A Necessary Church

Some of you know that the church I serve is seeking to become something kind of special. We want to structure the whole thing around making a huge, practical, recognizable difference in our community. Our goal is that several years down the road we want to hear people in our community saying, "We need that church in our community." We've started a new blog to keep folks in the loop about how we are progressing. Give it a look.

Kinda Scary

The Most Important Sermon I've Given at Lifepath

Really. Read a transcript. Listen to the audio.

Great Western Trek, Finale

After the beauty of Wyoming, we drove down through Idaho and into Utah. Near Salt Lake City at Antelope State Park we decided to visit the Salt Lake. There is only one word to describe it: ew. Do you see that brown film on the water? Those are salt flies. Millions and millions of salt flies. It was like something out of Dante. We stayed in a hotel that night to wash off the salt, sand, and ewwyness.

But Zion National Park in southern Utah was amazing. This is the view from our campsite.

There was a beautiful little creek just a few yards away from the campsite where the kids swam. Can you see those two little heads floating away? Click on the picture. There go my two sons.

It was all fun and games until their shoes floated away. After that there was a lot of shrieking.

We left Zion and drove through the canyons to Bryce. The hiking there was hard but rewarding. These geological features are called hoodoos.

Desert hiking isn't for wimps. We had to take lots of stops whenever we found some shade.

Allie admires the view. Maryallie looks uncomfortable. Can you see Jake hiding in the shadiest spot he can find?

But it was worth it.

Southern Utah is worth the trouble.

After the heat of Bryce we were surprised to discover the little oasis at Capitol Reef National Park. Lots of trees and deer. Allie's hurricane tarp has held up pretty well.

The campsite also had another little creek where there was much clowning about.

After all the desert hiking we were content to laze about for a couple days reading.....

....and roasting marshmallows!

Maryallie is something of a marshmallow gourmet.

The twins show their modeling skills.

We left Capitol Reef and were winding our way through the canyons on a two lane highway when a deer jumped out of the gully and creamed us. I never saw it until it was helicoptering off the grill. The front end was pretty torn up but still drivable. You can see the blood but if you look closely you can also see hair. No, I didn't go back to see if the deer was dead.

We made it to Dead Horse State Park where the views were stark but amazing.

Desert camping presents its own challenges. Dead Horse has some great covered campsites.

But we arrived in the middle of the day. It was too hot to do anything but sit in whatever shade we could find, read, and play with our army men.

As evening came on we felt more like getting out and seeing our surroundings.

The reason it looks so much like the Grand Canyon is that we're just up the Colorado River from it.

I love this picture. Nice job, Allie.

Keeping Dead Horse as our base camp we also visited Arches where we did more hiking.

Can you see Maryallie sitting at the base of the arch?

Kids love to climb.

Myown little flock of mountain goats.

Dead Horse is near Moab where we booked a raft ride down the Colorado River. The guide is telling us what to do if we fall out....

Maryallie and Hannah are ready to go.

Jake gets into the spirit of things.

Sam and I decided not to ride in the raft with the guide.

The kids took turns riding with me. Maryallie looks like she's concentrating.

Judith likes to be up front.

The view from the river.

Jake fell out of the raft early in the trip. After a moment of panic it turned out to be fun.

After a couple of hours of floating and paddling we stopped for lunch. The guides prepared sandwiches while we tried to find shade.

After lunch we had another hour on the river and then we beached the rafts and waited for the bus to take us back to Moab. One of the guides played with the kids. Judith is about to get dunked.

After the river ride we spent another night at Dead Horse. There are no showers so we spent the next day still covered in river silt. We drove the next day into Colorado where we stayed with our good friends Charis, Mike, Erin, and Anika. After a month of constant camping it was good to be indoors. We ate pizza, had adult conversation (yay!) and laughed alot. Mike and Charis are good company.

But I'm not sure our kids were a good influence.

After two days with Mike and Charis, we drove across the mountains to Denver to visit Allie's sister Amy, her husband Stephen, and many cousins. Unfortunately, we didn't get any pictures. The final two days we spent driving across Texas to get back to Houston.

After 5500 miles we looked a little ragged with our hurricane tarp, the front end of the minivan falling off and covered with the dust of seven states. But what a great trip!

Great Western Trek, Part 2

After leaving the Black Hills, we drove across Wyoming toward Cody. We stopped at the Devil's Tower for a picnic lunch. This is your cue to hum those five notes from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."

After nearly a week of camping it was time to wash clothes, buy supplies, and swim in a pool. While we were in Cody we visited the Buffalo Bill Museum. It's an amazing place and well worth the visit. The natural history portion of the museum kept us entertained for hours. Here we are out in front of the museum breaking several laws.

After one night in a hotel it was off to the Mother of All National Parks - Yellowstone. No, this is not Old Faithful. It was an overcast day and gray geyser steam against gray sky didn't make for good pictures. But here is a pic of another geyeser that shows up a little better.

Here we are waiting for Old Faithful to do its thing. See how bundled up everyone is? Hard for Texans to believe its July....

