Home Again

I am home in good ol' Virginy. Florida was great and we would have loved to stay longer. However, we have certain responsibilities at church this Sunday which we need to complete so we had to leave, amid much lamentation, and come home. March is World Mission Month and we have to get started on our missions drive. March also happens to be when our young people are responsible to hold Sunday services at the local Nursing Home. Anyway, we had a great time with the Cox's. We arrived just after 7:00 Thursday night and said our hello's and the next thing I knew I was hiding in a bush telling Francie to be quiet or the big boys would find us. War had broken out. I really don't think it was quite fair. Zach, Beau, Josh, and Daniel were on one team and Micah, Nate, Caleb, Noah, Bethany, Francie, and I were the other team. We had the bigger team but there were a couple of problems. Beth and Francie would scream at the top of their lungs whenever we saw the big boys which directed their attention to us, Caleb talked the entire time we were hiding, and when Noah got caught he would show them where we were hiding. Thus it was really Micah, Nathan, and I against the big boys. It was still pretty fun and the 3 of us made a deal that we would never give up. We ended in a truce. We went to St. Augustine the next day and had a lot of fun and learned quite a bit. We went to the Spanish Quarter, Fort Matanzez, and The Old Florida Museum. Saturday we rested up and Sunday there was a dinner and singing at the Palatka Church. After the dinner we went to the hospital and visited a couple of the members. That evening it was VLB service. We played a Bible Trivia game, we won by the way, and then Beau had a short devotional and alter call. I really enjoyed Beau's devotional he had a great visual aid. Zach, Beau, Josh, and I learned Amazing Grace on our respective instruments and played together. It was a lot of fun. I taught all the Cox kids, except for Abby, the Bright Arrow Song. Beau and Josh weren't too keen about it but they learned it anyway. The rest of our visit was filled with Basketball, War, Spotlight, Dutch Blitz, and lots of talking, laughing, and joking. We also made one more trip to St. Augustine and visited the Castillo De San Marcos. That was very interesting. We also visited a quiet and deserted strip of the beach and played Frisbee, built sand castles, and got our feet wet. Friday was a sad and dreary day. It was raining and that made everyone feel even more gloomy. The older kids had discussed the possibility of pulling out a spark plug or something similar to that but we decided we would get in big trouble so we were good and didn't do anything. That's about it except for details and other things that make up our inside jokes. We finally arrived home early this morning. In other news Hailey's test results have come back and she tested negative for Leukemia and everything else they tested her for. Praise the Lord! She is still having all the symptoms that I mentioned before and has now been running a Temp. for almost a month. Please keep her in your prayers. The doctors have no idea what this is and it is stressful for Vanessa and Jacob. Pray for them also that the Lord would give them perfect peace and comfort in this trial.