So here we are. Down to less than two weeks now. It first really hit me when I was putting away crates of ice cream and I noticed the expiration date was the 22nd of August. I thought, I'll be gone before this ice cream expires!
I preached last week and we had this week off. I think my sermon went pretty well. After the first service I had 3 different people come up to me asking if I was planning on going to seminary after the summer! I still don't know... one day at a time. Last week I also had to work on Sunday for a few hours. Chris isn't doing any storekeeping at all now, and we're still working on a relief storekeeper. The guy we're most interested in, Steve, helped me put stuff away last Sunday. It was nice, but stuff was EVERYWHERE instead of nicely organized, he wasn't reading labels very well. A bit rough around the edges, but he really wants the job and I hope that he'll learn my way of doing things, or that he'll find better ways of doing things. On Monday, Chris had kinda tossed Steve into the fire. Basically gave him our order list and told him to go for it. So when I got back to work on Tuesday, we had a MASSIVE order that came in. The good news is though, we haven't been running out of items since I took over, except what the warehouse doesn't give us, and even then we've survived pretty well. The rest of the week was pretty much a blur. In to work, out to sleep. Not a whole lot has changed there. We've had 3 cooks leave so far, all heading home so our staff has somewhat changed faces a bit.
A few prayer requests. Keep praying for Marcus and his (ex)wife. We've talked a bit recently and they're both actively trying to get back together again, which was good to hear. Pray that God would heal their marriage and keep them together.
I'd also appreciate prayer as I try to find work when I get back. I asked Jen about a letter of recommendation and she told me that Xanterra absolutely 100% is not allowed to write them... but she will anyway since she likes to bend the rules and she's done it before. I know that she will give me a good recommendation, so please pray that God will lead me to the right job that He wants me at for this semester at least.
I know this post is really short, I feel like there's more that I could write about but I'm not feelin it right now. I'll just save it for when I can tell stories in person :)
Thank you so much again for all your support and prayers. It's really meant a lot to me and your comments have more than frequently lifted my spirits and fueled me forward, I wouldn't have survived without them!
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Thursday, July 29, 2010
End of July
It has finally been done. I've gone through almost 2 weeks now as full time storekeeper. Chris has taken my jobs, cook and relief storekeeping, although I think he's still trying to switch locations. Either that or he could quite possibly be fired soon, it's not looking good for him.
I still love storekeeping, a very good thing! Although Tuesday was pretty rough for me. Last week while storekeeping I finally had time to get everything organized how I liked it, by the end of the week it was all pretty comfortable, everything had a place and it was all neat and orderly (go figure!). Tuesday, I get in from my "weekend" and after 2 days of Chris' relief storekeeping, I felt like I had lost all of the progress I had made. I was not happy at all for the first few hours of work. We were running out of stuff left and right, not entirely Chris' fault, I guess we're hitting our busiest few weeks right now. But it's my job to bring in what we need, and when we run out of stuff, people come to me asking where it is. Well, I settled down after a bit, and got to organizing things again. The order that we brought in was pretty massive, and I had a few other special things on my lists to do. Getting in at noon, I was finally able to leave around 10:30. Wednesday was a bit better. Another massive order, still trying to keep up with demands, but since it was the last Wednesday of the month we had to do inventory. Basically, we count EVERY food item that we bring in. Prepared or not, we have to count it all and enter it into the computers. I did this with Jenn the head cook, and she was VERY appreciative. I don't how things worked out while she did it with Chris, but she read off the list of items and I told her how much we had of it. It was a lot like when I go through for my daily orders, except I'm writing down how much we have instead of how much we need. Jenn was excited too because we would have one random item in a different cooler, and instead of having to go and find out how much we had, I could remember, mainly because I had already gone through and done my ordering for the next day. It all really wasn't that bad, and today Jenn was asking why I had to leave so early and if I could extend my end date (NOT A CHANCE!). It was quite the compliment though, and last week Frank was asking the same thing haha. Today, we had a few discussions about who will be my relief storekeep. We've got eyes on one guy in particular who works in the pantry, I'm not too fond of him, he's kind of annoying but we'll see what happens. The good part is that I get to train the relief this time, so he'll be learning to do it my way! HAHA!
Sunday we ran the services at Madison again. Sarah preached her first ever sermon, and pulled off an awesome Christmas message! (July 25th, Christmas in July) We sang Christmas carols and she talked about how we can have the excitement of Christmas year round instead of just once. It was very well done! After that, we went to West Yellowstone and hung around there for the afternoon. It was a lot of fun, we visited random shops, and went to the park. I had bought a kite, one of those 5 dollar cheap bird kites and we had a steady wind. I had it up for a little bit then my line got severely tangled. So after about 10 minutes of untangling I finally had it up in the air... then it crashed and ripped. I flew it for maybe 15 minutes :( devastated. After that I pulled out my soccer ball. The size 4, really light one. I kicked it a couple times... then got it stuck in a tree. DEVASTATED!! It was maybe 20 feet up in a lodgepole pine, the nearest branch was 8-9 feet up which I somehow managed to grab and pull myself up to rescue the ball. I played with it a bit longer and a little kid in 2nd grade came and joined me. I showed him a few tricks and we talked about soccer and how he wants to be a professional. I encouraged him to keep practicing and working hard, we had a blast :)
Eventually, we went back to Madison for our final service to find that they were setting up right at our amphitheater for several speeches to be made the next day, one of the key speakers being Vice President Joe "Bison" Biden. We nick-named him thus because, like a bison walking down the road throwing off people's plans, Joe "Bison" Biden was walking into our amphitheater and we had to cancel our night service.
So there it is. Tomorrow, Nam and I are going to be joining a few of the Crusaders to read through the book of John. I'm looking forward to this one because I haven't been able to make it to any of their events yet. I've barely met any of them either and for some reason they don't always show up for our services... Be praying for Nam as we read through the Gospel message!
Less than 3 weeks now, I think I'm preaching this week, and I think I'll be preaching about where we call home... a good sermon for the end of this summer!
Thanks all for your prayers! I'll be home before you know it!
I still love storekeeping, a very good thing! Although Tuesday was pretty rough for me. Last week while storekeeping I finally had time to get everything organized how I liked it, by the end of the week it was all pretty comfortable, everything had a place and it was all neat and orderly (go figure!). Tuesday, I get in from my "weekend" and after 2 days of Chris' relief storekeeping, I felt like I had lost all of the progress I had made. I was not happy at all for the first few hours of work. We were running out of stuff left and right, not entirely Chris' fault, I guess we're hitting our busiest few weeks right now. But it's my job to bring in what we need, and when we run out of stuff, people come to me asking where it is. Well, I settled down after a bit, and got to organizing things again. The order that we brought in was pretty massive, and I had a few other special things on my lists to do. Getting in at noon, I was finally able to leave around 10:30. Wednesday was a bit better. Another massive order, still trying to keep up with demands, but since it was the last Wednesday of the month we had to do inventory. Basically, we count EVERY food item that we bring in. Prepared or not, we have to count it all and enter it into the computers. I did this with Jenn the head cook, and she was VERY appreciative. I don't how things worked out while she did it with Chris, but she read off the list of items and I told her how much we had of it. It was a lot like when I go through for my daily orders, except I'm writing down how much we have instead of how much we need. Jenn was excited too because we would have one random item in a different cooler, and instead of having to go and find out how much we had, I could remember, mainly because I had already gone through and done my ordering for the next day. It all really wasn't that bad, and today Jenn was asking why I had to leave so early and if I could extend my end date (NOT A CHANCE!). It was quite the compliment though, and last week Frank was asking the same thing haha. Today, we had a few discussions about who will be my relief storekeep. We've got eyes on one guy in particular who works in the pantry, I'm not too fond of him, he's kind of annoying but we'll see what happens. The good part is that I get to train the relief this time, so he'll be learning to do it my way! HAHA!
