life in Como

No big news. Most of our life is made up of the mundane - like tonight, for instance. I'm standing at the sink giving our dog a bath who was proudly released out the front door by our little precious 2-year-old. While out, Gracie decided to take a nice roll in some cat poop. Anyway, I'm giving her a bath while listening to Josiah complain about growing pains when Isaac strikes again, spilling a left over cup of milk all over the inside of the fridge and the floor. Cleaning up messes - slimy yogurt, chunky applesauce, snotty noses, spilled milk, lots of water being poured in various places, and poop...poop, poop, and more poop.

Whatever. There are some cool things going on in our neighborhood. I'm including the grafitti picture. Randy noticed that some gangs had visited the pavillion at our lake a few weeks ago. The following week he was praying at the pavillion (he does this once a week with another guy) and while he was praying that God would take the grafitti away, a truck drove up and sandblasted it off the wall. Pretty cool.

Some of you have met Demonte from Op Camp (he's our neighbor - sometimes - not a mighty man). His mom lives down at the apartments by our house and was saved about a month ago. She hasn't touched drugs since and it has been amazing to listen to her talk and to just look at her. She LOOKS like a new creation! We pray for her often - she's still living in the middle of "drug world" down the street, but she says she's never going back to that life.

About 2 weeks ago, we got to be a part of the first "pastors alliance" meeting that Randy and Terrence Butler put together. Jamey and Kim Miller (our pastor and his wife) and another white pastor from a large church near here were the only white pastors there. It was very cool to see this group of about 16 people sharing a meal together and seeking racial unity. We have been amazed over and over again at what the Lord is doing in Jamey and therefore at CF. He is really preaching racial diversity and love for the poor, etc. and has become passionate about seeing it happen at CF. This past Sunday a man from Uganda named Jackson Senyonga preached. He is on one of the George Otis Jr. Transformation videos and he was amazing. His message was EXTREMELY convicting and SO good. I wish I could tell you to go online and listen to it, but he has spoken 2 times before at CF and it has never been successfully recorded. This week it happened again. Not sure if that's God or the devil, but his message was powerful! He is truly a missionary to America.

Our kids are doing well - Isaac is two and quite challenging at the moment, but we've survived 4 others so I'm sure we'll make it through this one! ha! Moriah is doing better (praise God!). i've been doing more "time out" this week with her and Isaac (mostly because my own nerves seem to be on edge and spanking sometimes seems inappropriate for ME). Today I saw her in the time out corner and when I asked her what she was doing, she said that she had to be in time out for hitting Isaac - she had put herself in time out. She did that again tonight. Quite a contrast to the wrestling match we had a few months ago.

It also looks like God is moving in getting more people to join us here in Como. Jeff and Charlotte Connally are making plans to move here in June 2009 and another single woman at CF is house hunting right now. There are a few other families that we believe the Lord may move here (they just don't know it yet :) ).

Love you all. Sorry about my random rambling - just wanted to write some things down (so that I can remember them later!!).

May you see God's glory this week,

Anda