Haircut Day

Hello.

I'm so terrible about scheduling haircuts regularly, that it is a momentous occasion when I actually get it done.  I haven't had a haircut since May, and it was long overdue.  

So, I saw Jodi today, and she gave me a long bob, cutting off about 5 inches.  While my bangs are still growing out,  and (Please ignore my 3 chins.) I don't look like the photo of Gwyneth Paltrow I took in for an example of what I wanted done, I do like that it's longer in the front than in the back.  

I even scheduled my next appointment for 7 weeks from now.  

Constant Reminder

In April 2011, I lost one of the two medium diamonds out of my wedding band.  I had been lax in taking my ring to be inspected every 6 months, so I knew replacing the stone wouldn't be covered.  I didn't want to use our personal articles insurance to pay for my own stupidity and have a claim to raise our rates, and I didn't want to find out how much it would cost out-of-pocket to replace the stone.  So, I haven't worn my wedding ring for about a year and a half.

I don't know why it suddenly became urgent, but last weekend I decided I wanted to find out about getting it fixed.  We went to the jeweler and were encouraged to trade in the band and have the stones put in a new setting.  We asked about cost, but were told we could get an estimate after we chose a new setting.  So, I spent about 45 minutes (while the kids stood patiently waiting, watching Jungle Book on a mall kiosk) trying on various pretty rings.  After I narrowed it down to 3, the saleslady finally said she would give us a quote on what my band would trade in for towards a new setting.  It was something like $150 towards a $1400 ring.  We wanted to laugh in her face, but were honestly a bit annoyed that she wasted our time when we told her we wouldn't be spending money on a new ring.

Anyway, we decided just to replace the missing diamond in my original wedding band, and it came in today.  I'm glad to have it back as a constant reminder of my marriage to such a wonderful man.

 “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” 

 - Ruth 1:16-17

Wisdom Extraction

My poor, wonderful husband had all 4 of his wisdom teeth extracted on Friday.  He's known for a while that he needed to have them taken out, as 3 were impacted and one was crumbling with a cavity. We didn't know, though, how tough it would be!

I went with him, and was able to go into the room with the doctor for the pre-surgery consultation.  During the consult, the doctor showed us Jeremy's x-ray and explained that, because he should have had the teeth removed 20 years ago, the impacted teeth now had nerves running either right up next to them or actually through them.  Dr. then said that if one of the nerves was cut during surgery Jeremy could have permanent nerve damage and his bottom lip could be numb.  Whoa.  We were unprepared for this information, but the doctor was about to begin the surgery, so Jeremy did not back out.

The surgery was pretty quick; I only waited about half an hour, I think.  It was pretty scary when I was called back to see Jeremy who was just barely beginning to open his eyes and come out of the anesthesia.  He was mouthing things to me, but I am terrible at reading lips.  The nurse told him he could use his voice and talk to me, and the first thing he told me was that it was scary.  

As he talked (clearly not really knowing what he was saying), I gathered that he was pretty upset/annoyed that the nurse had trouble getting his I.V. put in and poked him several times, he wasn't sure if the surgery was over yet, the nurses attending the surgery were talking about someone named Kyle (an intern) and Jeremy thought they wanted to ask Kyle out, and that Jeremy saw an orangutan walking around in the office.  Jeremy had never gone under anesthesia before, and had been worried about it, so even though it was a bit frightening seeing him under the influence of it, I was very glad he had come through the surgery okay.

When we got in the car, he wanted his phone to text Collin, the guy he works out with.  I made sure his text was coherent, and saw that he told Collin he'd see him Monday at the gym.  At that point I thought he would probably be up for working out by then, after 3 days of resting.

We stopped at Meijer to fill painkiller and antibiotic prescriptions, and I bought a blender, knowing I'd be pureeing whatever Jeremy was going to attempt eating.  I was nervous leaving him in the car while going in the store, but he put the seat back and rested.  His stomach was upset (from the anesthesia), so I got him a water too.

I stopped at Family Video, per request, and picked up 4 dvd's for him.  When we got home, he was supposed to eat and start meds, but all he got down was a couple pre-made protein drinks.  The headband with changeable icepacks was the best thing in helping, I think, and I did force him to start the painkiller prescription.  