Sunday we ran the services at Madison again. Sarah preached her first ever sermon, and pulled off an awesome Christmas message! (July 25th, Christmas in July) We sang Christmas carols and she talked about how we can have the excitement of Christmas year round instead of just once. It was very well done! After that, we went to West Yellowstone and hung around there for the afternoon. It was a lot of fun, we visited random shops, and went to the park. I had bought a kite, one of those 5 dollar cheap bird kites and we had a steady wind. I had it up for a little bit then my line got severely tangled. So after about 10 minutes of untangling I finally had it up in the air... then it crashed and ripped. I flew it for maybe 15 minutes :( devastated. After that I pulled out my soccer ball. The size 4, really light one. I kicked it a couple times... then got it stuck in a tree. DEVASTATED!! It was maybe 20 feet up in a lodgepole pine, the nearest branch was 8-9 feet up which I somehow managed to grab and pull myself up to rescue the ball. I played with it a bit longer and a little kid in 2nd grade came and joined me. I showed him a few tricks and we talked about soccer and how he wants to be a professional. I encouraged him to keep practicing and working hard, we had a blast :)
Eventually, we went back to Madison for our final service to find that they were setting up right at our amphitheater for several speeches to be made the next day, one of the key speakers being Vice President Joe "Bison" Biden. We nick-named him thus because, like a bison walking down the road throwing off people's plans, Joe "Bison" Biden was walking into our amphitheater and we had to cancel our night service.
So there it is. Tomorrow, Nam and I are going to be joining a few of the Crusaders to read through the book of John. I'm looking forward to this one because I haven't been able to make it to any of their events yet. I've barely met any of them either and for some reason they don't always show up for our services... Be praying for Nam as we read through the Gospel message!
Less than 3 weeks now, I think I'm preaching this week, and I think I'll be preaching about where we call home... a good sermon for the end of this summer!
Thanks all for your prayers! I'll be home before you know it!
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
July 20th
These updates are getting further and further between. I guess in most part because not a whole lot happens during the week, just work. Anyway!
Work has been pretty good still. Frank still wants me to be the storekeeper. On Friday he told me that they would do something about it on Sunday. For some reason I thought that he would have done it sooner, but I guess he's not allowed or something. Anyway, he told me today that he talked to Jen and that they'll be doing something soon... we'll see.
Something to pray about, on Saturday there was a little incident with Amber. It just happened that my roommates wanted to go to lunch at the EDR at the Inn instead of our usual Snowlodge EDR. So we headed over there and had lunch. Amber was in there and I said hi, but not much more. We were just finishing up when I noticed her and another guy a few tables over. The guy was almost yelling at Amber and wasn't too happy (fortunately there were other people with Amber). As we were leaving I felt like I should talk to her about it and make sure she was ok. She has had some trouble with this guy in the past. He's a Christian, he's showed up to a bunch of our service, but he has some kind of mental trouble, I'm not entirely sure what. We're pretty sure he's got a serious crush on Amber and she's had to tell him off a few times in the past. That day it just happened that he had told her that he bought her a present while he was in West Yellowstone. Amber figured what he was up to and told him that she didn't want it because he wasn't going to be able to buy a date so to speak. This upset him pretty good I guess, and he got angry and was saying how she isn't really a Christian because Christians don't act like that etc. then he stormed off. Amber has talked to her managers since then, and they know that he's caused problems like this in the past few months. They said that they could get him out of here on grounds of harrassment. Amber was pretty shook up, she almost started to cry when she was telling me about it, she was afraid he was going to get physical. I prayed for her there and told her that if she ever needed anything, anytime, to contact me. I feel a bit responsible for the girls on our team since I'm the only guy in the group. Anyway, she went back to work and she's still trying to avoid him as much as possible. It's a tricky situation because we know we're supposed to show love to him, but this is almost getting dangerous, and Amber isn't the only girl this has happened to. Please be praying!
Sunday, the college team had the day off, and Staci, Sarah and I have been plotting a camping trip. We got our permits and started looking at the gear we had and realized we were a bit short. So we drove to West Yellowstone and bought some stuff, just kinda the bare minimum survival gear in my opinion. We then drove out to our trailhead, on the East side of Lake Yellowstone, called 9 mile trail or something like that. It was 5 miles in to our campsite. Not a horrible hike at all, mostly flat travelling, but the mosquitos were THICK. A couple river crossings which I managed to find a way across so that I wouldn't have to change intno sandals, or... ahem... go through in my boots. I stayed dry! We got to our campsite at about 5pm, which was great because we had a bit of set up to do, I was worried that we wouldn't have enough sunlight to get it all done but we were fine for time. The site was BEAUTIFUL, and the wind coming off the lake once in a while kept the mosquitos manageable. The edge of the forest behind us and Lake Yellowstone in front. We built a fire and got that going first. I cut a couple lodgepole pine trunks and lashed together a lean-to: I hope we got a picture of it... I'm pretty proud of that one! :) As rough as this trip was, it was great being able to use skills I learned from Royal Rangers. Thanks so much to Mr. Nast and the rest for teaching us all, I loved it! So we had a good fire going, I had bought a pot to use for cooking so we had potatoes and bacon. The first real meal I've cooked in almost 2 months... it was great! After that, we had to boil water for the next day, I really miss those water filters now, but no one got sick so I guess we did ok. Sarah didn't have a sleeping bag so I gave her mine, and her and Staci shared the lean-to. I stayed by the fire and kept it going, we were a little worried about bears as we weren't exactly following the rules on food prep and all. I slept for a little bit, but for the most part just watched the fire and the stars. I enjoyed it but I missed my buddies, you guys make a trip anywhere loads of fun! We had a couple doe deer that kept wandering near our camp, they would get about 30 feet away and just kinda watch us. Around 4 pm I noticed one of them had laid down near our site. It was comforting having them around, it was like they were guarding us, in that they wouldn't have been there if a bear were around. We got up around 6 and I made breakfast. Potatoes, eggs and spamwiches hahaha. I haven't had spam in YEARS, but it wasn't half bad. We broke camp quick and hit the trail, we needed to get back ASAP because Sarah had to work at 4. Uneventful hike back, although, right by our campsite we started following bear tracks down the trail, fresh poop and what looked like what was left of a grouse. It all wasn't there the day before! We made it back to Old Faithful around 1. I showered and fell asleep for about 4 hours.
