Goin' to the Chapel

June 13, 2009-Jacki and I had such an incredible day and were completely overwhelmed when we reflected on how much everyone did for us. We drove away from our reception reflecting on what an incredible day it was. We loved every detail.

All that to say...our photographer (who is incredibly gifted) posted some pics of our day. Check them out here: Craig Watson Blog

Ash Wednesday

So today is Ash Wednesday and I’m really excited about what we’re going to pursue as a church community tonight. Growing up in a Southern Baptist home, our church always breezed over this day, and as a child I always wondered what the ashes on my friends foreheads meant.

As we brainstormed how to get our church deeper into God’s Word, and how we as a church body could prepare in a more meaningful way for the Easter season, we decided to dig deep into the roots of the early church and pursue some traditions that aren’t really common for Protestants.

This year, we’ll be doing an Ash Wednesday service (ashes and all), we’ll be encouraging our people to observe Lent, and we’re doing a seven week series called “Cries from the Cross” where we’ll be unpacking Jesus’ last words from the cross.

Here's what we’ll be handing out to everyone attending tonight’s service:

What is Ash Wednesday?
Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent. It marks the beginning of a time of intense spiritual focus. Christ-followers are encouraged to reflect upon the grace and mercy of a loving God. The practice of marking the forehead with ashes in the sign of the cross has its roots in the early church (AD 50-800). Early church believers would mark their foreheads as a public sign of their commitment to live lives that honored God. The earliest roots of this practice in the church were associated with a believer’s preparation for Baptism.

What is Lent?
Lent is the period of 40 days leading up to Easter Sunday. The forty-day period begins each year on Ash Wednesday. Throughout biblical history, the forty-day period has held spiritual connections. Moses, (Ex. 34:28) Elijah, (1 Kg. 19:8) and Jesus (Mt 4;2) had forty day periods of spiritual significance in their ministries. As a way to remember the time Christ spent in the wilderness, the early church adopted this period of time as a way to prepare for the celebration of Easter Sunday. Lent is traditionally marked by three practices; personal prayer, fasting and giving.

Why should I spend 40 days preparing for Easter?
Ancient cultures observed multiple day celebrations as a standard practice. Days and weeks would go into an individual’s preparation for a significant spiritual experience. Easter (The celebration of the resurrection) is one of the most significant days on the Christian calendar. In a postmodern culture, we have become accustom to a speed of life that no longer encourages multi-day celebrations. By limiting ourselves to engaging with Easter as a one-day event, we can miss the significance that extended times of spiritual preparation can bring to our lives.

Why is Ginger Creek Observing Ash Wednesday and Lent?
Traditionally, Ginger Creek has not observed either Ash Wednesday or the season of Lent. This year the leadership has decided to embrace this practice as a tool to help our family deepen their individual faith walk. The practices of Ash Wednesday and Lent have their roots in ancient Jewish culture and early church history. Through Christian history, the period of time leading up to Easter has been used as a special time of spiritual reflection and focus. It is our belief that you and your family will find this focused time very meaningful as you reflect on the work of God in your life.

Isaiah 58

This is an incredible passage of scripture:

6-9"This is the kind of fast day I'm after:
to break the chains of injustice,
get rid of exploitation in the workplace,
free the oppressed,
cancel debts.
What I'm interested in seeing you do is:
sharing your food with the hungry,
inviting the homeless poor into your homes,
putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad,
being available to your own families.
Do this and the lights will turn on,
and your lives will turn around at once.
Your righteousness will pave your way.
The God of glory will secure your passage.
Then when you pray, God will answer.
You'll call out for help and I'll say, 'Here I am.'

A Full Life in the Emptiest of Places

9-12"If you get rid of unfair practices,
quit blaming victims,
quit gossiping about other people's sins,
If you are generous with the hungry
and start giving yourselves to the down-and-out,
Your lives will begin to glow in the darkness,
your shadowed lives will be bathed in sunlight.
I will always show you where to go.
I'll give you a full life in the emptiest of places—
firm muscles, strong bones.
You'll be like a well-watered garden,
a gurgling spring that never runs dry.
You'll use the old rubble of past lives to build anew,
rebuild the foundations from out of your past.
You'll be known as those who can fix anything,
restore old ruins, rebuild and renovate,
make the community livable again.