Over the past few days, the pain has increased in his jaw, and his bottom lip is definitely numb.  He is afraid to eat anything he has to chew, as he doesn't want pieces of food to get stuck in the holes where the teeth came out.  It is very difficult for him to open his jaw because the pain is so bad.  Fortunately, there is so far no sign of infection or dry sockets, but he definitely feels a LOT worse than he would have expected--and for a lot longer.  

Yesterday, he did go to work, but fell asleep in a meeting in the early afternoon and they sent him home.  He said that last night he was awake all night with horrible pain.  He could tell it was a healing pain, but it was so immense he wanted to scream and couldn't sleep at all.  

We are praying he will soon hit a point where the pain recedes and he feels like he can at least chew enough to have some foods more solid than jello, pureed potato soup, applesauce and ice cream.  

He is joking that he "had all his wisdom removed" and has no wisdom now.  

"The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding. To him belongs eternal praise."

 - Psalm 111:9

Not Much to Harvest

Seeing lots of this now, as I drive from here to there.  I love to see the farmers in the fields, but this year it feels sad, knowing how poor the crops are after the summer's terrible drought.  Usually there are semi's and grain wagons filled past the brim with grain, running up and down the roads and fields next to the combines, but I haven't seen many full yet.  Friends have told me it seems the crop is less than a fifth the normal size.  I pray for the farmers and their families, and the families of the world, as we will all struggle more with higher food costs and less food to feed the world in the coming year.

“But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him.  They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.”

- Jeremiah 17:7-8

Launch Sunday!!

Ohhhh, God gave us a wonderful, beautiful, fabulous day today!!!  Everything about Point of Change Church of the Nazarene Launch Sunday was fantastic!!

Some of the team was at the church extremely early, checking the building and praying through it, setting out signs, making coffee...

The worship team began rehearsing at 7:30 a.m.  

Today we praised God with:

God Is With Us Now

Our God

How Marvelous

Stay Amazed

Rise Up

Victory

The hospitality table and sight/sound table have new homes this week, as well as the addition of the logo and new skirting, lighting, and greenery.  

We had two services today!  Baby Jantze was dedicated in first service.  We praise God for the miracles of his life!

I helped with children's check-in today, and happened to catch some of the teachers in the hall before the kids started arriving.  We have cool new shirts so the parents can easily identify PoC Kidz workers. 

Our children's worship is run like a VBS.  Having several large classrooms really facilitates this quite well, as the kids rotate rooms for the Bible story/lesson, music/worship, games, crafts, and free play time.  It's nice for them to get a change of scenery at each station, and the volunteers can tailor each part to the different age groups better this way.

Babies were having fun in the nursery!  And, I saw some snoozing away while others played, too!  

So sweet!

I saw toddlers and preschoolers enjoying free play time with blocks and little people and kitchen toys!

During first service the elementary kids were able to play a rowdy game in the game room.  During second service there were 20 elementary children, so they had to go outside to play in the grass where there was more room!

The preschoolers were so adorable during their music time, singing about God and marching with their ribbons!

It was so neat to have over 100 people in our sanctuary during the 11:00 service, praising God together!!

The elementary kids learned some great motions to the song Live Like That by Sidewalk Prophets.

I went to take photos of them and was totally overcome with emotion seeing and hearing them worship!!  

The lyrics are powerful, and I could see on their faces that they believe what they were singing!  It was beautiful!

They all circled up for prayer just before the service ended.

After the second service ended, everyone went outside...

There were six people who wanted to make a public statement that they are walking with God--SIX baptisms!!

Pastor Todd had the great privilege of baptizing his daughter Jillian.  He presented her with a ceramic dove, and reminded us that when Jesus was baptized the Father descended from heaven in the form of a dove to tell him that he was "well pleased" with him.  What a neat comparison it must have been for Jillian to hear from her daddy that he is proud of her in that same way!

Pastor Brian also had the privilege of baptizing both of his daughters.  It was so beautiful to watch the baptisms of these sweet girls and the joy on their faces!

First Sierra...

...then Savanna.  

Praise the Lord!  It is such a rush of joy to be part of celebrating baptism!

Following the baptisms, we enjoyed a super yummy lunch provided as a gift to us by a local restaurant--Keller's Iron Skillet.  There was a ton of food--deep-fried turkey, BBQ pulled pork, potato salad, relish trays, huge cookies--and plenty to go around!  What a blessing!

