A new year

Baby it's cold outside! And wet!! We had some strong storms move through the area Christmas Day and then the cold temperatures followed. Hope your part of the world was not so stormy and wet.

Last Saturday, we made our way around to the camps. Through the generous hearts of the congregation at Grace Methodist, we were able to give our friends gifts of shoes, coats, gloves, shirts and pants. Just in time for the cold weather they faced this week. What a blessing. They all really liked their gifts. Turner, Richard, Robert, William were doing ok. Dale was again not looking good or feeling well. Smokey had a bad tooth ache and was just getting up as we got to his apartment.

We had a nice surprise Saturday morning, as we met with the Keithville Middle school Student Council faculty advisor. Her children collected over $300 for Common Ground and also gave us coloring books, freeze bees, and other smaller toys. She wants to come again one Saturday and help us out around the center. What remarkable young people.

Krysten spent most of the morning sorting through all the toys and gifts we have received from various churches for our neighborhood children. She and her band of elves went door to door Christmas Day handing out the packages. Forgot to ask Krysten how it went. Krysten could you let us know.

With school out, there were no scheduled activities for the children.

Hat got a call Monday evening from William about Dale. William was concerned for Dale's health. Hat made a few calls, and Tim and Charley picked up Dale and took him to the emergency room at LSU hospital. Tim said, they almost lost Dale during the night. On Wednesday afternoon, Joey, William and I went to MICU to see Dale. We woke him up, talked for about 30 minutes. Dale was doing much better. The doctor came in as we were visiting and told Dale he had a severe case of ulcers. It was great watching William and Dale talk together. William had a smile on his face, seeing Dale doing better.

Thursday, we got started off by Gus singing songs in chapel. Then Ms Jean sang a song, followed by Pastor Eddie sharing the Word from Philippians. Talking about letting go of the past, so we can move forward into the new year. The highlight of the evening, was when Pastor asked if anyone wanted to turn their life over to Christ, to let go of the past and start the new year living for Christ. A young lady came forward, Bernice. Pastor invited us up front to lay hands on Bernice and promise to help her start a new life in Christ. Awesome.

Krysten, Joey, Ms Dorothy and Ms BJ provided us with our meal, groceries and drink. Ms Lisa came in to check in our friends at the grocery table, Momma T and Allison helped serve our meal, Ms Ardis served our drinks, Joey, a new friend John, and Gus washed the dishes and an old friend Ricky helped clean off the tables.  We got to see Georgette and meet Momma T's granddaughter. What an evening.

I lvoe this time of year, for moments like we had Thursday. We get to see our young adults who have moved on to new adventures, to come home and come by and see us. The real meaning of Christmas, family.

Continued prayers for Ms Abbie and Mr Joe. Both are getting better but still have a long way to go. Go by and say hi, they would appreciate seeing you all. Prayers for our Ms Sarah as she leaves us next week for her 6 month stay in Haiti. Exciting and also challenges await her. We will miss her. We can always go by the youth office and give Mr Scott a hard time to make him feel at home!

As Pastor Eddie talked about in chapel, we are at the threshold of a new year. We have an opportunity to let go of the things in our past, so we can move forward into the future. If we don't let go, then we can not move forward. What is in your past, what is holding you back, what is wearing on your heart, what are you holding onto, that prevents you from moving forward? We have so much to look forward to in the new year, what a shame if we don't let go and get to experience all the blessings God has for us. I pray for each one of us, we can forgive, we can forget, we can let go. God is preparing us for experiences beyond our comprehension, we don't want to miss out! 

What a community you are becoming. I am amazed at all the things you are doing for God. Just this week, one of our friends needed your help and compassion and you came through. When there is crisis, you don't think of reasons why you can't help, you jump in. When a community member gets sick, you provide food and conversation. You help out around the center, when there is a need, not complaining, just doing. Thank you all for allowing Christ to flow through you and be the light into the world. What an honor it is to know each one of you and to see you grow deeper in your relationship with Jesus Christ.

May we all have a blessed new year. Amen.

Merry Christmas

The old saying, if you don't like the weather in Louisiana, just wait 24 hours, came true this week. The temperatures on Wednesday afternoon were in the 70's, Thursday it struggled to get to 50! Hope your weather was not as tricky as ours!

