Pell City Newsletter

Dear friends and family,

                Well, the summit is over, and I think I speak for everyone when I say that we truly don’t want to leave. This summit is our first full summit after our 2-3 week break in Florida/Alabama and it has felt very fast and yet very slow at the same time. We saw some of the biggest confessions and changed lives in this church so far this year, and I’ve been very excited to write this newsletter to tell you all about Eden Westside.

The Church

This church has been praying for the summit for a long time and even went through the Daniel Fast in preparation for the summit. They have a great outreach ministry in the community with their Revelation walk and they are really seeking after God to find out what His will for their church is. They had some incredible stories about how God had provided the land for their church, and how He had provided far more than what they needed and how they have gotten to us it for His glory. Pastor Jackie passionately leads the church and is really excited to see how this summit will affect them in the long run. The testimonies here were some of the most amazing out of the year. One lady’s testimony was truly amazing. For the majority of her life, she had lived a lie. She was very good at imitation, the point that she was able to forge two diplomas from universities that she had never gone to. And so with those two diplomas, she lived her life just as regularly as everyone else. She got jobs with those diplomas, got married, and continued to live her life, even up into the summit. But during the summit, God really began to grip her heart and show her the sin in her life, and that she needed to confess it. So on the final Sunday morning, after she had confessed to her husband, in a spirit of brokenness she got up in front of the entire church to confess the lie that she had been living for almost all of her life! This is just one of the awesome stories we have had from the summit.

The Ministry

For whatever reason, I have seen team members get into the lives of the church members more at this summit than any summit prior to this, and that in of itself has been really cool to see. We have also been invited over to more family’s houses so we have been able to get into their lives as well. This summit I got to stay with Clint Smith, the drummer on our team, and almost every night, we had some kind of deep discussion about life, the Bible, or some kind of controversial topic (LOVED it!) One of the greatest things about this summit by far was our amazing host people Barbara and Warren Lovvorn (yes, it is fun to say.) They were such a blessing to us from the first night and God really did a work in their lives that is unbelievable to see. The stories in this church were great as team members got to get into the lives of their host families (including two guys who were there when their host dad got engaged to his girl friend!)

The Team

Like I said in the previous paragraph, the team really reached out to impact the church members in a way that I had never seen before. Some of the band members really reached out to a man named Thomas who the drummer at the church, and really poured time and effort into spending time with him. The team got a chance to come over to my host home and have a night of games and then the next week we got to shopping as a team. (Note to self: shopping with girls is vicious. I repeat, VICIOUS!) Add in an afternoon of bowling and that’s just a few things that the team got to do while in Pell City. One of the biggest things that happened to our team though was on one of the mornings of the first week. There is a huge hill behind the church that we were at, and Jeremiah (our team revivalist) told the team that he wanted us to climb up the mountain. There were many different roads that we could have taken up the mountain and we were supposed to decide what road we should take. I’ll tell you more about what I learned in a little bit, but it was the coolest sight to see my team walking up the mountain in different patterns and paths.

 My Life

Life has been good, and I am blessed. God cares enough for me to bring me down notches to show me where I am compared to him. While on the mountain, God showed me about peace. In the last month, things have come up that have really rocked my peace, and given way to a lot of doubts and concerns in my life. (Also known as worry). As I walked up the mountain, I was looking for paths which characterized my life, and I decided to take a path through the trees. I had worn sandals that day, and as I walked up through the woods, the ground kept crumbling under my feet and I soon realized it probably wasn’t the best idea. But after I finally made it up, I looked back and started to see that if I had had the right footwear; it would have been much easier. Just like in life, we have footwear that we can choose to wear or not wear. It’s one of the least famous parts of the Armor of God, feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. As I looked at the hill, I started to realize that it characterizes my life in that, trials will come, whether I like it or not. However, if I have the right “footwear” or peace in those trials, it makes for a much easier job than if I worry. (This is the clearest way I can try to explain what God taught me. It’s kinda hard, and it makes sense in my head, hopefully it does for you too)

Well, we only have 4 meetings left. It’s so hard to believe that we are coming to the end, but I am already looking forward to telling you all about the next summit!

In Christ,

                Josh