God Moments

It has been far too long since my last entry. So, I apologize for that.

Here's a beautiful sunset to make up for it:


Jasyln is an amazing person. She's going into the 10th grade and she will wake up, as she has done in the past, at 4:30 am to catch her 5 am bus ride to school. She's been through a lot in the past, but she has an amazing future ahead of her. She wants to be an RN--and I have no doubt she'll be able to do that or anything else her heart desires. The youth group at Cookson has been making short movies. They won a competition and their movie was shown at a film festival. Jasyln loves editing the movies on the computer, but Wednesday she and I had to figure out how to use the tripod. We eventually got it!


I visited two seniors on Thursday. Both of them lived close together, but they lived really far back in the woods--where roads didn't seem to have names. But she had a tornado shelter! I've never actually seen a real one! So that was pretty cool! While I didn't go in it, I was content with a picture of the outside:


Stormy sky:


Ok. So here is a picture of one of my biggest "God moments":


I had been wanting to hear Billy's story for a long time, and it started in the form of a flat tire. Everyone here has told us that their stories are our stories. So, that's why I want to share some of this with you.

I'll start from the beginning of the story. Anna and I have a mice problem in the trailer. We went to Dollar General to purchase some mice-killing supplies and on our way back we hit a rock the wrong way in our driveway. FLAT TIRE. We got out of the van and the tire was fully deflated in about 10 seconds.

So, we went next door and asked about what we should do and Billy said right away that he'd come out and help us.

Trying to figure out how to get the spare tire down:


Anyway, Billy just started talking as he was helping us. He was telling us about his stay in a maximum security prison in Texas. He was in his cell and reading the Book of John and he said he felt God put his hand on him as he was reading. He described the feeling as using intravenous drugs except it was a real feeling. While he doesn't understand why he is still living since a lot of his friends "crashed and burned", I can really see all the wonderful ministry he has been doing for his family, for the mission, and even for Anna and I.

He spoke so eloquently about the world and the problems we were facing. He talked about the church and about how it's doing well, yet there are still some serious changes that need to be made in the system.

Although I can't describe every single detail of our conversation and how moving all of it was for me, I hope you can trust me in saying that it was. This was one of those conversations that I'll never forget.

I went exploring a bit:

The Marble City Center:


They say "Pop" instead of "Soda" or whatever else people say:


Closed gas station:


Field of hay:


Cows:


I found a house that was built into the ground:


A woman at AA said I had pretty toes:


Our Health Center is open and in full swing:


Some of the programs happening at the Health Center:


Don putting in an AC unit

Peace,

Meredith