We had a morning shower last Saturday to make everything just wet enough to make it miserable. The scouts could not work on the greenhouse, our stuff got a little damp in the back of the trucks, but we moved on and things worked out. We covered the back of the truck with a tarp, asking Turner if he needed the tarp for his camp. He said, no thanks, you better keep it, the rain is not over. As soon as we left Turner, it started raining again! Ok Turner, what do you know that we don't?! Richard read a story from a book he had with him. Dale, William and Robert were waiting on us. Dale got out of his chair and hobbled to the truck. He looked better following his hospital stay, but not sure he should be outside in all of this cold weather. William seemed to be fine. We finished our visits talking to Smokey about his new job at the VA hospital. He pushes a book cart around the hospital and asks all the patients if they would like something to read. Smokey was made for this job, with his love to talk and outgoing personality, he is having a good time.

By noon the weather had dried up enough for the scouts to begin the final phase on the remodeling of the greenhouse. They began to install the new plexiglass panes. Ms Lisa has put up pictures of the glass, it is outstanding. With a late start the scouts were not able to finish, so they will be back this Saturday to complete the project. Can't you just see, rows and rows of little plants budding out, waiting to be planted!

We had an unusual large number of children this week in the afternoons. Monday, Krysten, Joey and Mary helped the children, make gingerbread houses. Tuesday, they made Christmas cookies, Wednesday they made a Christmas tree out of pictures of their hands. The tree is on the wall in the Fellowship hall.

With the completion of our new roof, the air conditioner units needed to be hooked back up. John Sauls got our plumber to run new gas lines to the units and on Tuesday our friend, John Williams hooked the electricity back up. John came after work, with flashlight in hand, worked in the dark to get the job done. What a blessing our two Johns are!

Tuesday evening, Mr Matt led our discussions after reading from the first chapter in Ecclesiastes. People live, people die, but the earth continues forever. All things continue the way they have been since the beginning. We all too often get full of ourselves, thinking we can change the world, or look what I have done, or think we are indispensable, but Solomon reminds us, God has been here for ever, will be here for ever and we are but a small blip in God's radar. God is in charge of life, not us.

Wednesday, Lomax and Joey went and picked up smoked turkeys from our friends at the New Room. Later on in the evening, Momma T led our team of table decorations. Krysten, Emily and Lomax helped her transform the room into a Christmas wonderland. Patience, pictures are coming.

Thursday was full of activities. To get the day started, Krysten, Emily and Joey made bags of groceries, then moved over to the kitchen and began the process of carving up all those turkeys for our meal. Quite an adventure since no one had ever done that before! 

Mr Matt invited a pastor friend of his, Pastor Doyle Adams to lead chapel. He pastors a church in Benton.  A long time friend  Spencer lead us in singing some Christmas hymns. Pastor Doyle talked about relationships. Our relationships with our families, our spouses, our children, our friends are important but the most important relationship we can ever have is the one with Jesus. God lvoed us so much, He sent His son to earth so that we may begin the process of starting that relationship. Very simple, no magic, just a willingness on our part to accept Christ in our hearts. This is a perfect time of year to do so if you have not done so already.

We then made our way into the fellowship hall where the food and fun was everywhere. We had a special visit from the guy in the red suit. Another friend of ours, Thomas Jackson, entertained the children as well as the adults in learning what everybody wanted for Christmas. Ms Lisa and Momma T checked the names of all our friends as they got their groceries. Then they made their way into the friendship room, where Ms Sarah  and Ms Tammy was busy handing out Christmas bags to both the children and adults, compliments of the generosity of the congregation of Grace.

What a night, so much joy and fun.

Ms Lisa reported the new fundraiser is going well so far, close to $5000 has been collected. Continue to think of names to give to Ms Lisa. Please keep your prayers going that God will provide a way for us to pay our debt.

Prayers for Mr Joe as he recovers from his heart surgery. Prayers for Ms Abbie as she recovers from her pneumonia. Prayers for Ms Sarah. For those of you who have not heard, Ms Sarah has accepted a temporary assignment to Haiti. She will be gone for 6 months, starting the first of January. Prayers for safe travel for all who are visiting family and friends this holiday weekend. Continued prayers for Cari Bollinger as she starts a new treatment. Prayers for a friend of Hat's who was diagnosed with the same disease as Cari's. Prayers for us all, as we stop for a moment and celebrate the birth of Jesus and reflect on our relationship with Him.

