I don’t like to race. But I do like the journey of a run. The last few months of training for the Nashville half marathon have been quite educational. There really are so many parallels between running a race and running THE race of life. I’m still trying to process a bit from this experience…but since I know the fam is anxious to see photos, here’s the basics!
We woke early to rain. It poured on us quite a bit as we joined over 30,000 runners in Centennial park in Nashville. The race started at 7am, but our section didn’t start until 8, so we were quite wet and cold, and nervous and excited chattering and shaking as we approached the starting gate.
The rain cleared up leaving us with pretty much perfect, overcast, not too hot weather as we started the race…
It really was fun to run through the city, see the sights, the people, the band, the cheer-ers. I appreciate our own cheerleaders who cheered us at the start and around mile 6. The hills weren’t so bad as we were thinking and by God’s grace we ran almost the entire thing, minus one potty stop and various water stops. At mile 9, the race for me began to get very difficult, I thought I might actually cry during the last mile because I just didn’t have anything left in me. But the Lord is good, and stayed with me all the way through the finish line! Stacy, Anne, and I finished in about 2 hours and 29 minutes, much faster than we were expecting! Though the soreness soon set in after we stopped, it was a blessing to see friendly faces again and acknowledge that truly I can run a half marathon through Christ who strengthens me!
I had never felt an earthquake before last Friday morning. At around 4:30am I woke up, strangely, wondering what day it was and if I could sleep in the next morning. About 7 minutes later I heard things jinggling in my room, I thought it might have been my dog. But when my bed started to shake back and forth, that theory was foiled. I thought briefly it was a truck passing by, they often shake my room, but it was going on too long….I sort of felt like I was in a movie all of a sudden and realized this was an earthquake and jumped out of bed to grab my shoes, grab my roomates and get out of this house. Because…we’ve been expecting an earthquake.
My other two roomates were also woken up just before the quake hit and we ended up in the same room looking a little dumbfounded at each other, like…it really is happening… God’s been talking to people in this area about an earthquake coming for quite a while, and although we are expecting one quite larger…this we feel was God’s merciful wake up call to get ready.
Since Thursday morning I’ve felt two more aftershocks and am faced with the realization, yet again of the greatness of God. Even the ground I walk on is in His hands. Join us in praying that God will prepare this region for what will come sooner or later – that people would be “awake” and putting their trust in Jesus, listening to Him.
My friend Stacy and I have been training for the Nashville half marathon since January, and the blessed day is about to arrive. Tonight we made our last run before the big day (this Saturday!) and celebrated God’s goodness to us in this process. It has been quite a journey, many lessons learned. This is something I remember thinking about maybe possibly doing in college, but thought it was WAY out of my box. Well, it was. But through Christ, I can do anything, and He has brought us thus far. As a form of commissioning and prayer we had our teammates deck our running shoes out with scripture and words to proclaim over Nashville and Cairo – and wherever else our feet may carry us. May God continue to teach us on this journey…
Every Tuesday a group of us head over to one of the housing projects here to run something we call “Clubhouse”. It’s an afterschool Bible study/activity time for a small group of kids from this housing project. This month we have been pairing our Bible study with a bit of drama, having the kids act out the Bible stories we talk about. Who knew we had such actors! It’s been a fun time reconnecting with some of my drama roots which had been laid to rest in high school. Plus…it’s been a helpful tool of really planting the Word in the hearts of these kids in an active way.
Colfax, Illinois is a small farming town in central/northern Illinois. In this quaint little town full of corn fields and farms is a church called Emmanuel Lutheran Church. A few years ago their youth group took a leap of faith and took the church’s first ever mission trip….it landed them in Cairo, Illinois and began a wonderful partnership between our ministry and their congregation. We have been blessed to receive a few groups from this church over the year, and they have served our community and opened amazing doors for us to do ministry in the housing projects here.
A few weeks ago we had the opportunity, for the first time, to visit their church and share more about our ministry, pray for their church, and lead a little worship. It was such a blessing to be with this family of faith. They showered us with kindness in hospitality and friendship. It was amazing to see how God is using this church for His Kingdom – truly to plant seeds of faith to transform the nations. What an honor to be part of the fields where they have sowed!
Gary shares about the Cairo House of Prayer
Amanda prays for Emmanuel Lutheran
Joy for Harlan and Gary
Us ladies and Harlan
Dancing and Praising the Lord! Yay Lutherans, you’re precious!!
If you read this, please keep my family in your prayers! Both my father and brother-in-law were admitted to the hospital this week. My brother-in-law is now home with medication for a heart related issue – join me in praying for complete healing and restoration for Phillip, and that he and Katie would have rest over these next few days after a week at the hospital.
My dad remains in the hospital with a large blot clot in his leg. Pray for healing and strength and energy for he and my mom. Pray that in all these things, Jesus would receive the glory!
This summer, God is leading us on quite an adventure. For 50 days we will be embarking on 24 hour prayer and fasting to basically lay a spiritual siege on the city. We affectionately call this summer, the summer of love, where our staff and prayerfully many others who will join us for this leg of the journey will spend time in prayer, worship, and moving out into the community in acts of love and service. I am excited, but also very aware that it will take Christ’s strength in each of us to persevere through this season. Join us in praying for preparation for The Siege and pray for God to call those He would desire to be here. If you or someone you know might be interested in joining us, check out www.thesiegecairo.com for more information. Check it out anyway, Kristy did an AMAZING job on the website, and it’s worth a look see.
Actually it was more like very nice cabin-ing. Our team ventured off this weekend for a little R&R and fellowship at Camp Ondesonk, a Catholic retreat camp here in southern illinois. We stayed in carpeted dorm rooms, ours even had a fireplace, so not bad at all ;o). Many thanks to Heather C. for putting this trip together, it was a real blessing! The camp was wonderful. We enjoyed horseback riding, hiking, and a great campfire cookout. We were joined by some of the Harrisburg house of prayer folks who are doing a similar ministry north of us. We love them dearly, and it was a blessing to spend time with them again this weekend. We’re hoping to make it a somewhat regular occurrence. It was great to be outdoors and see some of the beauty of this area, much of which, I confess I haven’t taken the time to enjoy in my going-on five years here. Hopefully this will be the beginning of a new trend of discovering the undiscovered around me. I very much appreciated this trip as we approach April – our weekends are packed this month with ministry trips to other churches, hosting mission groups here in Cairo, and to finish off the month running a half marathon in Nashville. It will be action packed, but He will strengthen us and help us find rest in the midst, I know!
Uprising is our weekly prayer and worship time on Friday nights. We generally have dinner and then a time of prayer and worship. It looks different every week, depending on how God leads. We’re not a church, so it’s not a “service” per se, but more of a time for the community to come together and worship and pray. Once a month we take this shin-dig over to one of the local projects. Our crowd when we head to the projects is generally of the younger age bracket – mostly just kids. So this week when the tides where turned and mostly adults showed up, it caught us all a little off guard. Guess you never know what God is going to do. But it was such a blessing to see adults come out and praise the Lord together! I was particularly touched to see our friend “V” (see earlier post) come and give testimony about what God was doing in his life. It was a sweet gathering and a wonderful time with the Lord. Thank you, Jesus for how you are reconciling people to one another – bringing families together and showing me more an more a picture of the beautifully diverse Bride you died for!!
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Posted by gerberdaisy 
Posted by gerberdaisy 
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