January 2007 Report:
Well we have been blessed with a new year. 2007, wow, it doesn’t seem that long ago that we were ushering in the new millennium and here we are now only a few years from 2010. Tami, Noah, Ben and I had a wonderful Christmas season. We were able to go to Tami’s parents house for a few days and spend time with her family. The boys just love spending time at the farm. The animals, the machinery, the people, the never want to leave. It is just a wonderful time to be with family. I know that when we got back home though it was a wonderful feeling not only to be home and be able to spend time with our church family as well. If you could also keep in your prayers Tami as we plan for the future. Here maternity leave will end soon and we are really struggling with have to send two kids to day care and with her job as well as what that means for me and our family. Please pray that God will show us that path that we are to take in this. Thank you and praise be to our God in advance for his answer to your prayers.
This past week we were able to spend time celebrating the answer to prayers. We had a 60th birthday party for Mal Tarrant. Who was as recently as a few months ago having so many health problems that we were not sure how much longer he was going to be with us. God Answers Prayers!!!! We should by now not be surprised at how wonderful our God is. Yes we should stand in awe of his power and might and Holiness, but it should not surprise us that he loves us and listens to the prayers of his children. So thank-you to all the people that spent time in prayer for our congregation and for Mal specifically. Mal was definitely surprised, when he came to a staged wedding anniversary and found out it was actually a birthday party for him. It was a lot of fun.
I am still working as a part of the local food bank. The wintertime is a terrible time for many people in our region. As you can imagine with the cold comes a lot of struggles. There is a lot of need in our community when it comes to people being hungry. With out going into anyone personal details I will say that one of the saddest truths that I have learned from working with the food bank is the number of children that suffer, children that have no way of making more money for food or any other alternative, they are simple going hungry. I know that this community is not the only one that suffers from this problem, which is a sad testament to our society. Matthew 25: 31 – 46 says a lot to how important this issue really is.
One of the things that we did here that I was able to be a part of was through the Parkland Crossing ministry, we offered all of the people that live here at the building an opportunity to come and share with us in a full Christmas dinner. There was food and games and every that was able to attend got to enjoy lots of both. It allows us an opportunity to share with people a meal that they might not have been able to have otherwise, but it also allows us to share in their lives in a very fun and relaxed atmosphere. It was a great idea, and a lot of work went into it. So I must say thanks to Loreen Husband and Carol Harvey for doing almost all of the planning and the work.
We are still working on a sign for the front of the building that identifies who we are and why we and when we meet. There is some question as to the funds that it will take to accomplish this as well as exactly how to best go about having it made. In a small town those are always hard things to get accomplished. So please pray for that as well.
A new opportunity that I have just been made aware of this past week is the Family Fun Time Project. Which is geared towards tutoring families in how they can become a healthy family unit. This would be a time where there will be playing and learning and eating together. This would be a joint effort between the Manitoba Healthy Child/Family First programs and the Parkland Crossing Staff. Again we need your prayers to make this a success for the betterment of the family unit, which has really been under attack from Satan.
A few of the men from the congregation were talking golf the other day, and so we had to spend some time lamenting the fact that winter will last another 3 months and that golf season is probably at least 31/2 months away. However, as I thought about that conversation later I thought how amazing it is that our Lord knows exactly what we need. The weather is always changing but our Lord is unchanging, he is and always will be the giver of salvation. He is the corner stone on which we can build our lives. Praise the Lord O my soul. (Psalm 103) Thank you for all that you do for me and my family, and for all the ways in which you support us and the Church here in Dauphin.
PS: I hope to have some new pictures for everyone to see real soon.