We're Back!

We have returned from an awesome choir tour! God really blessed with safety and some wonderful experiences for everyone. I will try to sum up all that happened in this post. If you would like to see more pictures from our choir tour CLICK HERE.

We had a great choir concert last Tuesday night (May 2) and then left afterwards to drive through the night to New Jersey. The trip took us about 14 hours. We arrived in Little Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey around noon on Wednesday. After a quick lunch, we took the kids to the ocean and enjoyed the fresh air and salty water. Of course, the students were a little stir crazy from being cooped up in a bus for so long, so there was plenty of attempts to push each other into the cold water. Some were successful!

After a group picture, we headed back to the church to clean up and get ready for the youth rally that night. Our host church for the week was Calvary Baptist Church there in New Jersey and we had about 80 teens join us for an awesome supper and time of worship around a bonfire afterwards. The students sang two songs (one ended up being accapella after the track stopped midway through the song!), Pastor Paul shared a challenge, and a couple of our Seniors talked about how they saw the power of God through prayer on their last missions trip to Zambia Africa. We had an awesome time with the youth there.

On Thursday, we took all 40 of the group to New York City for a fun day of touring. We split into three groups and traveled throughout the city seeing whatever we wanted to. By God's grace, all of the groups stayed together well and had no problem meeting back at our rendevous point that evening. We all met at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater at 8:00 p.m. to watch Disney's Beauty and the Beast! It was fabulous! What a great ending to a wonderful day in the Big Apple.

On Friday, we went to the Atlantic City Rescue Mission to serve and sing for them. We spent the afternoon cleaning the entire mission, scrubbing walls, mopping, and sanatizing matresses. We also cooked supper for about 500 people and then served it to the people as they came in from off the streets. Then we had the most awesome chapel service that evening. The students sang, we shared testimonies and listend to some of the stories of the people there. I gave a gospel presentaion and afterwards, many of the students gathered around the people there and prayed for them. It was a great time of worship and ministry for us.

On Saturday, we went to Cezech Drug and Alcohol Rehab center. We spent the afternoon working on the grounds planting and potting flowers and other plants. I think we estimated that our group of 40 potted over 12,000 plants that day! Then we had another awesome service singing and ministering to the people there at the camp. The men and women in the program at Cezech were in tears as the students sang and prayed for them. The staff at the camp were very grateful for the student's hard work and awesome ministry.

Saturday night came quickly which meant the bus was back and we were loaded for our final 14 hour drive home. We arrived back in Holland about 10:00 a.m. Sunday morning, unloaded all the stuff and the kids and then went home and crashed!

I really enjoyed this trip and the students were such a blessing to me, Sarah, and Rennah. We love being able to take these kids out and let God work in and through them. Now, we are back to a somewhat normal life . . . it's Tulip Festival time here in Holland, which means lots of tourists and extra traffic around town. Tonight, we went and watched the dutch dancers. Tiffany and Melody are with us right now as the rest of my family are in London and on their way to visit in Dublin Ireland! Lucky them.

Now, I am preparing for my next trip in two weeks with the Singing Crusaders in Chicago. Life goes on . . . let us know how you all are. We love you!