January 29, 2009 at 4:19 am (Callie Grace)
Callie Grace has two characteristics about her that goes deep. She is Creative with a capital “C” and she is resourceful. Melvin’s family, all of them really, but especially his mom and sister, Frankie, are creative and resourceful. There is NOTHING that is headed in the trash that Callie Grace doesn’t say, “Can I keep that? I want to use that for a craft.” This, personally, drives me mad at times. I have the “spiritual gift”, according to my husband, of throwing things away. Everything goes in the trash to me.
Callie Grace’s latest escapade is knitting. She has had in her head that she wanted to knit for some time now. This past weekend, we made a trip to a local discount store. Both of the kids took their wallets and had the green light to buy a small toy type item with their own money. Callie Grace very quickly found a kid’s knitting kit. So on Sunday, after getting back home from church, she opened up the kit. Much to her dismay, neither I nor her Daddy could figure out the directions. Aunt Laura came and visited on Monday and she couldn’t figure out the directions either.
Yesterday, we had to make a trip to the home that we are in the process of trying to purchase. The home inspector came to do the inspection and needed us to be there for the download of it. The kids of course had to tag along with us, both of them had backpacks in tow with special things to do. One of the things that Callie Grace took with her was the knitting kit. Our AMAZING realtor, Suzanne, had told Callie Grace that she would try to help her figure her knitting kit, and figure it out they did. Suzanne was so patient and kind and taught Callie Grace how to knit. Here is a picture of her today continuing her scarf project. She was even teaching Josiah how to knit today. How precious!
1 Comment
January 27, 2009 at 3:17 am (philosophy)
An author that Melvin and I enjoy reading is Francis Chan. He is a “color outside the lines” type of pastor in California. I am going to quote him in this blog because I believe this is a “knock it out of the park” gut check for the church, specifically Roane Church.
A Gathering Force by Francis Chan
Is there any logic in believing that God started His Church as a Spirit-filled, loving body with the intention that it would evolve into entertaining, hour-long services? Was he hoping that one day people would be attracted to the Church not because they care for one another, not because they are devoted to Him, not because the supernatural occurs in their midst, but because of good music and entertainment?
Try to imagine what conclusions you would come to if you had no prior church experience. The things in church services might make sense to the American church-attendee, but they don’t make sense biblically.Picture yourself on an island with only a Bible. You’ve never been to a church-you’ve never even heard of one. The only ideas you have about church are what you’ve read in your Bible. Then you enter a building labeled “church” for the first time. What would you expect to experience as you entered that building? Now compare that to what you actually experience when you attend church.
GANG RELATED
A while back, an ex-gang member got baptized at our church. He fell in love with Jesus and turned from his old lifestyle. But after several months at the church, he stopped attending. When we asked him why he stopped attending, he answered: “I had the wrong idea of what church was going to be like. When I joined the church, I thought it was going to be like joining a gang. You see, in the gangs we weren’t just nice to each other once a week-we were family.”
That killed me because I knew that what he expected is what the church was intended to be. It saddened me because I realized that the gangs paint a better picture of loyalty and family than the local church body does.But what if the church looked like this?
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship,
to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many
wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were
together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they
gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the
temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and
sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the
Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. (Acts
2:42-47)
That describes what the ex-gang member was looking for. It describes what the world is waiting for. I used to look at this passage as something that was wonderful but could never happen in the twenty-first century. There are just too many cultural obstacles for the Holy Spirit to overcome. He is powerful enough to raise the dead, but not powerful enough to form a sharing and loving body in our individualistic society. I doubted God’s ability to stir a body of believers to love tirelessly and give without restraint. I reasoned that this type of fellowship was probably not intended for our time. Besides, we don’t have time to love like this.
Oh how we long for the people of Roane Church to love tirelessly and give without restraint.
Leave a Comment
January 26, 2009 at 3:31 am (sunday morning reflections)
We did not know what to expect at our second service. Statistics say that you can expect a 50% drop in attendance for a second Sunday of a church launch. Thankfully, it wasn’t a total discouragement. We had about the same number on week two as week one. Really, that is encouraging. People are talking about whom they are going to bring next week. That is the jam that people are already looking forward to next Sunday and what God is going to do and who He is going to bring.