Tuesday, I got into work and instead of spending the first few hours doing food prep as usual, I had a bit of work to do reorganizing. Again, I'll have something real nice working in one of our coolers and it's a complete mess when I get back. Keeps me busy! I might miss working with some of these people. I really like Steve, our morning sous chef, and Adam, who was our Pantry lead, but he just took over the evening sous chef position. They're both pretty neat guys to work with. So I guess that's all for now. Next week Sarah will be preaching, her first time ever, and we're going to have a Christmas service for July 25th. Normally out here, they celebrate Christmas on August 25th, they get a huge tree for the Inn and have cookies and music, since we're all going to miss it we're doing it early! Should be fun, I'm looking forward to it.
So, good night for now. Keep praying, I'll be home soon, now less than 1 month!
Work has been pretty good still. Frank still wants me to be the storekeeper. On Friday he told me that they would do something about it on Sunday. For some reason I thought that he would have done it sooner, but I guess he's not allowed or something. Anyway, he told me today that he talked to Jen and that they'll be doing something soon... we'll see.
Something to pray about, on Saturday there was a little incident with Amber. It just happened that my roommates wanted to go to lunch at the EDR at the Inn instead of our usual Snowlodge EDR. So we headed over there and had lunch. Amber was in there and I said hi, but not much more. We were just finishing up when I noticed her and another guy a few tables over. The guy was almost yelling at Amber and wasn't too happy (fortunately there were other people with Amber). As we were leaving I felt like I should talk to her about it and make sure she was ok. She has had some trouble with this guy in the past. He's a Christian, he's showed up to a bunch of our service, but he has some kind of mental trouble, I'm not entirely sure what. We're pretty sure he's got a serious crush on Amber and she's had to tell him off a few times in the past. That day it just happened that he had told her that he bought her a present while he was in West Yellowstone. Amber figured what he was up to and told him that she didn't want it because he wasn't going to be able to buy a date so to speak. This upset him pretty good I guess, and he got angry and was saying how she isn't really a Christian because Christians don't act like that etc. then he stormed off. Amber has talked to her managers since then, and they know that he's caused problems like this in the past few months. They said that they could get him out of here on grounds of harrassment. Amber was pretty shook up, she almost started to cry when she was telling me about it, she was afraid he was going to get physical. I prayed for her there and told her that if she ever needed anything, anytime, to contact me. I feel a bit responsible for the girls on our team since I'm the only guy in the group. Anyway, she went back to work and she's still trying to avoid him as much as possible. It's a tricky situation because we know we're supposed to show love to him, but this is almost getting dangerous, and Amber isn't the only girl this has happened to. Please be praying!
Sunday, the college team had the day off, and Staci, Sarah and I have been plotting a camping trip. We got our permits and started looking at the gear we had and realized we were a bit short. So we drove to West Yellowstone and bought some stuff, just kinda the bare minimum survival gear in my opinion. We then drove out to our trailhead, on the East side of Lake Yellowstone, called 9 mile trail or something like that. It was 5 miles in to our campsite. Not a horrible hike at all, mostly flat travelling, but the mosquitos were THICK. A couple river crossings which I managed to find a way across so that I wouldn't have to change intno sandals, or... ahem... go through in my boots. I stayed dry! We got to our campsite at about 5pm, which was great because we had a bit of set up to do, I was worried that we wouldn't have enough sunlight to get it all done but we were fine for time. The site was BEAUTIFUL, and the wind coming off the lake once in a while kept the mosquitos manageable. The edge of the forest behind us and Lake Yellowstone in front. We built a fire and got that going first. I cut a couple lodgepole pine trunks and lashed together a lean-to: I hope we got a picture of it... I'm pretty proud of that one! :) As rough as this trip was, it was great being able to use skills I learned from Royal Rangers. Thanks so much to Mr. Nast and the rest for teaching us all, I loved it! So we had a good fire going, I had bought a pot to use for cooking so we had potatoes and bacon. The first real meal I've cooked in almost 2 months... it was great! After that, we had to boil water for the next day, I really miss those water filters now, but no one got sick so I guess we did ok. Sarah didn't have a sleeping bag so I gave her mine, and her and Staci shared the lean-to. I stayed by the fire and kept it going, we were a little worried about bears as we weren't exactly following the rules on food prep and all. I slept for a little bit, but for the most part just watched the fire and the stars. I enjoyed it but I missed my buddies, you guys make a trip anywhere loads of fun! We had a couple doe deer that kept wandering near our camp, they would get about 30 feet away and just kinda watch us. Around 4 pm I noticed one of them had laid down near our site. It was comforting having them around, it was like they were guarding us, in that they wouldn't have been there if a bear were around. We got up around 6 and I made breakfast. Potatoes, eggs and spamwiches hahaha. I haven't had spam in YEARS, but it wasn't half bad. We broke camp quick and hit the trail, we needed to get back ASAP because Sarah had to work at 4. Uneventful hike back, although, right by our campsite we started following bear tracks down the trail, fresh poop and what looked like what was left of a grouse. It all wasn't there the day before! We made it back to Old Faithful around 1. I showered and fell asleep for about 4 hours.
Tuesday, I got into work and instead of spending the first few hours doing food prep as usual, I had a bit of work to do reorganizing. Again, I'll have something real nice working in one of our coolers and it's a complete mess when I get back. Keeps me busy! I might miss working with some of these people. I really like Steve, our morning sous chef, and Adam, who was our Pantry lead, but he just took over the evening sous chef position. They're both pretty neat guys to work with. So I guess that's all for now. Next week Sarah will be preaching, her first time ever, and we're going to have a Christmas service for July 25th. Normally out here, they celebrate Christmas on August 25th, they get a huge tree for the Inn and have cookies and music, since we're all going to miss it we're doing it early! Should be fun, I'm looking forward to it.
So, good night for now. Keep praying, I'll be home soon, now less than 1 month!
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
July 11th...ish
So through all the hassles of having to mess with our employers over where we can and can't use internet... we now have wireless in our dorm again and it's much higher quality!
In no particular order, I guess that's how my mind works, here's what's happened in the past week.
Work as usual, although I was cooking in the mornings getting everything all set up. I love working with Steve, but I hate waking up at 6-6:30 in the morning. On the plus side, on Thursday I was able to go on a hike up Purple Mountain with Amber and a couple of her friends from Singapore I think. That was pretty cool. Sunday we were conducting the Old Faithful services so Amber preached. She did a really good job talking about "sanctuary" and how sometimes God has us step back so we can learn new things and prepare for what He has in store for us. I can't help but believe that God has me out here to learn new things and prep for the next leg of the race. One possibility that has come up in conversations and other things, particularly in the past year or so, I feel like God might be leading me into a pastoral internship. It's all still kinda up in the air and I guess I'm waiting for more confirmation, but I'm now openly considering this as a possibility after graduation. Come to think of it, that might be the most stable possibility so far. ANYWAY.