We were really excited that our friends Leanne and Lauren, and Sue and Andrew joined us for the special day!  And our precious friends, Shannon, Dawn, Addie, and Reece, who have been so supportive to pray along with us during the launch journey surprised us by coming today too!  Many "old" friends from our Bloomington 1st Naz family were with us as well.  I think we all felt so grateful our hearts almost burst!

As we finished the tear-down process, we recounted the many blessings of the day, and continued to praise God for His goodness!

(This is what the room looks like before we set up our sanctuary and after we tear it down.  

Kinda dramatic, huh?!)

I think I showed this graphic earlier on the blog, but this is a photo of our most recent PoC billboard in Bloomington...

As the baptism pool and lunch tables and chairs were brought back into the building, Zac found this little friend!  Doesn't it look just like the one on our billboard?!?!  Maybe God wanted to remind us that there will be more change to come?  

Well, I'm sure we're okay with that, because we believe that change is good.

"O LORD my God, you have performed many wonders for us. 

Your plans for us are too numerous to list. 

You have no equal. 

If I tried to recite all your wonderful deeds, I would never come to the end of them." 

- Psalm 40:5 NLT

Twas the night before Launch Day...

Many of our Launch Team members were at the church this evening, setting things up, continuing to work on projects and make things ready for our special day tomorrow.  

We had a special meeting at 5:30, and Pastor Todd asked that if there were projects we wanted to work on we should not start them after 6:00, because it is important that we all get rest.  I appreciated this advice, as this team of people contains some really hard workers who probably would have considered staying up half the night to work on things.  We will continue to complete projects and do work even after we launch tomorrow, but we are ready to have church and watch God change lives!

Caeden and Sammy were having a great time playing in some cardboard box houses.  (There've been a lot of cardboard boxes around here in recent weeks!)

Pastor Todd was working on finishing his sermon. Pastor Scott was adding more content to the website.  Other kids were helping alphabetize name tags.

I'd put a collection of photos of our journey over the last 6 months on a flash drive.  Tony had beautifully mounted the TV Zac and Lyndsey donated, which has a great slide-show feature.  For some reason some of the photos were not showing, so I had Annah watch the whole progression (over 500 photos!) and write down the files that weren't working.  It took her over an hour, and there were only 3 files not showing, but I think she enjoyed the progression of photos.  It is a great God story!

This week we added the logo to the center panel in our foyer.  I created some sepia photo collages and added them to some of the frames, per Kim's vision.  These photos also show our journey in a beautiful way.  God has been so good to us!

Through that door is the PoC Kidz hallway!

New tables and stools were added to the foyer this week, as well as some stenciling and textures on the canvases.

another corner of the foyer

Children's volunteers were busy preparing their classrooms for the kids tomorrow.  We are starting a new sermon series (which the children do in their classes and worship as well) called Rise Up, Rise Up, which is based on the book 12 Unlikely Heroes by John MacArthur.  Tomorrow we will learn about Enoch, who walked with God.

We also got nice new sandwich board signs this week, which will be put out by the roadsides every week to help direct people to the building.

We are ready to share the love of Jesus with our city!!  God will bring the people for us to love on!

Praise March

Each Thursday night there is Prayer Service at Point of Change.  Tonight it was unique and very special!  We met outside under the pavilion next to the building and Pastor Todd brought a good word and we prayed through a Psalm.  Then we "marched" around the building seven times, praising God for what he has done and will continue to do through PoC.  It was powerful!!  When we each finished our 7th lap, we were to let out a praise shout!  Whoohoo!!!

There were some things to do inside the building after prayer, so we stayed around for a while.  

Pastor Scott was busy installing our two projectors in the ceiling.

Jeremy and I needed to meet with our Children's Ministries Director, so Lydia helped Annah study for her science test and Pastor Todd helped Sylvia with an assignment she was supposed to do with a parent. They all had fun studying together.

Among the busy-ness of the day, my sweetheart husband took the time to give me a rose and a beautiful card.  21 years ago today he asked me to be his girlfriend.  I'm so glad.  Could not be more happy.  Love that man.  Love this life.  So blessed.

Counting the days

The countdown to PoC's Launch Day is running, and is currently at less than 4 days!  It seems like we've had such a short time to do so much, yet God has been so faithful!  We feel ready, and are glad the time is here.  We can't wait to be a church and focus more on helping others grow closer to Jesus!!! (We've been doing that all along, but we'll soon be able to focus more on small groups, care, personal growth, and less on building design, fundraising, and such.)

