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England Day 8- York
We spent the day in York with the rest of our whole team. It was a beautiful day to be there. We celebrate all the birthdays on the trip, including Talyor Davis. We went all through the minster this time because Fiona hooked us up to go throughout the whole church for free. All in all it was a good day.
This evening Ryan, Daniel, Kasia, and Kimberly joined Ryan and Daniel’s hosts for coffee with their neighbors as an outreach event. It went well.
Pray again for us today as we are in the Bishopsgarth school and then for the 4th Wednesday of the crusade with J John tonight.
Thank you for your prayers. They are making a difference.
England Day 7- I “Pledge” this church with allegiance to Christ
What a day! We spent almost all day in an old Anglican church called Stockton Parish. It was a beautiful old, old church with a new vicar. He is very evangelistic and has a desire to help this church grow again. It probably has room for 500+, but only about 25 or so attend. They can’t even meet in their main sanctuary during the winter because the heater went out and it will cost them a small fortune to have it replaced. We spent a lot of time with Nikki, the vicar’s wife. She is great and has such great hope for the church. Dorene, a member for 41 years was also of great help.
We cleaned out lots of cabinets and compartments to help get rid of things that are not any use and are just rotting for two hours before lunch. After lunch we polished as much of the wood work as was possible. We became very attached to our Pledge cans. We also reset all the pews to look nice and swept and mopped the entire floor. It truly looked and smelled beautiful like a church with this rich history should. The team did a great job and worked very hard to serve Christ by doing the lowest of jobs for a place many have forgotten.
Later that night Ryan, Daniel, and I were given a tour of St. John’s Church, built in the 11th century. The vicar’s wife gave us and one of our host home dads an amazing and rich tour of this church that looks like a castle looking out over the area known as Yarm. It was truly enriching to see it all and spend time with such a lovely saint.
England Day 6- Church, church and church
Our team was split up today. Four attended an Anglican church and the rest Tabernacle Baptist, fondly known as “The Tab”. The first group was able to celebrate Pentecost with their church, but spent a majority of their time at church working with a small group of kids/youth. It was an interesting experience for them. The Tab group spent the entire worship service time working with the youth, something new their youth leaders are attempting. One of our girls, Jena Coulson, taught about Esther. A story many of them had never heard. She did a great job! We closed that time with a discussion dealing with had they ever been in a situation that seemed small/insignificant at the time but later God showed them that it was actually something big as a part of His plan. It was a very good discussion. We then filled them full of sugar and sent them on their way.
We split up to go to lunch with different families. Ken and Fiona, my host home, took us to lunch at the Beefeater…need I say more. The restaurant was by the Tees River and directly in front of the restaurant was an Olympic style competitive kayaking course. It was impressive, but even more impressive were those in it…the water had to be freezing. The girls went in pairs to join families for lunch. Jena and Michelle were taken to sight see as well…including an ancient monastery. After lunch, Ken, Jason, and I went to find Jason some new shoes. He blew out the toe kicking the soccer ball on Saturday. Its not easy finding size 13 shoes here.
We rested in the afternoon and then returned to The Tab for evening worship. It reminded me of our church..except I didn’t recognize a lot of the hymns. Kasia was interviewed by the pastor during the service. It was very David Lettermanesque. She did a great job on short notice.
Later that night we joined a group of believers from the Stockton area lead by Jon Burns, the Youth For Christ leader in the North East and Fiona’s boss, for a worship service called Vintage. It took place in an old church meeting hall. It was very sensory and focused on the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, tied to Pentecost. It was a great time of worship and fellowship. The five minutes of silence was much needed to stop and converse with God. When we finished we met Hope and Amy from Arkansas and Louisiana. There were great.
It was a great day of worship!
England Day 5- Parmesans and the BBQ guys
Because of a change of plans, the morning started slow. However, one group was able to meet up with a team from the Texas A&M BSM and help them pass out cookies and do some gardening at a church in the poorer part of town. Some were chewed out, while passing out cookies, by people for trying to make them sick with sugary treats. The other group went back to the Just 10 tent and helped clean up. They also played a little football (England style). It was very entertaining to say the least.
We all met up for lunch and finally had a parmesan (a delicacy only found in northeast England). It was good but the Middlesbrough parmesans are the best.
The team then went to pass out flyers and more cookies and get ready for the BBQ. I went to Nunthorpe to meet up with one of the other teams. This team has Janie and Taylor in it. They have had a good experience and it was great to hear about some of it. They have worked very hard in their school and truly opened closed doors by doing acts of kindness in the school (like helping file papers and clean). There I met their leaders Ste and Emma. Two top notch believers serving Jesus.
I brought back a couple of their team to help with our BBQ event. It was crazy when we got there. There were about 150 people milling around eating, dancing to the music, and enjoying their favorite “non-carbonated” beverages. Some were face painting children. The church had some senior adults doing a lot of the serving and cooking. Their BBQ guys reminded me of ours. I guess every church has these wonderful guys. It truly turned out to be a very productive evening for the ministry in those housing projects. The people were asking about when it would happen again. Our team did a great job!
We finished the evening at Fiona’s playing cards and laughing. Tomorrow we split to go to two churches. Tabernacle Baptist (The Tab) and St. Mary’s (an Anglican church). The group at St. Mary’s will be in for a treat because it is Pentecost and unlike us, they celebrate that event in a big way.
