Isaiah 61 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has
anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom
for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, and release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Jesus’ mission was to not only bring
spiritual healing, but his mission had a physical dimension as well. Jesus’
mission was to show what the Kingdom of God is like, and we as his missionaries
are sent to the world to proclaim the goodness of God and the reality of His
Kingdom.

Many people in Rakai are oppressed, many are imprisoned by poverty, HIV/AIDS,
spiritual darkness, and we are called to help fulfill the message of the Good News
that there is FREEDOM and HEALING in Christ. We will do this not only by our
words, but by our actions.

Please pray that God may use us as his missionaries to help bring lasting healing
and transformation to an area that is beautifully green and lush, but is a desert
wasteland spiritually as people live under the oppressive yoke of the kingdom of
this world. Together with your fervent prayers, let’s wave the banner high and
kick in the gates of hell!

I look forward to writing you again and updating you on what God is doing in the
lives of the people in Rakai.

Much love and gratitude,
~Kathryn

Trip Dates: (Rakai, Uganda – 6/9-6/22) (St. Pete, Russia – 7/5-84)

Star Wars Mashup

Brian Bailey’s son has put together several Star Wars Mashups with the site, mashup.starwars.com.
Pretty funny stuff. Good job Ben. Keep it up.
I’d still love to see a mashup with Josh Wink’s “Higher State of Consciousness” playing for the soundtrack.
Get a little R2D2 rapping going on. You know what I’m saying in full effect?

Faith like a mustard seed


Well if you live in North Texas you’ve likely seen the yellow flowers of the Mustard seed across the country side on back roads around the region.
Most of them are getting mowed over now or being overgrown by weeds, but my buddy “>Michael has some interesting observations he’s learned from his own mustard seeds. (Mike sent me some of my own mustard seeds a few months back but I believe they were lost somewhere along the move to my new place)

  1. The Mustard Seed I received were small but not minuscule.
  2. These seeds sprouted in two days: faster than any other seeds I have seen!
    (Perhaps faith can sprout as fast when nurtured?)
  3. This plant thrives in full sun.
    (Faith thrives in the light of the Son!)
  4. After several weeks of steady growth, the plant has sprounted little yellow flowers and is spreading out into other areas of my herb garden, with branches growing over some of my other plants.
    (Perhaps the Kingdom of God is steadily gaining ground and branching out: “God’s Aggressive Love Finds a Way.” Voice of the Martyrs

Prayer request for Carl Wessels

The Waxahachie Finance Director, and someone I’d consider a good friend, Carl Wessels, was in a car accident Sunday.
From the WDL:

Waxahachie director of finance Carl Wessels has been hospitalized after being injured in an automobile accident near Ruston, La., on Sunday, June 3.
Driving back from a fishing camp, the 2006 GMC Suburban in which Wessels was riding lost control on a wet road and rolled, reports indicate.
Wessels was transported to a local hospital, where it was discovered he suffered two compression fractures in his back, specifically the T-2 and T-3 vertebrates. He was later moved to a Shreveport, La., hospital, where he may undergo surgery to repair the damage.
Wessels’ family reported that aside from his back injury, he is in good condition.

Weekend changes

Well, as you may remember, my life and I were planning on going camping Friday night after attending the wedding of our friends Josh McDonald and Amy Wade.

I got to show off my new clothes. As you can see in the photo, I still have a habit of leaning or slouching down when I’m standing next to Laurie. I’m hoping I didn’t do that in our wedding photos. We’re still waiting to get those back.

While we were at the wedding reception in downtown Dallas at the Trammel Crow building, we received a call from Dollye saying, “There’s a tornado watch and a thunderstorm warning. They’re expecting 70 mile an hour winds and we don’t think our tent will hold up.” Needless to say, they began packing up to head home.

So we opted out of heading north and decided to head south and home afterwards. The storms hit around 1 a.m., about the time we were falling asleep.
With no other plans for the weekend we took it easy Saturday and visited our parents, went to an Army Supply store for some Geocaching goodies, ate an early dinner at El Fenix (Mmm) and picked up the Pres-i-nator from Laurie’s parents.
We came home and drove around the Waxahachie area before retiring for the night. We’re planning to hide several Geocaches in the area so we drove around to scout out a few ideas.
I decided to sleep in Sunday morning and not help the set-up crew at encounter since they weren’t expecting me. It was a nice change.
Sunday was another relaxing day as we (I really mean she) took care of some laundry and we visited Brian & Heather and other encounter folks for an anniversary shower at their house.
Now we just have to figure out a time we can go camping again before it gets too unbelievably hot, or too cold again.

See some other photos from the wedding.