I was excited about today! I enjoy getting a bunch of my partners together!
I wanted to have a welcoming party for our new partners the Palmers that came into town a couple of days ago. Yesterday was their first full day of working at Huntington Ridge. Tim, Cathy and Andrei are adjusting well to their new home. It’s a LOT different from their house on the lake! They’re surrounded on all sides by apartments filled with folks from Central America!
I took the Palmers along with Bill Hickey from Huntington Terraces, Ashley, Miles and Jesse, Zac Harrison (who’s been helping Ashley) Keith Harrell (another new partner waiting to be appointed by NAMB) and a perspective new partner Cami Miller who came down from Indiana to meet with us today. We enjoyed delicious Indian food from Vikhyat prepared by our good friends the Patel family.
After lunch, Bill, Jesse, Andrei, Keith and I went up to Franklin road in Marietta to change the lock on the door at the mission. We’d had some issues with one of the keys, so we had to change the lock.
Michael Anderson is the director of the mission. He’s doing a great job!
We also stopped by Best Buy to pick up some software for Keith so he can work on his newsletter.
Then back to Azalea to check on the kids at the mission. Jesse and I had a good time with Jouvens and Bubba as well as Clinton, Jowan and Angel.
We came on back to Stone Mountain and Jesse and I took a quick bike ride around the big rock. He’s a pretty quick biker!
I’ve been working on hard drive issues with my computer. I needed to transfer some material from one drive to another. Jesse took a look at it and gave me some suggestions as to what I should do. Sure am glad he’s around to help!
My folks will be flying in from Austin on Monday! I’ve made reservations at our hotel for them. Sure am looking forward to that!
Jesse and I headed up to Alpharetta this morning to meet with our UNITE partners from that section of the county. It was great to see old buddies and make some new friends! I’m looking forward to getting more work moving in that area.
Went by Barnes and Noble. I enjoy taking a few minutes to look through the business and marketing sections.
Checked on the kids at the mission. Everyone seemed to be doing well and they feel pretty confident about the CRCT testing. Jouvens opened a bank account today. He was so proud! He has his passport from Haiti. We still hope to get him into Perimeter School in the Fall. Also talked to John about the incident with the baseball breaking a car window. There’s always something I have to try and negotiate. Keep the peace!
Ran 4.2 miles up to Stone Mountain.
Went by Walmart to make keys for the Palmers to get into my office if they need the internet. Took forever to get that done! Also heard from one of my partners in Marietta that we’re having trouble with a mission. Too many keys floating around so we’re changing the locks to make sure that only the leadership has access. Bill Hickey and I will go over there tomorrow and swap it out. I made extra keys for the new lock. Always something.
Working on my financial report. Sure am glad we finished the newsletter this weekend!
This morning Kathy, Jesse and I went to the In The Dark exhibit at Ferbank Museum. I was less than impressed. It was mainly geared to little kids, so even though I did learn some things, it wasn’t nearly as good as what I was hoping. We arrived at the museum on a quiet Monday morning. I thought we’d have the museum to ourselves. Man, was I wrong. We pulled up into the driveway and I was shocked to see 9 school buses lined up around the parking lot. HUNDREDS of kids were in line to go in the museum It was like being at the mission with a bunch of rowdy kids. Bahd luck.
I love kids, but sometimes it’s nice to have a break and just be with my family. Oh, well.
I liked the cultural exhibit on the third floor the best.
I came back to the hotel and Jesse and Kathy crashed out. I worked on email and then went over to Huntington Ridge to check on the apartment for the Palmers. They still didn’t have the sink nor the oven fixed. Bummer. I did get all the paperwork done for the lease. I hope their first night at the mission will be a positive one!
Went to Huntington Terraces to drop off Bill’s glasses. He forgot them in my car. I found them this afternoon under the divider between the seats.
Checked on mail at the church and talked with my partner Deborah Hayes at the Pregnancy Center about the missions fair at Briarcliff Baptist Church this weekend. I told her she needed to personalize her presentation more. Focus on the stories of the people she’s worked with and the baby’s lives she’s saved! Her work is literally a matter of life and death!
Zac Harrison came to work with Ashley today. What a blessing!
Went to my house to check on the construction. They’ve taken out most of the bad sheet rock.
Pray for my friend Kerri Lamb. Kathy and Ashley are still living at the Lamb’s house. Kerri was taken to the ER last night with acute tonsillitis. Pray that the medication they gave her will be effective!
