Thursday, June 21, 2007

The Seasons are over

Yes, its true, Baseball, softball season is over. Its done. I don't know if Zachary is glad or not. Several of the parents mentioned they were. I think we are going to miss it. They had a party at the water park here in Florence. And since then all we have heard, "I want to go to the water slide today, now!" It was a fun party though, and the parents enjoyed talking with each other.
The girl's season is over too. We are waiting to hear what they are going to do for a party. I know the girls are glad its over. But as the season went on, they really played better, and they were encourage to play Fall Ball. So I guess we will be back out with fall ball.

The Dance season is over too. And the Dance Recital was really good. The girls remembered their routines in both their dances and did really well. I have to brag, on one of the dances, the girls were the only ones who knew the routine and danced it. People were coming up and telling us how good they did, and encouraging them to keep up the dancing. Katy told Bob that she liked being on stage. I believe it! She and Kara were just beaming. All the dancers and dancing was just great. In the girl's jazz class there were two boys. At first they didn't like them. But then all I heard toward the end was their names. They are cute boys. Katy didn't want to take dance this summer, she wanted a break. She is taking tumbling instead. Kara wanted to take dance, so she is in dance and tumbling. She originally didn't want to take tumbling, but when she got there and saw what the others were doing, she was excited. Zachary finished his preschool dance class, and their little recital was well cute, what other word is there. There was one other boy in the group, and the boys were both pretty good. Zach is taking hip-hop this summer, and is really good at it. One of his teachers is the granddaughter of one of our members. So he is now in love with Darby. Darby is really a good dancer, a sweet girl, and very beautiful but too old for him. He is taking tumbling for boys, and is loving it and doing well. They wanted to do Karate too, but we just could not afford or do it all. They offer Karate at the Y, and so maybe later they can take it. So Bob is still doing a lot of running back and forth to the dance and tumbling studios.

I finished preaching the Purpose Driven Life series, and the book study is done. It has had an impact on us. This Sunday the book study group celebrates with a meal. They are also supposed to make a commitment to some kind of practical application of what they have learned. This group has decided they want to continue to stay together. So Sunday they will be looking at that, and deciding or looking at deciding how they will do that. This is good news.

We have started the Natural Church Development Process at St John. We completed our surveys, sent them in for scoring, and they came back this week. I met with our Coach to go over the results and to make plans to meet with the leaders to go over the results. I am not going to reveal the results here. I am going to say that the Coach was positive about our strengths and how that will help us in our working on our weakest point. When I looked at them I felt the same way. It was very uplifting, and says a lot about how this church is growing. I am going to be preaching on the Eight Characteristics of a healthy church, How God grows us, and how the church has its own natural growth process. I am calling it the Growing Season.

I haven't written in awhile, so I thought I would summarize some of what I keep meaning to do. And it seems like I can't get to the computer to blog like I was. I know I have been double tagged and am planning to blog those, but every time I sit down to do it, something comes up.
I am hoping it gets better for me to be able to blog now that the season is over.

5 comments:

Theresa Coleman said...

Where do I find out more about the Natural Church Development?

Mary Beth said...

Yeah! That sounds awesome!

Terri said...

There are only so many hours in a day or a week, or however you need to mark time. And family should get most of those hours, then church, and then, well whatever else comes along. I get it. My kids are older, and actually, rarely home these days as they move into the world of their friends and social lives. (Doesn't mean I do less, just less in an "obvious" way...parenting older kids is a lot of behind the scenes kind of work...). Good to hear from you.

Tara Ulrich said...

I tagged you on my blog. SOrry if you already played!

RevRosa said...

Oh m'gosh RevAbi, I just read your blog page for the first time. My husband's first position after he left seminary was "Muscle Shoals Missioner" for the Episcopal church. Basically, he was the chaplain for UNA and assisted at Trinity, Grace and the other church (I've forgotten what it's called.) Most of our courtship took place thereabouts and I have very fond memories of a little house in Tuscumbia. SMall world and great play. Thx for visiting this morning!