Pray that we will be a source of encouragement to those we worship with on Sunday…actually later this morning.
England Day 4- Lord’s Stone and 15 seconds of fame
We left this morning to go to Lord’s Stone. It is a special place where you can see the entire Tees Valley. It was a breath taking view. We drove up as far as we could and then hiked up a stone path to the top. We came down a different way, traversing bike trails, running as fast as we could without falling. A few of us found a small pond with a bench to sit on and watch the mallards and look out over the valley. Easily one of the most serene places I have ever been. It was hard to leave and meet up with the rest of the group. We ate at the cafe on the mountain and then headed back into town. We split into two groups. One group did interviews and fun with the hosts of their new Christian radio station. It was hilarious!! They definitely received their fifteen seconds of fame. One of the girls even made up a language that she called Zuhili. The other group went back to Ken and Fiona Toop’s home (where I am staying) and helping bag cookies to hand out to people in the lower income housing where we will be having a BBQ on Saturday night. We met back together later and spent the evening at Fiona’s because our original plans had been canceled that day. We played a fun game together and called it a night after painting Ryan Arnold’s toe nails silver and orange while he slept. He was so tired he did not even wake up and even when he did he was too tired to care.
England Day 3- A Great Day in the School
What a great day in Stokesly school. The Youth For Christ leaders and Religious Education teachers were wonderful to work with. They really do a lot for students and try to find creative ways to include faith in their discussion. We met with students in the morning and talked about America, why we were there, and how faith affects their life daily. Many don’t go to church…some ever. They were curious about meeting “practicing” Christians. We walked into Stokesly town for lunch and ate sandwiches from Fatso’s. I had a chicken tikka sandwich…kinda like chicken salad with Indian spices. We sat by a beautiful creek and enjoyed the amazing weather. We went back to the school for more discussion and then took a walking road trip with a class back into town to see an old but active church. The students were challenged to figure out what the stained glass depictions from Jesus’ life represented. They were given opportunity to explore and some took leaflets about the ministries of the church. We even learned some things about church tradition that we had never heard. It was a beautiful campus, including the tombstones from as far back as the 1700’s all around the building.
Thursday night we walked into a close part of Stockon and saw a very old bridge used in the early days of trains. We found out that the first ever train traveled from Stockon to Darlington. We looked in some shops around town, walked along the river, and then had a debriefing time on the back porch of a pub called The Blue Bell…seemed appropriate…too bad no ice cream though…just sodas and coffee.
It was a great day!
England Day 2- Just 10 and you gotta be kiddin me…
Day 2 has been a great but long day. All the groups were in schools today. Our group spoke in two classes to about 40 students. We talked about America, Texas, and about believing in God and making moral choices. Most students do not believe there is a God and think of church as boring and unnecessary. There were a few who had good questions and seemed to be genuinely seeking. Pray for a young girl named Lauren. She seemed to be sincere in here questions about faith and God. Janie and Taylor’s group went with their school for their special Wednesday activities…like horseback riding, shooting pellet guns (Olympic style), sailing, tennis, etc. When we heard that, we thought they were kidding…but no…Janie is definitely saddle sore.
My group then helped set up for the Just 10 event tonight. It was just good ol’ fashioned grunt work. We had a great time working with some very servant hearted men and women. After a wonderful dinner at our host home, we returned to the tent for Just 10. Just 10 is ten weeks of going through the 10 Commandments one at at time in reverse order. Tonight in week three, we looked at stealing. Gram Seed told his amazing testimony and then, Evangelist J John, who reminded us of Mr. Beane because of his mannerism and looks, did a great job communicating the Gospel. There were probably about 3 or 4 thousand people there. Many made decisions including one deaf young lady who one of our new friends had been signing for earlier in the evening.
For those that came last year, I saw Steve Jackson (the painting guy) and Sharon. They pass along a “Cheerio”. We hope to connect up with some of the others from Middlesborough soon.
We will be in a school all day tomorrow. Please continue to pray for our teams as they connect with students and open doors for future groups to follow.
England Day 1- Here minus some luggage and the big blue
We made it safely here and hopefully Kasia and Taylor’s luggage will too. Yep…it got left in Newark when we left. It should be here Wednesday afternoon. They are doing fine and are well taken care of. Thank you for your prayers.
The day was tiring but good. Nobody was able to get great sleep on the plane so all were tired. We had a great bus driver…Joe. He was fun and took very good care of us. He even made a side trip to allow our group to see some beautiful scenery.
My group, with Kasia and Kimberly, had fun prayer walking around the GINORMOUS blue tent (seats 6000) and then walking around a beautiful park with cool bird and butterfly exhibits. I and another guy on our team were able to talk with some junior high boys about coming to the Just 10 even on Wednesday night. This will be the giant youth evangelism event. It goes through each of the Ten Commandments one at a time for ten weeks.
As you pray tonight and Wednesday, pray for the groups that will be in the schools and for the Just 10 event. Also pray for us to be rested so that nothing hinders us from serving however we are needed.
And with that in mind…it is midnight and I am going to sleep.
Goodnight.
May Overflow
The May edition of Overflow is now available online.
April Overflow
The April edition of Overflow is now available online.