I was "in the office" today, meeting with Pastor Todd and the pastoral staff and listing last-minute things to take care of.  The list is short.  We are calm.  God is doing this!

This is the outside of the building we share with the IBEW and BNJATC.  They've been very good to us.  We are fortunate to have this nice facility!

This is our most recent billboard, which faces Veteran's Parkway.  Change IS good!

Our website has recently had a complete re-design, and is looking good.  More information is being added.  Stop by and check it out!

Auditions

Annah and Sylvia have been part of the summer ISU String Project Camp in the past, and Jeremy and I decided we'd really like for them to try being involved in the regular String Project this semester.  There are 4 different groups--a beginning class, a second-year, a mixed intermediate, and a mixed intermediate by audition class.  Some of the groups meet more than once per week, and the only ones that would really work for our schedule right now are the mixed intermediate groups, because they meet on Mondays.

Since Annah has been taking private lessons for 6 years now, we definitely wanted her to audition for the top group.  She wasn't sure she wanted to at first, but once we convinced her that it would just be like going to band rehearsal once a week, she liked the idea better.  (The girls' school has no orchestra or any way for them to be involved with their string instruments.  So we need to seek out other ways for them to grow musically with them.)  

Sylvia told me outright that she didn't want to have to audition in front of anyone, and she hasn't learned scales and shifting and things she would need to know to audition for the top group.  Yet, when I contacted the program's director about which group she thought Sylvia should be placed in, she told me Sylvia would need to play for the lead teacher...basically an audition.  We were very careful not to use "the a-word" and call it an audition, but I emailed with her teacher about preparing her to play a piece and some scales.

When I picked the kids up at school this afternoon, Annah said she was excited about her audition, and Sylvia said she'd had butterflies in her tummy all day long!  (I was nervous for them both, but I'm pretty sure they didn't realize the pressure of auditioning for prestigious doctoral faculty members at a large university!  And I did my best not to mention it!)

When we arrived at the audition, it turned out the girls auditioned for the Director of String Project and the teacher who had conducted one of the ensembles Sylvia was in during camp, so at least Sylvia was glad about that...faces she knew.  

Annah went first. The other 3 of us stood outside, but Caeden was reading homework aloud, so I didn't think to listen to Annah playing until I heard her sight-reading--which sounded good!  When she came out, she said they asked her to play the F-major scale, which is the highest and hardest major scale on violin.  She said she actually played it the best she's ever done it (since she's only been doing it for 3 weeks) and even played it fairly quickly.  She felt pretty good about her audition.

Sylvia went right in next, and Annah said she thought it sounded like Sylvia was playing "really fast."  I thought she sounded good, though she said she was "still really nervous" even after the audition was over.  It took a while for that stress to fade, I think!

As Sylvia was packing up her violin, Mr. Lane came out of the office and told the girls, "Congratulations!  You both made the ensembles you auditioned for!  Great job!"  

It was a good thing I'd packed supper for all of us, because that meant they had rehearsal an hour later!    We are really proud of both the girls, for practicing and preparing for their auditions, for doing so well in their auditions, and for accepting the opportunity to be part of this great program.

While the girls were in rehearsal, Caeden and I went to Fusion Brew.  He had a strawberry slush and I had a pumpkin bubble tea with boba, mmm!

We played Crazy 8's and Go Fish!

When we went to get the girls, they both said rehearsal was awesome!  They are excited about the cool music they're getting to play, and are ready to do some practicing!

Circle Up

God blessed PoC with another wonderful, spirit-filled day of worship today!  

This is our last week as a Launch Team, so at the end of the service Pastor Todd gathered everyone into the sanctuary.  We circled the room for prayer, just as we did the first time we came to this building together.  

However, things looked a bit different.  Physically--the room reflects even more how God has blessed us with things to make it look welcoming and like a church.  But also, the circle itself includes faces and souls God has sent to join us along the journey!  People have already come closer to Jesus through the work of PoC and the Holy Spirit drawing them closer to Him!

Even today, God brought 6 guests who had no personal connection with anyone on the Launch Team to our second service of the day.  One man came because he saw a PoC sign in someone's yard!  This is not our doing; it can only be God's work!

It has been a wonderful journey already, and a lot has been accomplished in 6 months.  There will always be more work to do, but we are ready to be an official church!  

Thank you Lord, for this opportunity, and for walking with us and showing yourself powerful in every detail and step of the way!!!