I hope everybody has a joyous time with your family and friends as we gather to celebrate the birth of Jesus. God continues to bless our little community in so many ways, we need to stop and thank Him for sending His son to us. Exciting times are ahead for us in the new year, may we all draw closer to the one who makes a way out of no way. May we celebrate a new life, a new way of living, bringing joy to everyone we meet. Shinning His light into the world around us.

Merry Christmas and blessings to all in the new year. Amen.

Don't forget

What an amazing week we had. God's riches abound with lvoe and joy. Hope your week was just as joyful and inspiring!

We made our visits to our outdoor friends and everybody was doing ok. Turner smiled during our visit, doesn't do that much! Made our morning. Richard is always lively. Dale, William and Robert were waiting on us. William has a new tent and was doing good. Joey stayed with William the rest of the morning. Wish there was something we more could do more for Dale. He is in need of a shower, clean clothes, but resist our offers. We got to sit down and visit with Smokey for a few minutes, very nice. Smokey gave us a list of names he has been talking to for the past year to see if he can get some financial help. So far he has gotten the run around. Ms Lisa has taken on Smokey's list of names with the hope she can get some action. Sad, our friends have to go through this, but it is the norm for most of them.

Karl was busy in "his" house as usual Saturday morning, making it ready for new construction.

Robert was washing his clothes Saturday. We asked him to plant our new pansies. If you see him, tell him what a nice job he did.

Ms Patty was busy in "her" garden while the Boy Scouts continue their work on the greenhouse.

Sunday evening was dinner at the Ackermans. Lots of good food and good conversations. Thank you Ackermans for opening up your house to the community each month.

Monday afternoon was kind of drizzly, so we had no children. There is a small riff between two families, so some of our children are staying away. Hate to hear this, but this feud has been going on for generations.

Early, very early, Tuesday morning, Lomax, TJ and mr brian left on their road trip. We had to get to New Orleans by 11 am to meet with the folks of a non profit food establishment called Liberty's Kitchen. We met with the executive director for an hour or so and she explained why she started the kitchen, what she is learning and where they are going. We then met with her program director Dennis and he continued our tour of the various sites around the city. They are focused on helping at risk young people, ages 16-24. Offering a way out of poverty, learning life skills, how to work together, how to deal with authority figures, working with the public a whole new way of life. They are having great successes changes these young lives. The thing that comes to mind, thinking back on what they said, it is about relationships, about helping each other, learning from each other, and growing together.

After our meeting with the kitchen, we did do some sight seeing around Jackson Square. Will have pictures up shortly. Lomax had never been to New Orleans, so we made our way to Cafe Demonde and we forced down some beignets and coffee. Walked around for awhile and got to see some of the life of New Orleans.

We ended the day at Sione's Beth church in Kenner. They host groups working in the area from the hurricanes, so they have rooms and a shower trailer on the side of the church to offer to the groups. Hate to say, John S. I took pictures of the shower trailer, to give to you to plant a seed of construction for us! We had the whole place to ourselves. We met Beth for supper at a seafood restaurant and had a great evening of conversations and dreams.

Wednesday morning, we made our to Baton Rouge to meet Pastor Eddie and see their operation at First Methodist church in Baker. Their kitchen is similar to ours and they do a ton of business. It all started after Katrina as they began to feed meals out of their kitchen. They have since expanded their kitchen, now serving meals to several private schools in the area and offer a catering business. They also are a teaching kitchen for youth from a drug program. Every Wednesday, they have a worship service, followed by a meal for the community, similar to what we do on Thursdays. Again, what I remember thinking back on our visit with pastor Eddie, he said, it is all about relationships. The ones you develop with community and each other.

Lomax, got us together with Stephannie on our way out of town. It was great to see her again and visit for a few moments.

The next few paragraphs are from Mr Matt from our Tuesday mens fellowship. 

