Refreshed and Ready!

We had the privilege of being with our church family today. How can one describe the joy? It reminded me of when I was a young adult and 'left' my family for the first time to venture off to a college 8 hours away. Afer 2 months at college, the blissful weekend that I had been dreaming of arrived and I got to go home for the first time. You soak in as much as you can from everyone... loving words of encouragement...the faces that you miss seeing, watching the young children and wondering how big they'll be when you return...just treasuring the moments. That happened to us today. We had only really been gone two weeks...but the weeks were hard and seemed longer. I noticed that we talked a little longer, hugged a little tighter and soaked in as much as we could and savored each moment. There is nothing like family, and that is what our church is, a loving family. The Lord has really used our Pastor, Mark Looman, to bring our church together. His humble loving ministry has rubbed off on all of us. We are not the same...and for that we are thankful. Before it seemed like we were all on a journey to heaven...but we were all on seperate paths. Now we are helping eachother along the way, sharing eachother's burdens and loving on eachother like family....because that is exactly what we are. The coolest thing is that our family keeps growing...many new people keep coming in and joining our family. We are so excited to welcome new people in on our journey...we just make room...add a little extra water to the pot of food and have fun along the way. Thank you, Jesus, for our church family. It's a little taste of heaven...and it refreshed us today!