Sunday after our second service, we were going to drive out to Lake Yellowstone and rent a rowboat and just chill for the afternoon. Thanks to the lovely hills and horrible reception, our group got split up and Staci, Sarah, and I ended up driving around. Loads of fun! I want to bring back the Sunday afternoon drive tradition.
Cool story number 1. I'm in my room and my roommate Nam comes in. He was out on a trip with some people (Campus Crusaders) and one of the girls in the group told him about Jesus and gave him a Bible to read. He told me about it and said, "I think I like this stuff". I don't think he's taking it entirely seriously yet, but he started reading Genesis and he's pretty into it. I've been able to answer questions and explain things for him too so it's been pretty neat!
Cool story number 2. Before our last service, I'm sitting outside the Lodge Cafeteria eating a pretzel and this guy Marcus I met before came and sat down next to me. He's a traditionalist Catholic I think... anyway, he asks if I could pray for him and he starts telling me about how his ex-wife is in a rough situation with her current boyfriend and Marcus wants her and his son back and how he's genuinely changing who he is now for her and he's willing to do anything for her to be safe. This is with about 30 minutes until we start our last service, I really wanted to stay and hear him out more but duty called. I was able to pray for him and I'm really hoping that God will show up powerfully. It sounded like Marcus already had his wake up call and was ready to change. If you remember, please pray for him too!
Cool story number 3. After a crazy trip to Bozeman with my roommate Nam, and friends Tung and Hiep, (all Vietnamese) they invited me over for dinner. Chicken and fried ramen noodles, it was pretty dang good for not having a kitchen and equipment to work with! More of their friends showed up, I mean my friends too but yeah, we ate and chatted and hung out for a while. And somehow, perhaps Niah told them, but I guess they heard that I'm a pastor. Once again, the first question I get when I tell them that I might: "Can you get married???" followed by "Ooooooooooooooooh" when I tell them yes, yes I can get married. I love em! They make me laugh! Noon, one of the girls, showed me a Vietnamese Bible that she has. She told me that she isn't a Christian but she likes reading it because it gives her good feelings. I told her that if she ever has any questions I'd love to talk to her about it. She seemed pretty interested, and again, Niah was there as well, my old roommate, and when we were talking about the Bible he seemed VERY interested. Keep praying that God will work in their hearts more and more and draw them to the Truth!
We kept saying that it was like Christmas, everyone coming back to their room to find us there with stuff we bought for them in Bozeman. Since I'm the one driving the car they've nick named me Santa Claus :D which I can't remember what it is in Vietnamese but I love it hahaha! When they found out that I could drive some of them there next week I had 5 of them crowding around me practically begging me! I'm looking forward to it, I hope we do it, at the least it will give us time to talk and I'm sure the Bible will come up at some point.
Cool story number 4. Not really a story but, I got back from work today and found out that I have a third roommate now. His name is Andres and he's from Quito, Ecuador. Somehow he found out that I play soccer and he was already asking me if I knew where to play, he wants to start as soon as possible... no objections!!
I feel like I have more cool stories to tell, but I'm gettin pretty tired so if I remember more I'll throw them in another post!
Thanks for all your prayers and support!
(1 month!!)
In no particular order, I guess that's how my mind works, here's what's happened in the past week.
Work as usual, although I was cooking in the mornings getting everything all set up. I love working with Steve, but I hate waking up at 6-6:30 in the morning. On the plus side, on Thursday I was able to go on a hike up Purple Mountain with Amber and a couple of her friends from Singapore I think. That was pretty cool. Sunday we were conducting the Old Faithful services so Amber preached. She did a really good job talking about "sanctuary" and how sometimes God has us step back so we can learn new things and prepare for what He has in store for us. I can't help but believe that God has me out here to learn new things and prep for the next leg of the race. One possibility that has come up in conversations and other things, particularly in the past year or so, I feel like God might be leading me into a pastoral internship. It's all still kinda up in the air and I guess I'm waiting for more confirmation, but I'm now openly considering this as a possibility after graduation. Come to think of it, that might be the most stable possibility so far. ANYWAY.
Sunday after our second service, we were going to drive out to Lake Yellowstone and rent a rowboat and just chill for the afternoon. Thanks to the lovely hills and horrible reception, our group got split up and Staci, Sarah, and I ended up driving around. Loads of fun! I want to bring back the Sunday afternoon drive tradition.
Cool story number 1. I'm in my room and my roommate Nam comes in. He was out on a trip with some people (Campus Crusaders) and one of the girls in the group told him about Jesus and gave him a Bible to read. He told me about it and said, "I think I like this stuff". I don't think he's taking it entirely seriously yet, but he started reading Genesis and he's pretty into it. I've been able to answer questions and explain things for him too so it's been pretty neat!
Cool story number 2. Before our last service, I'm sitting outside the Lodge Cafeteria eating a pretzel and this guy Marcus I met before came and sat down next to me. He's a traditionalist Catholic I think... anyway, he asks if I could pray for him and he starts telling me about how his ex-wife is in a rough situation with her current boyfriend and Marcus wants her and his son back and how he's genuinely changing who he is now for her and he's willing to do anything for her to be safe. This is with about 30 minutes until we start our last service, I really wanted to stay and hear him out more but duty called. I was able to pray for him and I'm really hoping that God will show up powerfully. It sounded like Marcus already had his wake up call and was ready to change. If you remember, please pray for him too!
Cool story number 3. After a crazy trip to Bozeman with my roommate Nam, and friends Tung and Hiep, (all Vietnamese) they invited me over for dinner. Chicken and fried ramen noodles, it was pretty dang good for not having a kitchen and equipment to work with! More of their friends showed up, I mean my friends too but yeah, we ate and chatted and hung out for a while. And somehow, perhaps Niah told them, but I guess they heard that I'm a pastor. Once again, the first question I get when I tell them that I might: "Can you get married???" followed by "Ooooooooooooooooh" when I tell them yes, yes I can get married. I love em! They make me laugh! Noon, one of the girls, showed me a Vietnamese Bible that she has. She told me that she isn't a Christian but she likes reading it because it gives her good feelings. I told her that if she ever has any questions I'd love to talk to her about it. She seemed pretty interested, and again, Niah was there as well, my old roommate, and when we were talking about the Bible he seemed VERY interested. Keep praying that God will work in their hearts more and more and draw them to the Truth!
We kept saying that it was like Christmas, everyone coming back to their room to find us there with stuff we bought for them in Bozeman. Since I'm the one driving the car they've nick named me Santa Claus :D which I can't remember what it is in Vietnamese but I love it hahaha! When they found out that I could drive some of them there next week I had 5 of them crowding around me practically begging me! I'm looking forward to it, I hope we do it, at the least it will give us time to talk and I'm sure the Bible will come up at some point.
