Sara's and Boston

Today will be my third time down to Sacramento in 10 days. But this time I am not going down there for Sounds. Sara will be catching a flight at 12:30AM tonight to go to the "National Youth Leadership Forum on Nursing" in Boston. :D She has been working hard to earn enough money to go, and has done a fabulous job. She will be roughing it there, for a week, in the Hyatt Regency--a four star hotel. I pray she has a safe trip and has fun! :)

Happy Birthday Mom!!!

God Is In Control!!!

I am writing this on my way home from an interesting weekend. It was actually more of a God led adventure; beings it was all in His hands. The plan was to arrive at the school at noon on Saturday and be down to Coloma--which is about an hour East of Sacramento--by about 4 to set up at the church for Sunday, eat pizza, and then have plenty of time to get to the "Coffee House"--which was their Jr. High and Sr. High youth group--practice all the songs and play. But that would have been too easy.

God had other plans to prove that He is in complete control. We did leave on time; but our 3 and a half hour trip was soon to turn into a 5 and a half hour trip. The excitement started when Dr. Nic told us our headlights were dim and to turn on our brights. So we did; and as we did, the engine tried to die on us (there wasn't enough power getting to the spark-plugs, so it was puttering and slowing down as if it were me trying to drive a stick shift) so we turned them back off, and we were fine again. That was our first hint that we had an electrical problem. by this time we were about an hour an a half down, driving in the rain, and couldn't use our lights, windshield wipers, heater, blinkers, hazards, or power windows. We continued into Sacramento, I think; it just didn't seem like we had gone that far. I know we were at least within 100 miles of Motherlode Church because we called AAA and they towed the blue van to the church. The tow-truck only took the van and Tom; so we squished 11 people into Dr. Nic's van. Us 4 boys took the two bucket seats in the middle sitting shoulder to shoulder; and the 5 girls sat in the back seat, window to window, and shoulder to shoulder. It was quite an interesting, hot, claustrophobic, and loud ride from that spot. God was good, and made provisions for Dr. and Mrs. Kong--the parents of one of the Korean girls, and aunt and uncle of the other--to fly into Sacramento, from South Korea, that same day to watch us sing and to see their girls. They had gotten in a little earlier, rented an USV, and were a bit ahead of us. So Dr. Nic called Dr. Kong and he waited for us to help transport us to the church. God's timing is best; even when it comes to airplane arrival times.

We got to the Motherlode Church and set up in a record time of...I don't know...but I am sure it was a record for us, beings it was only the second time setting it up. It was also by God's grace we did not miss the youth group activity altogether. We arrived right when they were suppose to start; but since most of us hadn't eaten since breakfast and it was about 6:30 -7, we ate before we started. Jonathan and Charissa led the worship time with Chris on the electric guitar, and David on the synthesizer, Tom recited Jonah, and during break I had a great time playing foosball and getting to know some of the kids there. Most people would say we already had enough excitement for one day; but yeah right! It was obvious that God was teaching the group something after the blue van had problems; but most of us just looked at it as God bringing us closer together as a group, which I believe He accomplished by the time this trip was over. Personally, these events have proven that God has everything under control, even the little things. Let me explain some more.

That night, after youth group, we dropped the girls off at Charissa's house in Georgetown at about 9:30. Sounds easy hum :)...well no. It was raining and it was muddy. We got there and dropped them off fine; but we had Dr. Nic's van with the small trailer up there. The driveway was on a slight slant but as long as we stayed on the rocks we were fine. We backed into what looked like a nice turnaround spot in the dirt and it turned out to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing, if you know what I mean. We sunk the back wheel down almost to the axle; so we were then good and stuck. Guess who got to come get us out. Yep...AAA again :) While all this was getting sorted out, we took care of David's migraine headache (it didn't actually go away then, but later sometime that night), and took advantage of Charissa's hospitality. Her and her sister, Bethany, are very nice. Bethany drove David, Chris, Farron, and me to the cabin a little after 11 to get situated and ready for bed. Just before we got to the cabin, we got stuck in the snow; but that was minor in comparison, it just needed to be pushed by the guys and it was out in a jiffy :) After we found the right key to the cabin, Bethany told us the place was probably out of gas, so we wouldn't have heat; but that wasn't too bad because we were out of the rain and the slight wind. I got the pilot light to the gas insert, but I couldn't get the thing to turn on for the life of me. It was about 11:30 and I decided it wasn't too cold if we were going to be in our sleeping bags, and so I went to bed. The rest of the men came to the cabin about 12:15 and Pastor Chris found the hidden switch that turned it on. :S So we did end up with heat, and now I know what to look for next time. :) It was a very nice cabin!

I woke up periodically through out the night because I didn't have a watch or an alarm, and I was afraid of over sleeping. I heard Pastor Chris coming up the stairs, and trying to find a light to wake us up. He said we had 10 minutes till the girls were going to be here, and 20 minutes till we had to go. So I got showered, dressed, and packed up in that time (which is amazing for me). The girls were late getting ready, so we met them on the road about half way between the camp and the McEffee's house. We made it to the church with just enough time to get up on the steps to do a sound check, but no warm up (for the second week in a row). I did my violin part for the offertories during both services and I am seeing some improvement. I didn't get it right either times, but it is getting better! :) I would give our first service a D+, and our second service--after our cookie, brownie, Fig Newton, and orange juice breakfast--was our best one yet. :D During the second service, God provided once again for us! There were about 5 men (so I have been told) that worked on our blue van, to get it working so we could drive it home. By the time church was over and we were packed, it was ready for us to drive. God is good!!!