Had a good group Tuesday. Rickey, Charlie, Tim, John, Patrick, Don, Noel, Karl, Richard, William and myself.

 

Read from Ephesians Ch 4 and talked about unity in the Body of Christ and using all that God has given each of us to build one another up for a common ministry.

 

The Spirit led quote of the week came from Tim. Concerning Common Ground's ministry to the people of Cedar Grove. "I hear a lot of people talking about the folks in Cedar Grove and what they want to do for them and the things they want to do to help them. Maybe we should just see what God wants to teach us through them. What we can learn from the people in Cedar Grove."

 

To me, that was profound, because I came to Common Ground with the same misconception, but concerning the homeless. What I found out was that God wanted to use the homeless to teach me - to allow me to see the world through his eyes - to learn about myself and my place in his kingdom and to draw close to him. And yet, I continually find myself creating the same misconception as I ponder the road ahead into Cedar Grove.

Thanks to God leading Tim, I know I have much to pray about.

Ms Lisa and her crew have been busy creating a fundraiser idea to help with the costs of repairing our roof. She is in the process of mailing out this hard copy to various people and companies. If you have anyone you think might like to contribute to our roof repair, please send the names and addresses to Ms Lisa yesterday! We need to get them out to the folks before the end of the year.

Thursday evening was great. Chapel service was exceptional, very moving to me. Not sure why Christmas hymns get to me so much, but singing and hearing folks clapping and praising God behind me, just started the tears flowing. Having our friends, Derrick, Heather and Richard share their love of the Lord with us is such a blessing. They read Bible verses about the birth of Jesus in between each song, Richard talked about the Joy of the season and the joy of having Christ in your heart and then we sing Joy to the World, awesome!

TJ spent all afternoon, cooking up a storm of food and dessert and we all got to taste his love of cooking. Tim and Ardis ended up cleaning the dishes for the evening. We need to continue to ask our community to help out and maybe one day, we will get to sit down while the duties of cooking and cleaning is done by the community.

We had a nice surprise at chapel and supper, a missing family member joined us, Mr Kevin came by to give out hugs and smiles. It was great to see him, he belongs with us. The kids ran up to him and gave him lots of hugs, great to see.

Dr Phil met with Dan Poole Thursday evening about the beginning of the build of the second JJ house. What a blessing to have such companies willing to sacrifice their profits to help us out in the building of these houses. Dan and his partners are on board for the second house and looking forward to many more projects together. There have been some bumps in the road in our first project, but that is expected. We are learning from them, making plans to do better and moving on to exciting builds. Dan is impressed with the work Dave has done so far. It is not often you can find a person who can do all of this work with such a quality outcome. There is talk about the end of the year or first part of next year as a completion date for the first house. Dan is preparing for the slab and driveway to be poured shortly, so the second build can start. The building of the house could have happened faster if that was what we wanted but this is about offering a job to some of our friends and allowing them to grow in their self esteem and confidence.

Prayer concerns for Momma T and her dad. They have moved him to a rehab facility. As our parents age, we become the care givers and our time and energy goes with that. Prayers for Momma T for strength during this time. Prayers for our friends out side. Downtown is getting to be a place where they are not wanted and the authorities are making it uninviting for them. And for them to stay warm this week if the cold air comes. Prayers for God's direction in our lives, in the life of our community and the direction He is leading us. Prayers for Joe. Ms Abbie shared with us Joe does not have cancer from the xrays taken last week, so they are scheduled to have his surgery as soon as the surgeon can work him in.

God is good. Is the first thing that comes to mind this morning. During this time of year, going to company parties, attending church functions, spending time with family, shopping for gifts, dealing with love ones who are sick, working full time we are pulled 95 different ways and some times we might loose our focus on life, worse yet on God. I fine myself sometimes trying to do for others and not taking time for myself. It is always a comfort, when I do stop for a moment, when I do get quiet, God is always there. My safety net. He does not leave me, I leave Him. He is always there wanting me to give my burdens to Him, wanting me to let go of my pride, wanting me to listen, God is always there. God is always good - all the time! Amen!

Don't forget God this coming week. Let's help each other to quiet ourselves, to listen, to pray, to talk to our God who lvoes us no matter how much we forget Him. Lvoe to all. Have a blessed week.