Cool story number 4. Not really a story but, I got back from work today and found out that I have a third roommate now. His name is Andres and he's from Quito, Ecuador. Somehow he found out that I play soccer and he was already asking me if I knew where to play, he wants to start as soon as possible... no objections!!
I feel like I have more cool stories to tell, but I'm gettin pretty tired so if I remember more I'll throw them in another post!
Thanks for all your prayers and support!
(1 month!!)
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
July 4th Week
Well, we are past the midsummer point. I'm having a great time but still, I can't wait to be home! Workdays have been mostly uneventful. I'm getting a bit faster and more efficient at all this cook stuff. However, I've been asked by head chef Jen if I would mind switching jobs with storekeeper Chris. I would work full time storekeeper and he would cook and relief. I haven't heard back about that, of course I agreed, but I do know that Chris is trying to transfer to a different job. Again, lots of people that I've talked with really don't want him around much longer, most likely if he doesn't get his transfer he might get the boot anyway. Just an example. Last week when I storekeeped I tried to organize our freezer a bit better. Things went pretty well, I was able to fit more boxes on the shelves and keep like items with each other, I was pretty proud of it. That next week, although saying that he really liked the organization and some of the changes made, when I got in this week it was all out of whack again. Not wiggidy whack, no not even regular type. I think we have 8 boxes of peas which we only use once in a while when we make chicken pot pie filling... which we make MAYBE twice a week. 2 boxes, what we're supposed to have is more than enough. Ok, now I'm just venting. At least he keeps me busy!
I'm starting to get more comfortable around people now too. 2 guys in particular, our Sous Chef for the mornings, Steve - he's a great guy, sarcastic quite often but you get used to it. He's been here for 7 years total. I eat lunch or dinner with him once in a while and its always worth it. The other is a front of the house guy named James. We met a while back when he noticed I was from Minnesota, he used to live in Minneapolis. He's a really nice guy, and I'm trying to fix his laptop at the moment haha. Last night we met one other guy named Charlie. He works over at the Old Faithful Inn as a line cook so I don't know if I'll see him again. Story though:
Staci and I decided that we wanted to have a campfire so I reserved a spot through the ranger station, got the permit and headed out there right after work. It was a bit of a rush trying to get the fire started and enough wood before things got dark, fire was started but I still had to scrounge in the dark for more wood (by the way, my new "chain saw" works AWESOME... just wear hand protection of some sort). So I started the fire and I'm waiting around for Staci to get off work and this guy shows up randomly. We talked for a little bit and he asks me if I'd ever hear of fire dancing. Not a clue... I thought it was a movie or something. Anyway, he asks if it'd be cool if he seasoned his new fire staves. Me not knowing any better said, "sure!". He leaves, Staci shows up, and this guy comes back with two fire staves he bought recently. He had to soak the ends in gasoline for so long then burn them for a while etc. While he burned the ends he put on a little show for us. More like he was so excited to try them out he couldn't wait, but I still got most of it all on video and let me say it was AWESOME. Firedancing, by the way, is basically twirling batons with fire on each end. He was going with both at the same time before we left. I think we're going to try and meet up again sometime, I really hope we do! That was a great treat for last night.
Hmm Sunday. Going back in time a few days.
Our services went well. We were at the Madison campground, our first service we had one family show up. It was ok though when that happens things get really informal and kinda fun. Second service we had the National Director for ACMNP Spencer Lundgaard show up with his family. We knew he was coming but it was still a treat. We all kinda knew him from our regional conferences which I think he was at all of them. I preached again, but I felt like it didn't flow as well as my previous ones. I redid my first sermon and I think that might have been the problem. Instead of completely rewriting the whole thing and using the same points, I rewrote some of it, so it was like 2 different thought processes coming together. All the same, Spencer told me afterwards, he never would have guessed I was a college student from the thoughts I shared in my sermon. That was pretty encouraging! He also remembered that I was a PK and he said that he could definitely tell I got some of that from my dad.
Monday, we had another ACMNP parkwide fun day. 31 of us hiked Avalanche Peak. About 3000 feet change in altitude in less than 3 miles. It was a beast of an uphill climb, but at the top it was amazing. And we had snow fields to slide down!!! :D (I was the only one to climb up twice)
I guess that's all for now, I'm running out of battery and I have to get to work!
I'm starting to get more comfortable around people now too. 2 guys in particular, our Sous Chef for the mornings, Steve - he's a great guy, sarcastic quite often but you get used to it. He's been here for 7 years total. I eat lunch or dinner with him once in a while and its always worth it. The other is a front of the house guy named James. We met a while back when he noticed I was from Minnesota, he used to live in Minneapolis. He's a really nice guy, and I'm trying to fix his laptop at the moment haha. Last night we met one other guy named Charlie. He works over at the Old Faithful Inn as a line cook so I don't know if I'll see him again. Story though:
Staci and I decided that we wanted to have a campfire so I reserved a spot through the ranger station, got the permit and headed out there right after work. It was a bit of a rush trying to get the fire started and enough wood before things got dark, fire was started but I still had to scrounge in the dark for more wood (by the way, my new "chain saw" works AWESOME... just wear hand protection of some sort). So I started the fire and I'm waiting around for Staci to get off work and this guy shows up randomly. We talked for a little bit and he asks me if I'd ever hear of fire dancing. Not a clue... I thought it was a movie or something. Anyway, he asks if it'd be cool if he seasoned his new fire staves. Me not knowing any better said, "sure!". He leaves, Staci shows up, and this guy comes back with two fire staves he bought recently. He had to soak the ends in gasoline for so long then burn them for a while etc. While he burned the ends he put on a little show for us. More like he was so excited to try them out he couldn't wait, but I still got most of it all on video and let me say it was AWESOME. Firedancing, by the way, is basically twirling batons with fire on each end. He was going with both at the same time before we left. I think we're going to try and meet up again sometime, I really hope we do! That was a great treat for last night.
Hmm Sunday. Going back in time a few days.
Our services went well. We were at the Madison campground, our first service we had one family show up. It was ok though when that happens things get really informal and kinda fun. Second service we had the National Director for ACMNP Spencer Lundgaard show up with his family. We knew he was coming but it was still a treat. We all kinda knew him from our regional conferences which I think he was at all of them. I preached again, but I felt like it didn't flow as well as my previous ones. I redid my first sermon and I think that might have been the problem. Instead of completely rewriting the whole thing and using the same points, I rewrote some of it, so it was like 2 different thought processes coming together. All the same, Spencer told me afterwards, he never would have guessed I was a college student from the thoughts I shared in my sermon. That was pretty encouraging! He also remembered that I was a PK and he said that he could definitely tell I got some of that from my dad.
Monday, we had another ACMNP parkwide fun day. 31 of us hiked Avalanche Peak. About 3000 feet change in altitude in less than 3 miles. It was a beast of an uphill climb, but at the top it was amazing. And we had snow fields to slide down!!! :D (I was the only one to climb up twice)
I guess that's all for now, I'm running out of battery and I have to get to work!