We eat at Wendy's for lunch (breakfast, or Brunch) at about 1:30 in the afternoon, and had an uneventful trip on the way home. We had had to much excitement for one weeks, so on the way home, we crashed. :(

No... I mean we fell asleep; we were exhausted. :) God reminded us all that He is always in control. It really wasn't as bad as it may sound, I had a good time. God always provided and took care of all our needs and problems; from the big ones, like the vans alternator needing to be replaced and the other van needing to be towed out of the mud, to the smaller ones, like food, heat, Advil, and our appointments. We never missed one thing, and it was all done for the glory and honor of God, from singing, preaching, eating, driving, and talking with others. It was a trip I will never forget, and I am sure no one else will either. IT WAS A BLAST!!!

Oh...and one more thing. You may say this was all just good luck or a coincidence; but one last thing happened while I was down there. After the church service, a lady turned to me, handed me a 20 dollar bill, and said, God had laid it on her heart to give it to me, she didn't know what my needs were, but she said it was for me and to take it. I thought I had everything together financially, so I didn't know what to do with it, but I took it knowing God had a plan for it. It is my mom's birthday tomorrow, so I went to the store to buy her a ring advertised in the paper, from us kids. Sara and I got there and the sale ended last night. But we went ahead and bought it anyways. Guess how much more it was. Yep...20 dollars. God once again prepared for me!

If you went on this trip, I would appreciate if you wrote a little bit about the trip from your point of view! :D Just click comment, and put your name in the post. Thanks

Paintball

I am about a week behind on writing my Blogs. But I guess we’ll live : ). Anyways, Last week we had a men’s retreat up at Charlie’s cabin, I don’t think it was actually his, but it was because of him that we got to stay there. It was out in the hills, miles from anything, and then a few more miles off that road. It was really nice; there were no city or town lights and I could see an unbelievable number of stars. As for the cabin, it was comfortable and well kept. There was a wood stove in the corner, and an upstairs where most of us slept. Jonathan and I went to bed early partly because it was late, and the other part was because we wanted the two closets to sleep in. They were nice and cool, and pitch black. The other 9 guys stayed up and played some concentration and rhythm games. They were pretty loud and sounded fun.

The next day we played paintball. I had never played it before, so I didn’t know what to expect. I had a blast running around in the brush and dirt and getting paint everywhere. I think there was a bunch of poison oak on one of the hills, but I am not sure because it didn’t have any leaf and I was in it. It’s been a week and I haven’t gotten it. So I’m glad about that. Again, I had a great time getting to know some of the guys better and making memories. After lunch, some of them had to go home. So the guys that were left played paintball with to use up the rest of the paint and air. Jonathan and I decided to hike up the hill to get away from everything and have some quiet time with God. We hiked about 45 minutes together, and I found a fine spot there. Come to find out, I only went up about a third of the way. Jonathan went to the top. : ) I went back down after a while sliding on the seat of my pants and feet. It was steep and fun coming down. It only took about 5 minutes to get down. After everyone got back to the cabin we watch some movie about World War III; it was obviously not true : ). That was about the end. We were there for 24 hours. On the way home four of us guys had a good conversation about…well, what guys talk about. :D And that was it!!! I had a great time!

Jan 30th ski trip

A lot has happened in the past two weeks. I will do my best to recall the details. Saturday, January 30, I woke up at about 5:45, in Jonathan’s dorm. I put on layers of clothes because several of my friends and I were going up to Mt. Shasta to ski and snowboard. I was in the minority with skis (I think I would have enjoyed snowboarding better; but I still had a fun time making memories and getting to know some different people). There were eight of us all together.

It was a beautiful day to ski and the ski park had just gotten a foot of snow a night or two earlier; so the slopes were nicely groomed. For the first half of the day I went down the Marmot--the mountain with the easiest runs on it--a few times with Adam after going down a pretty steep slope with Cassie. I was quickly humbled. Cassie is a very good skier; she would ski for about 30 seconds and then wait for about 5 minutes for me to catch up :s I was going slow because it was the first run of the day and it was awkward for me switching from snowboarding the time before to skiing now.

So, coming back to Adam. It was the second time Adam had gone snowboarding; so I enjoyed teaching him what I knew to do (and not to do) from experience. He was a fast learner and did well for it being his second time. He went from falling about 20 times the first time down with me, to about 5 times the fourth and last time with me. It is fun to watch someone improve so quickly.

After I spent time with Adam I went up the Coyote--the highest mountain-- with Jonathan, Katie, and Song Ung (one of the Korean girls). It took us an hour and a half to get down when it should have only taken 40 minutes; but it was definitely worth the extra time. :) We all had a great time! I took my camera down and the two girls had a camera, so we would go down a little ways and stop off to the side for a photo shoot, then we would go down a little further and take more pictures, and a little further and so on. The funny part was we would only take a few pictures at each spot, but we had to take those pictures three different times for each camera :D. Anyway, we finally made it down and eat at the cars and then I had to take my group back to Redding to be sure my skies got turned in on time. But when I started to get out of the car at the rental spot, I realized I put my skies on Jonathan's car. That was kinda embarrassing; but it turned out fine.

The next day Sounds went to Red Bluff to sing in the morning, and they didn't feed us there so Dr. Nic took the group to KFC for lunch. I thought that was very nice of him :) That was the first service played my violin part without any finger taps! It was OK but my knee was shaking uncontrollably and there was nothing I could do to stop it. Jonathan told me later it was very obvious my knee was rattling through my pant leg. But that's all part of learning an instrument, and I don't remember my hands shaking very much! :) We sang that afternoon at North Valley in Redding, and I did the first half of my violin part there. My knee didn't shake so bad but I still missed a few notes and had to improvise. I am sorry for the boring details about each time I play the violin; I am writing that mainly for myself. I want to be able to look back through this Blog and track my progress.