Thought of the day

It's extraordinary to me that the United States can find $700 billion to save Wall Street and the entire G8 can't find $25 billion dollars to saved 25,000 children who die every day from preventable diseases.

- Bono, rock star and anti-poverty activist.

(Source: The American Prospect blog)

Well update

I forgot to update about the well.

It looks like drilling will start on thursday. The village of suswa is putting in about 1/3 the cost of the wel. We got all of the approvals necessary and should be able to start soon

This is such an answer to prayer because this village is literally dying with no water. It is devastating t see these young children dying b/c of lack of nutrition and no water..

Please pray that nothing holds up the digging.

More updates to come

//Please excuse any typing errors. Sent from my wireless handeld...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Experience the connection...
Stay wired @ Ginger Creek. MyGingerCreek keeps you connected with groups, events, people, giving, and news.
Experience it for yourself: my.gingercreek.org

Update 2

Sorry...i hit the send button too quickly. Here are some highlights from the past few days

Sunday
~we went to two worship services totalling 6 hrs...even thy were awesome worship experiences.
~we taught the older students at the first service and they responded well. It was really neat to get to know those kids.

Monday
~we traveled about 2 hrs and taught at 2 different sschools. The kids have all been really responding well to the abstinence training and the team teaching the younger kids are all doing great...it

Today
~another long commute totally the first school. 2 hrs on long bumpy, dusty roads
~we got to drop off supplies to a girls reduce shelter that one of the teams was at on monday. They save young girls from fgm. That was a very neat moment
~the second school that we taught at puton a show for us...video of that to come
~our translator is awesome. More to come about him...he has a really neat story. But my thumbs are getting tired

//Please excuse any typing errors. Sent from my wireless handeld...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Experience the connection...
Stay wired @ Ginger Creek. MyGingerCreek keeps you connected with groups, events, people, giving, and news.
Experience it for yourself: my.gingercreek.org

Update

Sorry the updates have been irregular. Narok has very limited email access and I've not been able to get over to one of the cyber cafes. Im sending this from my phone so I hope it works.

//Please excuse any typing errors. Sent from my wireless handeld...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Experience the connection...
Stay wired @ Ginger Creek. MyGingerCreek keeps you connected with groups, events, people, giving, and news.
Experience it for yourself: my.gingercreek.org

//Please excuse any typing errors. Sent from my wireless handeld...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Experience the connection...
Stay wired @ Ginger Creek. MyGingerCreek keeps you connected with groups, events, people, giving, and news.
Experience it for yourself: my.gingercreek.org

Good Morning

Well, its morning here in Nairobi. Actually its about 7:40 and i've got a couple of things to share.

1-The group from Sudan arrived safely. They were to arrive in Nairobi at about 6:45 PM yesterday, but actually arrived at about 10:00 PM. Obviously this caused a lot of concern in our mind because of an earlier phone call we recieved from the team yesterday. The weather conditions in Sudan were pretty bad (rainstorms) and the runway that they were to use got washed away. However, through the Lord's provision they were able to catch a flight from another airstrip (which is what caused the delay) but arrived safely. It was pretty cool, at one point the team here was freaking out a little becauase we hadn't heard from them. So we prayed and while we were praying we recieved a call that they had touched down in Nairobi.

2-We made a donation to the market in Nairobi. You know how everyone says that everything's really cheap here. Yeah, NOT. Jacki and I attempted to bargin (negociate) at the market and were largely unsuccessful at it. We got the worst deal of anyone in the group. We can laugh at it today, but it wasn't so funny yesterday.

3-We're heading to Narok today. Our ride leaves in about 1 1/2 hours. We'll be stopping by the orphanage where we'll be drilling the well later on this week so that we can pray for the site. Pray that the negotiations for well are successful. The natives here seem to raise the prices, so we're praying that the price stays the same and we can drill.

4-I was successful at one negociation. We had a lot (i mean a lot) of money to exhange into Kenya schillings. After about 20 minutes of negotiations we got quite a good rate. PTL.

Keep praing for our safety and pray that GOd does awesome things in Narok. There are people patiently waiting to use this computer. So i need to let them get on. Blog at ya later.

~z

Sudan Gorup-Quick Update

They arrived about an hour ago. We're off to be for an early morning. I'll blog at ya later.

Hope you're all doing well.