Praise the Lord.

We are praising our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Ellen's surgery went very well and the prognosis is very positive.  She is home recuperating and feels pretty good.   We are still awaiting the results of a couple of tests which will determine any future treatment.

Dayle will be going to be with her on September 16th through the 28th.  She will fly out of Sacramento on the 16th and return to Seattle on the 28th.  I will leave Sacramento on the 16th and return to Fir Point Bible Camp for a few days before going up to Port Angeles.  On the 23rd of September I will be preaching at Wishkah Valley Community Church in Aberdeen, Washington.

Please continue to pray for my sister-in-law and her recovery and for the cancer to be GONE!

Urgent Prayer Request

My dear sister-in-law, Ellen Parker, just found out that she has an aggressive type of breast cancer.  She goes in Monday for a radical mastectomy.  We are very concerned that the cancer has spread to the lymphatic system.  We will know more on Monday.  Please pray right now and often!

Camp is Finished

Teaching the 5th and 6th Graders about "Real Faith"

We just finished the last camp which was the 3rd and 4th graders.  The previous week was the 5th and 6th grade camp.  The requested speaker  was unable to make it so I was asked to be the speaker.  I was already scheduled for the 3rd and 4th grade camp, so I used the same material.  My theme was "real faith."  I taught the children what real faith is and how it shows in the life of a believer.  We had our two grandsons, AJ and Andy, with us at camp.  Andy got sick almost immediately upon arrival and went home with the stomach flu.  He returned the next day feeling great.  Then Dayle and I both came down with the stomach flu. This was the first time in our 41 years that we have both been sick at the same time.  We were both miserable and we couldn't even pamper each other.  I asked Dayle to rub my head due to a terrible headache and she said, "No. Will you rub mine?"  As miserable as we were for those 24 hours it was very funny.  We even like being sick together...go figure!

The weekend between the two camps was Fir Point's Bible Camp's Family Camp.  There were 40 families for a total of about 200 people.  The speaker was a Pastor friend from Grants Pass, and Jeff Moritz, the camp administrator, was going to lead the music for the four sessions at family camp.  But the day before camp started he got attacked by wasps and got stung in the eye.  His eye swelled shut and was not able to lead the music.  So he asked me if I would fill in for him.  Of course I said that I would.  It was really good to be able to lead the music and the people really seemed to enjoy it.

Leading music at Family Camp

Even though I have been preparing lessons for the kids we both have continued to do lots of work around here.  We continue to clean, repair and organize.  I have used my welding skills to make a ladder hanger to hang the extension ladders on the side of the shop building.  I used my electrical and woodworking skills to make a post lamp over the outdoor campfire stage.  We just had a huge yard sale and a lot of stuff was sold and even given away.  The camp is almost empty of excess stuff.  I made two trips to the thrift store and another trip to the dump.  There is actually room now for the stuff they need to keep in storage.  This next week we plan to finish cleaning out and organizing the maintenance shop.  This should take one to two full days.

As I write this entry we are in Orting, Washington (Sunday 8/5).  I preached in both the morning and evening services at Faith bible Church.  It was good to be back in the pulpit.  We are staying with our NICE mission directors, Bob and Katherine Rodgers, and it was good to be able to spend some time with them.

We plan on leaving Fir Point on or about the 13th of August and will head south to my sister's house for 2 to 3 weeks.  We will help her with a huge yard sale.  While there we will go over to Lake Havasu City and visit our supporting church and see some good friends.  We need to be in Port Angeles with Jason and Shelli to watch the kids for a few days while they fly to the New York for Shelli's brother's wedding.

We are still awaiting for an assignment from the mission.  Bob may have a church for us in Idaho, so we are looking forward to that possibility. It the mean time we will continue to serve at every opportunity.