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
June 27th week
wow. Internet has been out in my dorm for over a week now, excuse number 1 for no new blog updates. And it's been a pretty busy week, excuse number 2. Fortunately, they recently put in some pretty fast wireless internet at the Old Faithful Snowlodge, roughly 5 minutes walk from my dorm and I usually go there to read anyway so problem mostly solved!
Hm... the past week. Well, I finally was able to work a full shift/day as a cook. I enjoy it quite a bit, especially the rush after Old Faithful goes off, I like to stay busy, and the more pressure the better!
Saturday I had off, and Dad stopped by, it was GREAT seeing him, and we watched part of the US-Ghana game online... tsk tsk. Seemed that most of his passengers were excited to see me too, I guess I'd gotten a lot of publicity in the past few days :) Thanks Dad, it was very encouraging, especially having everyone pray for me. Saturday night before we met as a group to discuss our services, I had my soccer ball with me in our Rec center. 2 guys that I guess work in my cafeteria (yup, getting possessive already) joined me for a little bit. One is from Columbia and the other is from Turkey. They told me that the park-wide 6v6 soccer tournament team for Old Faithful was full already :( heart breaker. BUT, I gave them my number and they said they would text me whenever they play over at our field. Not sure of the condition of said field but soccer is soccer right?
Sunday, I preache again. I didn't feel too nervous this time on Saturday night, but I still only got about 4 hours of sleep and I had what I would call a nightmare, even if I didn't wake up in a cold sweat. I was dreaming that it was Sunday, I was with a bunch of people that I know and I knew that I was supposed to preach but I was just talking with everyone. Finally it dawned on me that I wasn't at the right location (I'm not even sure where in my dream I was) - panic number 1. Second thing that I remember, I thought it was weird... Michael Gatlin was there and he sat down next to me and we just kinda chilled there for a bit and I think I was waiting for him to pray for me or to offer some kind of encouragement, but he just suddenly got up and left. I remember feeling really discouraged/disappointed - nothin against you Michael! Third thing I remember, I'm finally at my "location" and there are a few people that I know sitting in a half circle around me. I start preaching on something, no clue what but it wasn't what I had planned and I realize that I don't have my notes, I don't know what I'm preaching. My notes were just outside of the half circle so I explained myself and stepped out to grab them. By the time I get back someone else is talking/preaching from the half circle and I'm left standing up front waiting for them to finish. Then I woke up. It's weird for me to remember dreams, even more weird for me to remember this much detail.
Next morning I was preaching at Old Faithful. Nervous right up until I started, and God comes through again, taking over and really making the most of the scraps of paper and sermon I had thrown together the night before! Coolest story I had from it all. The scripture was from 1 Corinthians 9 about running the Christian Race (NOT the Christian WALK!!). So I got to talk about my old running days with Track. After the sermon, I had a couple an their son come up to me. We had been talking a bit before so I kinda knew them. They were very appreciative of the message I had to share because their son was in Junior high and has been in Track and cross country! I pretty much know that God had that message just for them! All 3 services went well, our third service, usually the one where most of the employees show up, we had about 4 show up. I was a little disappointed but, I'm still learning that this isn't about me at all or my performance! I'll be preaching again next week at the Madison campground on (hopefully!) what it means to be Kingdom citizens.
Sunday in between services, Staci, Sarah and I went for a drive. The Lamar Valley is on the north east side of the park and supposedly all the animals have been migrating there lately, particularly bears and wolves. So we were looking to see some bears and wolves! Traffic was pretty horrendous, although we were on the short side of a probably 3 hour long Bison jam, they were walking down the road and Rangers were trying to shoo them on. We were driving past cars for at least 10-20 minutes after seeing the Bison. We made it to Lamar Valley and saw 5 bears! I think 3 were grizzlies, sow and 2 cubs. The last 2 were black bears. One was a tiny guy just off the side of the road, I think we were pretty lucky to spot that one. Only a couple other cars were there when we got there, pretty early, for those grizzlies just driving past took about 10 minutes. It was a fun trip, we laughed a lot and my left arm got pretty well sunburned, but thankfully we made it back just in time to prep for our last service. We weren't sure if we would make it or not because of more Bison jams. A lone bull walking down the road. Monday and Tuesday I worked storekeeper again. I traded my Monday off for Saturday so that Chris would work Wednesday for our inventory day- last Wednesday of the month we take complete inventory going through all of our food items and recording, including EVERYTHING that is being prepared or has already been prepared. He'll be out maybe by 10pm tonight.
Ah, but back up a couple days. For some reason, every time I go back to store keeping we run out of foods. This isn't my fault, things should have been ordered the day before but they weren't. So I get left having to tell everyone that we're out of such and such. Someone was making a list, I think we ran out of at least 6 different items - all of which we frequently use. Butter, and BBQ pulled pork are just a couple examples. I was talking with Frank today because I wasn't sure if I was supposed to be working or not, and he was completely honest with me (as usual, probably more than necessary) in saying that he didn't give a flying *yup* if Chris never showed up again. Thank you God for helping me talk through that one! So things aren't getting any better for Chris. We've had trout going bad in our thaw box - one of our more expensive items- main reason for it is that our boxes haven't been marked and rotated out for the cooks and that's one of our main responsibilities. Once again, I don't think Chris will be around for long.
Weather has been great, lots of sun lately but mosquitoes have made a pretty big and nasty appearance. I'll have to get a bottle of spray for the services this weekend. Vince and Kristi Pinson did the services at the Madison campground this last weekend and they said they got eaten alive.
I finished reading White, time to start working on Green. And I've also got Wild at Heart and now Crazy Love on my reading list. I'm trying to not read through those last two so fast like I normally do. I think I blow through them so quickly I don't have time to think and absorb what they have to say as much as I should so I'm reading them at the same time, hopefully that will slow me down a bit.
Oh, I'm also planning on doing a Bible/book study on Wild at Heart next semester for the guys in Antioch so be praying for that.
A couple weeks ago I ran into a verse in 1 Corinthians. I was reading in the Message version and it said something along the lines of be content with where you are right now because you are exactly where God wants you to be. That REALLY hit home for me and was a huge encouragement. I still can't WAIT to be home, I really miss having friends and family around. But I still know that I'm right where God wants me right now, and I'm going to stick it out.
2 Corinthians 4:8-10 "We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body"
Hm... the past week. Well, I finally was able to work a full shift/day as a cook. I enjoy it quite a bit, especially the rush after Old Faithful goes off, I like to stay busy, and the more pressure the better!
Saturday I had off, and Dad stopped by, it was GREAT seeing him, and we watched part of the US-Ghana game online... tsk tsk. Seemed that most of his passengers were excited to see me too, I guess I'd gotten a lot of publicity in the past few days :) Thanks Dad, it was very encouraging, especially having everyone pray for me. Saturday night before we met as a group to discuss our services, I had my soccer ball with me in our Rec center. 2 guys that I guess work in my cafeteria (yup, getting possessive already) joined me for a little bit. One is from Columbia and the other is from Turkey. They told me that the park-wide 6v6 soccer tournament team for Old Faithful was full already :( heart breaker. BUT, I gave them my number and they said they would text me whenever they play over at our field. Not sure of the condition of said field but soccer is soccer right?