Leave a Comment
January 25, 2009 at 3:39 am (family milestones)
The Swaffords have a contract on a house!!! We are so pumped. The house is in Oak Ridge. There is a portion of Roane County in Oak Ridge. It is very convenient to the Michael Dunn Center. The house was built in 1971. The current owners have thankfully done many renovations. The only thing that we are looking at doing is a kitchen renovation. The house itself is so perfect for us. So many of you have been praying for us along this journey. Please continue to pray as we navigate the loan process.
Leave a Comment
January 19, 2009 at 8:21 pm (missional people)
Last week, I mentioned that we had Michaele Butler from the MDC to lead some training for Roane Church. She gave us some tools to use as we begin to try to minister to people with different needs. Our church is not a church just for people with special needs, but we are having church at a place that serves people with different needs. Therefore, we pray that the service recipients from the MDC will feel welcome to come to Roane Church. Something that Michaele read to us was a story written by a parent that was trying to describe what it is like having a child with special needs. I am copying it because it has been in my brain and heart ever since.
WELCOME TO HOLLAND
byEmily Perl Kingsley
I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability – to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It’s like this……
When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip – to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.”
“Holland?!?” you say. “What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”
But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It’s just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It’s just a different place. It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around…. and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills….and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy… and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away… because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.
But… if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things … about Holland.
1 Comment
January 18, 2009 at 9:26 pm (sunday morning reflections)
Where do I begin??? I know that so many of you have been praying today and over the past months, weeks, and days. It is hard to ascribe words to the experience of today. After so much hard work over the past year, the environment was perfect for this morning. I wish that you could have been here to see for yourself the excellence. Cut to the chase, right? 73 is the number. We had 73 in all this morning. Praise the Lord!
I am so thankful for all of our launch team. God has brought people alongside of us over the past year that has helped make every detail possible. Not one detail of this whole process has been insignificant, and we are certainly not “done”. There is so much more. We are desperate for those that have been praying to continue to pray. There will begin to be a louder buzz in our community about Roane Church. That is exactly what we are looking for. If people begin to talk about us, then maybe those that are looking for hope will come and check us out and find hope for their life. We ask you to pray for us as we follow up on the visitor info cards that we received this week and continue to advertise Roane Church to the community.
I wasn’t in there, but word on the street is that my sweet hubby “knocked it out of the park”. He began a series from the book of Philippians called “When Down is Up”. The series is about finding joy in Jesus. Jesus Christ is our joy!
1 Comment
January 17, 2009 at 1:11 pm (reflections)
As I awoke this morning to receive my daily manna, wow did God change my mind on what I would post today. I had planned on writing something totally different. His grace washed over me this morning in the book of Exodus again through a man named Bezalel. Bezalel was the only “blue collar worker” chosen by God to receive the Holy Spirit for a specified task prior to the day of Pentecost after the resurrection of Jesus. Prior to Acts 2, the Holy Spirit came and went as God pleased, falling on people for a temporary task. Prior to the day of Pentecost, there were only a handful of persons the Holy Spirit descended upon.
Bezalel was chosen to be the head craftsman of the Tabernacle of the Old Testament, which is a prototype of the Heavenly city to come. This job was out of Bezalel’s league. Why would God had chosen to empower Bezalel with His Spirit if he was already properly equipped for the task? God had purposely designed and assigned a task for Bezalel that was beyond his capabilities. Wow! How true in our case as well. God has called us to begin a church tomorrow. The task is so far beyond our capabilities that it is overwhelming at times. We are so dependent to daily walk in God’s provisions.
We have found a universal truth as we have walked this journey of faith. Anything that God calls us to do of significance, of eternal value, in the Kingdom is out of our league. As we serve in the church, we must never forget that we are dealing with people’s lives. “Sincerity and sweat do not always suffice.” God places us in positions beyond our capabilities so that we will be at His absolute mercy, realizing that only He can succeed. He has given us the indwelling Holy Spirit upon salvation because we are not capable of the task that He as called us to without His daily presence. The only way that we can do this thing tomorrow is through the power of the Holy Spirit. Pray for the Spirit’s power to be made known to us, to reveal that He is the one that has done this work.
