Happy New Year from Baton Rouge and Lutcher, LA

back to Our Walk of Faith

This was on Mike's shirt...How appropriate?!!











Oh it's been great to have Megan and Mike with us. We worked together most of the day on Friday. While we were at lunch, we told Pastor Rawls that we would probably be leaving Saturday morning. Of course, he didn't want us to leave, but he asked us to stop by and see a member of his church, Mrs. Clara, if we went to New Orleans. Chris & I just smiled at each other...we had been praying about whether or not we should go through New Orleans on the way to Baton Rouge or if you should just go straight to Baton Rouge. That appeared to be the answer. After lunch Megan and I helped to clean up. Then she vaccuumed the sanctuary while I finished up the posts. The guys went back over to John, DuJuan, Cole, & Chase's house to finish up the days work. So we went over to check out what the guys were doing...they worked the entire day getting the posts set up for the back porch. We wanted to admire their handiwork since they had been working so hard.

Friday night, we ate supper with two families who were down from Huntsville, Alabama. We ended up playing spoons and rummy with all of the kids (clockwise: Lindy, Mike, Taylor, Syndey, RE, Ben, Megan, and Eli...Dakota & Hannah joined us too!) until really late! It was tons of fun though!!

Saturday morning, Megan & I cooked breakfast with a lot of instruction from Ms. Juanita. (She lives at the church and oversees the groups who come in and out. She's part of the Missions Corp for Mississippi. We didn't meet her until Thursday because she was at home over the holidays.) All of the food was eaten, so I guess it was a success!! After breakfast, we were able to talk to Ms. Juanita a little more, and she expressed the same concerns that we heard from Pastor Rawls & Kenneth & Sheila. There is a great need for permanent-resident, Christian leadership. She has requested missionary "encouragers" to be planted by the North American Missions Board (of the Southern Baptist) in the community. Please pray that this request will come through...there is a great need for the Gospel in Pearlington!!

About mid-morning, Jay, Pam, Danielle, Sydney, & Ben came to get us to take us to the "Yellow House." It's this cute house we kept driving by and wondering about. Danielle wrote a narrative about the house for her English class. “Canada John" posted it on the Pearlington Blog, and the owner read it. He gave Danielle & her family permission to go in and take pictures. We went with them and were just amazed at what we saw. The owner moved to Dallas after the storm...he lost his wife 2-3 years ago, so he's trying to clean it out as he has time and energy. He's afraid that he won't see the completion of the project during his lifetime. It was a beautiful house...We were sobered by all that we saw there.

Saturday afternoon, we packed up everything and headed out towards New Orleans...we were able to make contact with Margie, who is Mrs. Clara's daughter. She was on her way over to the hospice hospital...her mother was recently moved there so that they could just make Mrs. Clara comfortable until it was her time to go home. She gave us directions, and we headed in that direction. We passed a Krispy Kreme on the way, so we stopped to get donuts for Margie (and a few for us). Margie had just arrived when we got there. We spent some time talking with her, and we all prayed over her mom.

By the time we left the hospital, it was raining pretty hard, but we decided to explore downtown New Orleans in search of authentic Cajun food. We finally settled on Jimmy Buffet's restaurant where we sampled the red beans & rice, gumbo, and jambalaya...along with a few cheeseburgers. It was all very tasty!! Then we began the rest of our journey to Baton Rouge. (Just in time because the entrance and exit ramps were beginning to flood to get on to I-10) We got off on exit 163, and there were 3 huge crosses...I took that as a good sign, but we realized that we were still pretty far from the airport. So we drove around for about 2 hours looking for another hotel. Baton Rouge may be the only town that doesn't have hotels near the airport. There was only one hotel...with that kind of monopoly, I don't have to tell you why we didn't opt for that hotel. So we ended up back at exit 163.

Mike & Megan gave us two additional nights in the hotel so that we could have a little time for just the two of us. (Thanks guys...you have no idea how timely that was.) They had to leave early on Sunday morning, so Chris & I stumbled out to see them off. We fell back asleep and didn't wake up until 10:20...both of us were in a rush...we just knew that we were going to miss church. We got ready as fast as we could and hurried out the door towards the 3 huge crosses. We figured that there must be a church close to them. As we walked we saw this huge lot of cars, so we were sure that they had already started...then we realized it was a car lot. Next we saw a construction sign & thought that the crosses must just be to let people know that the church was coming because we didn't see a building at all. Finally we realized that there seemed to be a lot of people dressed in Sunday clothes driving past us. All of them were turning just before the crosses, so we hurried up the road to see if we could find the church. We had probably walked 100 yds when this red 15 passenger van slowed down. The driver asked us if we were going to church. When we told him, "yes," he told us to climb on in.