Sunday, I preache again. I didn't feel too nervous this time on Saturday night, but I still only got about 4 hours of sleep and I had what I would call a nightmare, even if I didn't wake up in a cold sweat. I was dreaming that it was Sunday, I was with a bunch of people that I know and I knew that I was supposed to preach but I was just talking with everyone. Finally it dawned on me that I wasn't at the right location (I'm not even sure where in my dream I was) - panic number 1. Second thing that I remember, I thought it was weird... Michael Gatlin was there and he sat down next to me and we just kinda chilled there for a bit and I think I was waiting for him to pray for me or to offer some kind of encouragement, but he just suddenly got up and left. I remember feeling really discouraged/disappointed - nothin against you Michael! Third thing I remember, I'm finally at my "location" and there are a few people that I know sitting in a half circle around me. I start preaching on something, no clue what but it wasn't what I had planned and I realize that I don't have my notes, I don't know what I'm preaching. My notes were just outside of the half circle so I explained myself and stepped out to grab them. By the time I get back someone else is talking/preaching from the half circle and I'm left standing up front waiting for them to finish. Then I woke up. It's weird for me to remember dreams, even more weird for me to remember this much detail.
Next morning I was preaching at Old Faithful. Nervous right up until I started, and God comes through again, taking over and really making the most of the scraps of paper and sermon I had thrown together the night before! Coolest story I had from it all. The scripture was from 1 Corinthians 9 about running the Christian Race (NOT the Christian WALK!!). So I got to talk about my old running days with Track. After the sermon, I had a couple an their son come up to me. We had been talking a bit before so I kinda knew them. They were very appreciative of the message I had to share because their son was in Junior high and has been in Track and cross country! I pretty much know that God had that message just for them! All 3 services went well, our third service, usually the one where most of the employees show up, we had about 4 show up. I was a little disappointed but, I'm still learning that this isn't about me at all or my performance! I'll be preaching again next week at the Madison campground on (hopefully!) what it means to be Kingdom citizens.
Sunday in between services, Staci, Sarah and I went for a drive. The Lamar Valley is on the north east side of the park and supposedly all the animals have been migrating there lately, particularly bears and wolves. So we were looking to see some bears and wolves! Traffic was pretty horrendous, although we were on the short side of a probably 3 hour long Bison jam, they were walking down the road and Rangers were trying to shoo them on. We were driving past cars for at least 10-20 minutes after seeing the Bison. We made it to Lamar Valley and saw 5 bears! I think 3 were grizzlies, sow and 2 cubs. The last 2 were black bears. One was a tiny guy just off the side of the road, I think we were pretty lucky to spot that one. Only a couple other cars were there when we got there, pretty early, for those grizzlies just driving past took about 10 minutes. It was a fun trip, we laughed a lot and my left arm got pretty well sunburned, but thankfully we made it back just in time to prep for our last service. We weren't sure if we would make it or not because of more Bison jams. A lone bull walking down the road. Monday and Tuesday I worked storekeeper again. I traded my Monday off for Saturday so that Chris would work Wednesday for our inventory day- last Wednesday of the month we take complete inventory going through all of our food items and recording, including EVERYTHING that is being prepared or has already been prepared. He'll be out maybe by 10pm tonight.
Ah, but back up a couple days. For some reason, every time I go back to store keeping we run out of foods. This isn't my fault, things should have been ordered the day before but they weren't. So I get left having to tell everyone that we're out of such and such. Someone was making a list, I think we ran out of at least 6 different items - all of which we frequently use. Butter, and BBQ pulled pork are just a couple examples. I was talking with Frank today because I wasn't sure if I was supposed to be working or not, and he was completely honest with me (as usual, probably more than necessary) in saying that he didn't give a flying *yup* if Chris never showed up again. Thank you God for helping me talk through that one! So things aren't getting any better for Chris. We've had trout going bad in our thaw box - one of our more expensive items- main reason for it is that our boxes haven't been marked and rotated out for the cooks and that's one of our main responsibilities. Once again, I don't think Chris will be around for long.
Weather has been great, lots of sun lately but mosquitoes have made a pretty big and nasty appearance. I'll have to get a bottle of spray for the services this weekend. Vince and Kristi Pinson did the services at the Madison campground this last weekend and they said they got eaten alive.
I finished reading White, time to start working on Green. And I've also got Wild at Heart and now Crazy Love on my reading list. I'm trying to not read through those last two so fast like I normally do. I think I blow through them so quickly I don't have time to think and absorb what they have to say as much as I should so I'm reading them at the same time, hopefully that will slow me down a bit.
Oh, I'm also planning on doing a Bible/book study on Wild at Heart next semester for the guys in Antioch so be praying for that.
A couple weeks ago I ran into a verse in 1 Corinthians. I was reading in the Message version and it said something along the lines of be content with where you are right now because you are exactly where God wants you to be. That REALLY hit home for me and was a huge encouragement. I still can't WAIT to be home, I really miss having friends and family around. But I still know that I'm right where God wants me right now, and I'm going to stick it out.
2 Corinthians 4:8-10 "We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body"
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
June 20th Weekend
Saturday.
Work as usual. Nothing horrible happened, it was almost weird having the truck come in at a normal time. I was able to leave about an hour early, which was nice because I was pretty exhausted from the week. Something really awesome came up Saturday night. I was in my room and Nam came back. He told me he was at another dorm and had found a Bible and started reading it. He asked if I had one that he could read because he wanted to keep reading! Needless to say I was pretty excited about that one. I pulled out my Bible and was showing it to him. Niah was in the room as well and he looked really excited and curious as well. At dinner on Sunday I asked Nam what he knew about Christianity and he told me that his mom is a Christian in that she goes to church. Otherwise, they don't read the Bible or anything so I guess he doesn't know much.
Sunday.
I didn't sleep well that night, but I woke up at 6 and decided that I wanted to try trail running. Some of you may remember a certain hill on our way to the Bighorns that a certain group of teens thought they could run to the top of... It was kinda like that. I tried running to the top of Observation point, and I was doing fine until I got to the hill part. I only had to stop 3 times going up, it was pretty killer on the legs. Otherwise, I think I'm in pretty good shape right now. Our first two services went well. This week we were at the Madison campground and we had 16 people show up for our morning service. Amber preached a great sermon on God the Father for Father's day. It was her first time speaking/preaching and she did a great job. In between services we had almost 2 hours. So we walked around the area for a little bit and chased ground squirrels into their holes. We had about 8 people for our second service.
