Praise You in this Storm

Banter here!

We have been through one and a half weeks of campers now.  We have dealt with what seemed to be  a minor pandemic of a flu-like sickness.  Shelley was sick on Monday before breakfast.  Monday happens to be the day that campers arrive here at Victory.  She was out of commission until tuesday afternoon.  I then proceeded to get sick but didn't go down until Wednesday morning at 11am and then came back Thursday morning at 11am. Ugh!  Our staff was amazing through it all and made the best of it. The devil is trying extra hard to keep us from doing God's ministry this summer but God keeps on showing up as the stronger one in this spiritual battle!!

Bandage has been through a lot lately with her nursing licensing.  She needs to have an Alaskan license to practice here and therefore has had to jump through many painful hoops to get that done.  On top of all that, she has gotten sick twice and has been out of commission twice.  Ugh, Ugh!  Luckily she was sick the same time as me on Wednesday and Thursday so we got to spend a sick day together.  We have decided to get sick together from here on out! 

WE have many decisions that will affect our plans this fall and need a lot of wisdom and prayer to help guide us through them.  Please keep on praying, as we can feel the power of prayer and God's Spirit holding us up through difficult times.

We have seen more than 5 decisions for Christ in this week and a half!  I was able to share with the Frontier staff how cool it is to be a part of a campers decision process.  It is crazy to think that the things that amaze us such as; atoms, mountains, weather, sunsets, the body healing, music, and many others; are no big deal to God.  He enjoys them and enjoyed creating them, but nothing like that gets God and the heavenly hosts jumping out of their chairs like a choice for Him.  I can imagine Jesus sitting on the edge of His throne as that conversation between a counselor and camper turns the campers heart closer to a decision to Him. I can imagine Him leaving tears welling up in His eyes, not willing to wipe them away as to not miss a moment of that campers thought process.  I can imagine Him leaping from his throne at the point of conversion and all the angels join in the celebration and there is hugging and tears of joy for another one of us who has chosen Christ over Death. 

I obviously get pretty ecstatic about what God gets Joy from.  Joy. The second Fruit of the Spirit. The topic of this next weeks Frontier staff meetings...cool.

(Bandage here,
Speaking of Joy, This was a very challenging last week and a half! As Steve said, I have faced many unique challenges that others have not had to go through. It has been hard to be happy about all the bad and unexpected things that happen in life, but God has shown me what real Joy is. Joy is not like happiness. It is not circumstancial. I have everlasting joy in Jesus because He has saved me! Nothing that could ever happen in my life should distract me from this simple TRUTH- which is our theme for the summer.)

Thanks for your prayers and you support along our journey!
Tata for now!