Goofing off around the campsite in Yellowstone. What would we do without brothers and sisters?

We spent a lot of time driving around Yellowstone, which is just enormous. We visited many geysers and other geological features, which were the original reason for creating the park, but honestly they didn't make for great photography. So here's a shot of us hiking in the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. Doesn't Judith look quite the explorer in her Hello Kitty backpack?

Looking over the edge of a waterfall in the canyon.

Stopped to rest along the trail. What a cool hat.

One of our favorite activities in the National Parks is to participate in the Junior Ranger programs. You pick up an activity sheet with all the required activities, follow the instructions, and then go talk to a Ranger. He looks over the work and then gives the child a handshake and a badge. Congratulations, Judith!

We eat a lot of picnics while camping. Here we are, still in Yellowstone, at Sheepeaters Hill.

After the picnic the kids climbed to the top. Can you see them up there? You might have to click on the picture.

Yellowstone was wonderful but crowded. The Grand Tetons just to the south were just as beautiful with far fewer people. This picture was taken on our hike near Two Oceans Lake during our first day in the Tetons. We're deep in bear country and it's early in the evening. We are completely alone. I think it was my favorite day of the entire trip. Walking through the alpine meadows while clapping and singing to scare off bears was fun.

And the views from the trail were stunning. Unlike other mountains in North America, the Tetons have no foothills. They just shoot straight up.

We spent the next few days taking lots of hikes. Usually we would walk up to a lake and have a picnic. I think I'm looking at a bird but I can't remember now what it was.

Summertime in the mountains. Yeah.

Lake Taggart. The kids had fun feeding the minnows. A chipmunk kept stealing our food.

Pretty Allie in her camping hat.

Skipping rocks at String Lake. At one of the lakes leeches attached themselves to several of the kids. Nature is fun!

Yellowstone was nice but I could live in the Tetons.

The Great Western Trek, Part 1

On July 6 we set off on our grand migration West for a month of camping with occasional whining. The kids were ready, wedged into the minivan with little tv monitors and a box of dvd's to keep them docile for the long voyage ahead.

The pop-up and the minivan were loaded with coolers of food and supplies as we head into the wilderness. Take a good look at them. They aren't going to look this good for very long.

We drove all the way into the middle of Oklahoma the first day. If you look closely you can see the suspcious look Sam is giving to the giant prairie dog.

When setting up or tearing down camp, everyone has a job to do. Mine is management.

It was a pleasant little place next to a lake. Who knew Oklahoma was so pretty?

And there really were prairie dogs. The really cool thing to me was that there were burrowing owls all over the the prairie dog town, but we didn't get any pictures of them.

We spent the next day driving all the way across Kansas. On the third day, while in western Nebraska, we had our first bit of drama. Allie looked in the rearview mirror and started making those noises that a chimp makes when he sees a lion. The laminate on the roof of the camper (which had been repaired from earlier trips) had come loose and was blowing like a sail. We stopped and began to make emergency repairs.

You have to keep a sense of humor, which is one of Allie's many talents.

It isn't pretty but it kept the roof on. I'm pretty sure that 90% of the world's problems can be fixed with duct tape.

Later that afternoon we rolled into Custer, South Dakota and the sky looked like this......

Pioneer Allie decided that we needed more emergency repairs to keep the roof from leaking and prematurely wrecking our vacation. So we pulled into a parking lot and bought a tarp. The camper now looks like any other Houston dwelling after going through Hurricane Ike.

To the kids it was all part of the fun. The good news is that Allie's repair job held up. We got both rain and hail but the tarp and duct tape kept us dry.

And the Black Hills were definitely worth seeing. Wow.

We took lots of hikes through the hills.

It looks a little like one of the scenes from the "Lord of the Rings" movies, doesn't it?

The weather was cool and the kids enjoyed the hikes in the Black Hills. Like my hat?

These things were all over the place.

They even stopped traffic a couple of times.

....which allowed us to get a very close look at them.

We'd seen pronghorns before but never so many or from so near.

We made the almost obligatory pilgrimage to Mount Rushmore. Jake wasn't impressed. After the Black Hills we made ready to travel across Wyoming and head to Yellowstone. I'll post those pictures soon.

Junior High Mission Trip

Last week nine kids and five adults went on the first annual Lifepath Junior High Mission Trip. We went to Waco, Texas and worked at Caritas of Waco as well as the Salvation Army. We spent our time in their warehouses sorting and processing things. It was hot work but the kids were troopers. We also worked in some fun things like a snowball fight and a trip to the Waco zoo. It was a great opportunity to begin building in them the value of serving others as well as a chance to form some great friendships. Plus, I now know how to play "Duck, Duck, Freak." The triplets and I also used the time to meet Jimmy Dorrell who runs Mission Waco and pastors The Church Under the Bridge. We had a nice lunch together at The World Cup Cafe which was created by Mission Waco. Jimmy shared with us some ideas about community development which will inform our Inside-Out concept. It was a fun trip!