2 Comments
January 16, 2009 at 12:50 pm (answered prayer)
This week has been one of those weeks in which I haven’t even known where to begin to write a post. It has been so incredible to receive all of the encouraging emails, phone calls, and text messages letting us know that the Holy Spirit has prompted you to step up the praying this week. We have needed it!!! Those that are interceding for us need no more details than that. You just know. I love that about the Holy Spirit. It is good when people give details to pray, but sometimes, the details aren’t told or unknown, and the Holy Spirit tells you exactly how to pray.
Over the next two days, I am going to share a little from my time with the Lord this week. He has been faithful to give me daily manna, manna measured out specifically for my needs for the day. Oh how I have understood in a deeper way this week, “Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Deut. 8:3
“For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which
is Jesus Christ. If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver,
costly stones, wood, hay or straw, his work will be shown for what is is,
because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and
the fire will test the quality of each man’s work.” 1 Corinthians
3:11-13
We are building upon the foundation of Christ at Roane Church. The materials by which each of its members, including us, are building will be revealed by fire. This fire is a part of God’s judgement. It will cast a revealing light over all of our works and the motivations that bore them and will burn away all works of temporal value: the hay, wood, and straw.
Leave a Comment
January 12, 2009 at 3:59 am (serving at MDC, sunday morning reflections)
How in the world do we describe today??? We are so geared up and pumped about next week. Today was our final run through before the doors of Roane Church are opened to the community and it was a great day. Several visitors from the community showed up today. It was encouraging.
We have made some adjustments in our children’s area and things were better and much more exciting. Please pray for Roane Kids. We want the kids and their parents to know that they are safe, secure, and loved, but we also want them to have fun. We want the children to be dragging their parents back the next week. Here are some pictures from today. There are so many things in these pictures that have been donated to us. The big back drop for our “On the Trail” series is on loan from FBC Symrna. Thank you God for Your provision.
Roane Church also had a training time taught by Michaele Butler of the MDC. She gave us some basic tools for interacting and ministering to people with “different abilities”. It was very beneficial for us since we are meeting at the MDC and it can be intimidating to some that have never had much interaction if any with people of differing abilities. We are thankful that she took the time to share with us but we are also grateful she came and was a part of our service time as well.
Large Group Room for Roane Kids
Ants in the Pants does has something to do with our lesson. They were learning how important it is to follow rules by their leader not following the rules. There was almost a riot.
The kids are trying to part the water by blowing it and using their hands
RJ Creswell taking his morning nap. I couldn’t resist posting this one.
Snack time! Raisins in peanut butter on graham crackers. What would it be like to experience the plagues, especially the flies?
1 Comment
January 11, 2009 at 3:27 am (Callie Grace)
“You’ve come a long way BABY” is all I’ve got to say, from the sportsmanship award last week to the defense award this week! When they were pairing the children up with their “man” prior to the games beginning, we were worried. Why in the world would the coaches pair Callie Grace up with the tallest, biggest boy on the court??? Boy did she ever rise to the occasion. At practice this week, Callie Grace’s coaches worked hard with the team on rebounding and defense. Callie Grace’s mommy and daddy worked hard with her on defense too. She did so great. As a matter of fact, she had her first foul against that big boy today. Yes!
It is so great to see Callie Grace listening and receiving instruction from her coaches and us. She is not aggressive by nature whatsoever, so defense is a real stretch for her. We have been teaching her for her whole life to be kind, respectful, gentle, and loving towards others. For the most part, these things have come easier and more natural to her than our other child! Now we are asking her to be aggressive and in someone’s face, throwing an elbow??? No points scored yet, but at least she threw up two shots this week. She is definitely moving in the right direction. She had quite a fan base present, Grammy, Pappaw, Uncle Timmy and of course Josiah.
Prayer before the game
I love it! She has got the position and stance on the big boy.
Foul Shots from Callie Grace’s foul
Leave a Comment