After the services, we went back to Old Faithful and had lunch. Then I went out with Nam and Toong to West Yellowstone. I missed the turn at first so it was almost an hour longer trip than it should have been. But we still had plenty of time. We walked around for a bit and found an amazing clothing store with ridiculously low prices. I bought a jacket that I'm pretty excited about for $26. We had a pretty good time. On our way back we are told that the road to Old Faithful is loaded down with traffic because of an accident. An SUV broadsided an RV and we had seen the ambulances rush through. The front of the SUV was smashed in to the windshield, the RV had it's tires blown and right side torn up a bit, it was pretty bad. Unfortunately this was right in between Old Faithful and Madison. We got back in time for me to eat dinner and run back to my room and get ready for our last service. I picked up Staci and Sarah, Amber was going to meet us at Madison. And there was the crash still. Rangers were alternating traffic through a pulloff, but the line from Old Faithful was at least a mile long, probably more. It was actually a lot of fun waiting to get through, we laughed a lot. But we got to the campground at 7:30, service started at 7. So that one didn't go through unfortunately, we all felt really bad that Amber was the only one there, we couldn't call her because of cell phone reception. We pretty much got to the campground, turned around and headed back. Of course, the crash was clear now and we got back in good time. We got to attend the service put on by Rod and Linda. Rod has some pretty good messages. He preached about the "lunatic" who was the first called missionary - the story of the possessed man and the herd of pigs. Not who you would expect at all. It was a very good sermon. After that we met as a group for our debriefing. I'll be preaching next week and I think I'm actually looking forward to this one. I think I already know what I'm going to preach about.
Monday.
I've been looking forward to this day for a while now. Whitewater rafting!! Amber, Staci and I met at 9 and drove down to Grant village, less than 20 miles south of Old Faithful, I think. There we met up with the rest of the ACMNP group that we were going with. We hopped in the van and drove down through the Tetons... that place still gets my heart racing every time I see it. We got to Jackson Hole and paid for our trip. Got into our wetsuits (AWESOME) and loaded onto their shuttle bus. About 30 minutes later we got to our rafting area on the Snake river. I had been told they were class 4-5 rapids, but I think our guide said more like 2-4. The water was freezing but we had sunshine the whole time. Our rafting guide, Ben, was amazing. A really really funny guy with a lot of stories to tell. The Snake river had been at it's highest this year since 1997 and it was still pretty high, which I think lessened the rapids a little. But we still got plenty wet. No one fell over, several of us jumped in though. I paddled for about half and sat in the front for a little while - the major splash zone. I definitely would go again if I got the chance! That lasted about 2 hours. We were picked up by the shuttle at the end and drove back to Jackson Hole. We went to a Mexican restaurant called The Merry Piglets. I thought the name sounded more like a bar than a Mexican restaurant... The food was pretty good. We loaded up the cars/vans and headed back. We got back to Old Faithful about 9pm, and I was surprised how tired I was. I think I was asleep by midnight. It was a great weekend, and now I get to go back to work!
Work as usual. Nothing horrible happened, it was almost weird having the truck come in at a normal time. I was able to leave about an hour early, which was nice because I was pretty exhausted from the week. Something really awesome came up Saturday night. I was in my room and Nam came back. He told me he was at another dorm and had found a Bible and started reading it. He asked if I had one that he could read because he wanted to keep reading! Needless to say I was pretty excited about that one. I pulled out my Bible and was showing it to him. Niah was in the room as well and he looked really excited and curious as well. At dinner on Sunday I asked Nam what he knew about Christianity and he told me that his mom is a Christian in that she goes to church. Otherwise, they don't read the Bible or anything so I guess he doesn't know much.
Sunday.
I didn't sleep well that night, but I woke up at 6 and decided that I wanted to try trail running. Some of you may remember a certain hill on our way to the Bighorns that a certain group of teens thought they could run to the top of... It was kinda like that. I tried running to the top of Observation point, and I was doing fine until I got to the hill part. I only had to stop 3 times going up, it was pretty killer on the legs. Otherwise, I think I'm in pretty good shape right now. Our first two services went well. This week we were at the Madison campground and we had 16 people show up for our morning service. Amber preached a great sermon on God the Father for Father's day. It was her first time speaking/preaching and she did a great job. In between services we had almost 2 hours. So we walked around the area for a little bit and chased ground squirrels into their holes. We had about 8 people for our second service.
After the services, we went back to Old Faithful and had lunch. Then I went out with Nam and Toong to West Yellowstone. I missed the turn at first so it was almost an hour longer trip than it should have been. But we still had plenty of time. We walked around for a bit and found an amazing clothing store with ridiculously low prices. I bought a jacket that I'm pretty excited about for $26. We had a pretty good time. On our way back we are told that the road to Old Faithful is loaded down with traffic because of an accident. An SUV broadsided an RV and we had seen the ambulances rush through. The front of the SUV was smashed in to the windshield, the RV had it's tires blown and right side torn up a bit, it was pretty bad. Unfortunately this was right in between Old Faithful and Madison. We got back in time for me to eat dinner and run back to my room and get ready for our last service. I picked up Staci and Sarah, Amber was going to meet us at Madison. And there was the crash still. Rangers were alternating traffic through a pulloff, but the line from Old Faithful was at least a mile long, probably more. It was actually a lot of fun waiting to get through, we laughed a lot. But we got to the campground at 7:30, service started at 7. So that one didn't go through unfortunately, we all felt really bad that Amber was the only one there, we couldn't call her because of cell phone reception. We pretty much got to the campground, turned around and headed back. Of course, the crash was clear now and we got back in good time. We got to attend the service put on by Rod and Linda. Rod has some pretty good messages. He preached about the "lunatic" who was the first called missionary - the story of the possessed man and the herd of pigs. Not who you would expect at all. It was a very good sermon. After that we met as a group for our debriefing. I'll be preaching next week and I think I'm actually looking forward to this one. I think I already know what I'm going to preach about.
Monday.
I've been looking forward to this day for a while now. Whitewater rafting!! Amber, Staci and I met at 9 and drove down to Grant village, less than 20 miles south of Old Faithful, I think. There we met up with the rest of the ACMNP group that we were going with. We hopped in the van and drove down through the Tetons... that place still gets my heart racing every time I see it. We got to Jackson Hole and paid for our trip. Got into our wetsuits (AWESOME) and loaded onto their shuttle bus. About 30 minutes later we got to our rafting area on the Snake river. I had been told they were class 4-5 rapids, but I think our guide said more like 2-4. The water was freezing but we had sunshine the whole time. Our rafting guide, Ben, was amazing. A really really funny guy with a lot of stories to tell. The Snake river had been at it's highest this year since 1997 and it was still pretty high, which I think lessened the rapids a little. But we still got plenty wet. No one fell over, several of us jumped in though. I paddled for about half and sat in the front for a little while - the major splash zone. I definitely would go again if I got the chance! That lasted about 2 hours. We were picked up by the shuttle at the end and drove back to Jackson Hole. We went to a Mexican restaurant called The Merry Piglets. I thought the name sounded more like a bar than a Mexican restaurant... The food was pretty good. We loaded up the cars/vans and headed back. We got back to Old Faithful about 9pm, and I was surprised how tired I was. I think I was asleep by midnight. It was a great weekend, and now I get to go back to work!
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