Building Tomorrow's Church Conference, Arizona

Over Memorial Day weekend Paul and I took a group of college students to Arizona for the Building Tomorrow's Church Conference. It was the second year of the conference and we were greatly encouraged at the amount of college and young adults that came from all over the country. The conference was put on by our denomination (Reformed Baptist) to provide a time where we could meet other young Christians with a common theology, share what God is doing around the country in His church, and have a time of teaching on the importance of the local church and what that looks like and how that is practically applied in real life. We also had a lot of fun. We stayed at a camp in Prescott Arizona which had amazing food and facilities. We played volleyball and kickball and relaxed in the hot tub at night under the clear skies covered in stars.

Our group went a day early so we could go visit the Grand Canyon. It rained hard while we were driving to the canyon and we were all nervous that we would not be able to see anything when we got there. I decided to pray that if it was God's will, he could stop the rain, even for a little bit so we could all see his awesome creation. And he answered! As soon as we pulled in to the parking lot the rain stopped. We were still in a thick cloud and couldn't see anything. We sat down for a picnic lunch and slowly the clouds drifted away. It was almost like God was slowly unveiling the canyon. It was very dramatic as the clouds continued to disappear and you could see more and more and more until all of the canyon was in sight. When you see things like the Grand Canyon you realize how small you are and it's humbling...in a good way! God is so much bigger than us and his creativity is awesome.

We also had fun with the wildlife. They were not at all afraid of humans so we had fun feeding them Rice Crispy Treats. We saw a sign prohibiting this later, but we had fun in our ignorance. They were so cute!

Lauren Reader Graduates

On May 5th, Paul's sister Lauren Graduated for the University of South Carolina Upstate. We were all so proud. Can't you sense our excitement!

House Tour

The Slivka's Come To Visit

My Gandma and Grandpa Slivka came to visit this week. Right away they began helping us around the house. Grandma had sown me drapes for the family room and so Grandma and I spent a long time Monday shopping for drapery rods and Grandpa and Paul started making the built in book shelves for our family room. They also helped us work on the front yard, wash windows, and hang drapes in the dinning room. They wore Paul and I out! They were such a great example to us of hard workers. Paul and I want to be like them when we grow up... actually we would like to have their energy now! We also made Swedish coffee bread and watched movies. We had a very productive visit.

Ernie

Paul and I are fostering a dog named Ernie. He has been with us for two weeks now. I have been in denial so I haven't taken any pictures, but I don't think Paul is going to let him go. He is catching on to commands such as 'sit', 'off' 'down' and 'no'. He is 18 months old and a rescue dog. He is very emotionally needy and has to be right by your side. I have been taking him running everyday this week and it's been good for both of us. I'll keep you all updated on if it becomes official.

Smoker's Come to Town

Grandma and Grandpa Smoker from Wayne, PA came for a short visit this week. The four of us went out to dinner at Olive Garden on Tuesday night (I am currently hooked on their bread dipping sauce). Then the next day we showed them the church where Paul works and where we attend and they were greeted by the entire staff. They got the grand tour of Paul's office and the sanctuary. Then we took them to downtown Greenville. They were amazed at how beautiful the down town area was. It was a beautiful warm day and there was even lots of flowers in bloom (I still can't believe that its February!). We had a great time of fellowship with them and we love them so much! What a blessing it is to have Grandparents.

Growing Up

Sonja and I have really been enjoying our new house immensely. And its provided some incredible opportunities for fellowship and reaching out. We've both been thinking a lot about our need to be speaking about Jesus and the gospel with people around us, both to believers in fellowship and to lost people in love. God is good, and he's been answering our prayers.

Sunday night after church, we had to make a quick run by the grocery store for some essentials, and two Mormon elders approached us about coming to talk with us about the new "prophet", Joseph Smith, and his teachings. Sonja and I kinda smiled at each other, and quickly set up a time (Tuesday at 6:30) for them to come and talk with us about their prophet.

Since then, we've been excitedly (but a little nervously) awaiting the opportunity to sit down and discuss with them the teachings of their prophet and the teachings of our prophet, Jesus. God, however, had other plans.

Monday, Sonja and I had set up a burn pile in the back yard (who knew owning a house came with added benefits like an endless supply of leaves?), which we thoroughly enjoyed feeding our endless supply of leaves. Tuesday, at lunch, I came home to reignite the leafpile so Sonja could free our barren backyard from its enslavement to decaying, grass-killing leaves. After reigniting the leaves, the job of feeding the pile was quickly taken over by our neighbor and co-churchmember, Travis Simpson (otherwise known as "the verizon guy"). Travis and Jennifer Simpson, who live 4 doors down from us, are awesome, and have reached out to us and served us in many ways. Travis tended to the leaf pile for the rest of the afternoon while I was working and Sonja and I were running errands.

When we returned, we found a well stoked fire, as well as Travis and a random guy named Derek, warming themselves by the fire, discussing life, Scripture, and the difference between those who just think and those who act.

Travis had to go back home, but he introduced us to Derek, who he had just met, and Sonja and I jumped into fire tending and conversation and soon got to know Derek, who "randomly" happened to be going through our neighborhood selling magazine subscriptions. When he saw our fire, he was cold (yes, with wind, it is quite cold here), so he decided to warm up by the fire.

In God's providence, we got to hang out with Derek all evening, pray for him, play Halo 3 with him, feed him dinner, and ask him all kinds of questions about his soul. We got to talk about the fact that despite his half-hearted plea's of agnosticism, he truly does have an undeniable sense of God's existence and claim on him (yeah for Calvin's Institutes and all the people in the Institutes' discussion group- God used you to prep us for hanging with Derek), as well as about his life and his story (yeah Ryan Donnell, you prepped me for this with the Men's breakfast discussion). Though we said goodbye to Derek last night, we were able offer him real friendship backed up with tangeable love in the form of a solid meal, concerns about his future in this world and the next, and give him a bible and our contact information. The Mormons never showed up, (surprisingly), but God instead reserved our evening to have great conversation with Derek and to grow us in learning to talk with people about his Son and his plan to reconcile the world to himself.

God is good, and as you think of it, thank God for his sovereignty in random leaf piles, fires, neighbors, and magazine sales, and pray for Derek, that God would use his word and our conversation to bring transformation and resurrection to this man whom God loves. Pray also for us, that we would grow in boldness and pursuation. We are both weak here, but we desperatly need to grow.