His name is John Wahl and his wife Mary was at home with their youngest daughter, Rachel, because she was sick. However, 7 of their other children were in the van with their dad headed to church. They invited us to sit with them during the service. Oh, it was amazing...It was a huge church...I've never seen a church that diverse and de-segregated. It was amazing...That's what heaven is going to be like!!! Even the music was diverse...they sang popular praise songs from Israel and the New Breed and Matt Redman. We were in awe...When the preacher started preaching, we realized why...he just preached the Word...straight to the point...no holds barred. His message came from 1 Corinthians 2:14-3:3 about the Natural Man (who is without the saving knowledge of Jesus or the indwelling of the Holy Spirit), the Spiritual Man (who seeks to be lead by the Holy Spirit and to have the mind of Christ), and the Carnal Man (who tries to be a mix of the two...this person knows about Jesus and will probably go to Heaven, but he/she is miserable in this life). The pastor gave very specific examples of what each person looks like. He then tied it in to families and the important role of a godly father seeking the Lord and leading his family. He challenged each man to step up and lead his family as God intended in this new year, 2007.

After church, the Wahls (in the pyramid...bottom to top and left to right: Mary, Jennifer, Ben, John, Timmy, Deborah, Natalie, Rachel, Rebecca, & Jesse) invited us back to their house to fellowship with them. Daniel, the oldest, is working full-time and trying to finish his schooling for his pilot's liscense. Jennifer (right) is studying music ministry & Natalie (left) is learning to teach English as a foreign language at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, OK. They are home for Christmas, and they are trusting that God will provide the finances for them to return for the Spring semester. They shared that they know that God has not brought them this far just to leave them, so they are just trusting for His provision. Next is Benjamin who plays the guitar in a youth praise band. Deborah loves to read. Timothy's thing is playing Donkey Kong and riding his bike. Rebecca is really creative...she just made a "draft stopper" in the shape of her Aunt Liz's dog, Honz Solo. Jesse loves to run and to make "claymations." We were pretty shocked at all of the little figures that he made.. Rachel is the baby...she's five. After a little rest, she was up and playing with all of us.

You would think that a house full of kids would be loud, unruly, and messy, but it was just the opposite. They are all so polite and each had his/her own set of chores. Yet they are normal kids who like to run and around and have tons of fun. It was pretty cool to see! It's obvious that John & Mary are good parents who are following hard after the Lord. They shared with us that the Lord has called them to take a step of faith. John has a good job with the IRS, but they feel God leading them to do something else. Neither of them know what that "something else" is right now, but they know that they must be obedient. So this coming Friday will be John's last day of work. God's timing in bringing us together is pretty incredible, wouldn't you say?!!

Sunday evening, we got to experience the Festival of Bonfires. The Wahls live right on the Mississippi River in a little town, Lutcher, between New Orleans & Baton Rouge. The levee is right in front of their house and that's where everyone builds bonfires. Normally it takes place on Christmas Eve, but it was rescheduled this year because of bad weather. Some of the bonfires were 20 feet high and filled with firecrackers. You can buy all kinds of fireworks that shoot high into the sky, so there were tons of fireworks everywhere!! We had tons of fun seeing all of the celebration!!
When we got back to the house we had potato soup and we chatted with John & Mary. They shared their testimonies and about their lives together. What a great family!! I got tons of new recipes from them! John even made his own tried & true recipe for beignets...so tasty! They are kinda like home-made donuts.
As the New Year was coming in, we all sat together in the living room. Rachel was asleep, but from Jesse all the way up, the kids & the adults all prayed. The Wahls have done a great job teaching their kids and training them up in the Word. Then we sang several praise songs while Jennifer played...she even sang a praise song that she wrote...it was great!! I can't think of a better way to bring in the New Year!!

On Monday, Chris and I tried to rest up...he's almost well, but it appears that I have whatever he had. Please pray for quick healing. We wrote and watched some football games. Monday night, John called to see if we wanted to come over on Tuesday to help with his brother, Gary's house. We were pretty excited to spend some more time with the Wahl family.

Tuesday, I felt worse, so I went over to Liz's (John's sister) house and spent some time with Liz and her daughter, Joya. They are really sweet too! They both love the Lord so much, so we chatted about what God has been teaching them--the Father-Daughter relationship is so important. Both Liz and Joya were reading a book about that. Liz has a heart for working with teenage girls, so I shared some good book titles with her. This Friday night, she will be talking to the teenage girls at their youth group...please pray for wisdom and words from the Holy Spirit as she shares with them. After we chatted for awhile, I ended up sleeping some more...just trusting God for healing!!
While I was over there, Chris was painting and working on Gary's house with a bunch of the cousins--Jennifer, Daniel, Gary Jr., Justin, Sarah, and Joya--Mr. Wahl (John's dad), and Gary. Gary and his boys, Gary Jr. and Justin are hoping to move in pretty soon. Sonny, Sarah's dad, lives between Gary's new house and Liz's house. John & Mary live just a couple of miles away. All the cousins are going to have tons of fun when everyone is living so close together!!
We spent the night Tuesday and Wednesday with John & Mary's family. I'm feeling some what better today...we are having tons of fun playing with the kids!!!
God bless you and keep you! Happy 2007! May God protect you, and may you follow hard after Him all year long!!






A few more pictures: 1) Jay & Sydney playing around. 2) Mike served up ice cream for sundaes...a big hit with everyone! 3) Deborah rolled out the tortillas 4)while Natalie cooked them. 5) John's mom, Jean with Rachel 6) How many Wahls can fit under the desk?