The family went to Briarcliff Baptist Church this morning where Ashley and I gave a brief talk about our ministry. The people were warm and receptive to our message. They did a great job at the missions yesterday!
Jesse and I rode up to Roswell after church. We were supposed to have an Outreach Event today at Aspen Pointe but it started really raining. I met with the team and explained to them that the moms wouldn’t let their kids out in that kind of weather. We hope to change the event to next weekend instead. Hopefully the weather will cooperate!
I’ve been working on newsletters this afternoon. There are 248 people to write this month! Takes a while!
Today I worked with one of my favorite churches: Briarcliff Baptist Church. This was their annual “Operation In As Much” where they do service projects around the city.
They helped me paint the parking lots around Azalea Place apartments, clean up the soccer fields at the PDK location,
removed garbage from under the bridge on N. Druid Hills where homeless people live,
organized the mission at Azalea and painted over graffiti! Lot of work!
After the service projects they hosted two block parties at Azalea Place and at Briarlake Village. A great time was had by all!
Ashley made the copies for our newsletter this month. The kids at the mission helped me put the labels on the envelopes. Now we’re ready to write the letters!
I got up early to start working on the newsletters. I’ve got the labels and envelopes ready for the kids to help me with tomorrow. I’ll work on my article later this afternoon.
Stayed up late again last night finishing up editing video for Agricola Baptist Church. It’s in two sections, each about 8 minutes long.
We were supposed to have a meeting with the directors of mission for Total Grace church. Didn’t work out so we rescheduled for next week. That was actually a good thing because we went out to Roswell to do some promotion for the outreach event at Aspen Pointe instead.
We also picked up my guitar which FINALLY was repaired. They did a beautiful job on it. Plays great!
Then over to Lowes where we bought some paint to cover up the graffiti at Azalea Place apartments. I think we have everything we need for the events this weekend for my two church teams: Briarcliff Baptist Church and Roswell First United Methodist.
Ashley picked out Indian food to eat! It was delicious! How about me riding that elephant!?
We spent some time at Barnes and Nobel. I’ve been getting some books on marketing and design. I’m always learning new things about how to get the word out about missions!
Ran 4 miles this evening along highway 78. Must admit I was looking for money after I found $64 last time I ran! Only found .16cents. Wasn’t worth running next to all those cars!
Stayed up late last night working on editing the video for FBC Jefferson and Ty and Sharon Sanders. I posted those on the blog before this one. Check them out! I also posted the Tim Palmer video I made about their ministry at Huntington Ridge.
I’ll work on splitting the video that I made for Agricola Baptist Church tonight. It’s about 16 minutes long in all. YouTube has a maximum of 10 minutes.
Tomorrow will be a rest day, although I need to start working on this month’s newsletter. Always something to do!
Here are a couple that I’ve been working on including our Outreach Event with FBC Jefferson with my partners Sharon and Ty Sanders.
This is with my partners that are moving up from Missouri: Tim and Cathy Palmer. They’ll be working in Norcross and living at Huntington Ridge and also ministering to refugees in Clarkston.
Ever wanted to be in the Olympics? We’re planning on having Kids Games in Chamblee & Doraville! Jesse and I went to a meeting with partners from Kids Games, Dunwoody Baptist Church and the Salvation Army to discuss hosting this in several of the missions around the area. Dan Williams is the director of the program. He’s a missionary kid from Taiwan. I look forward to helping get this organized in our area.
In October we’ll have the Compassion in Action weekend. That will involved mobilizing our UNITE churches around Atlanta. We had some preliminary discussions about what types of projects we’ll host and what churches will be involved this afternoon. Last year we had outreach in over 20 locations around Atlanta. That’s always a great time!
Jesse and I also went to collect the different items we need for the Outreach Events this coming weekend in Chamblee, Doraville and Roswell. We picked up twisty balloons from Party City and paint from Lowes. I decided to get more paint to cover up some grafitti around Azalea. We’ll get a gallon of that paint tomorrow. Today we got the rollers to paint the parking lot.
We also went to Huntington Terraces to pick up some painting gear as well as see how the new basketball goal we got for the mission there turned out. Bill did a great job putting that together! It was also good to see the new computers in action!
We went over to Azalea to check on the kids at the mission. Bubba and I went around the complex to see where we needed to paint over graffiti and which of the parking lots needed to be repainted the worst. The kids seemed like they were doing well on the CRCT. Hope so!
It was also good to see the new computers in action!
