July 2015

• July 2: We took a family trip to Six Flags. Awesome day! Sophie loves the rides just like Lacey. I tolerate them and enjoy the atmosphere.

• July 3: I had the privilege to hang out with the men of Riverside Church in Prattville and discuss some of the issues that Christians are currently facing. It was encouraging to see and hear Godly men sharing how we can appropriately deal with worldly issues in a loving, but convicting, Biblical way. Afterwards, I spent some time with one of my first mentors, Jason Mchenry. I met Jason when he was the student minister at Christ Community Church in Montgomery. He invited me to help out on Wednesday nights with the students doing silly games. I did not really like silly games or students, but I am so thankful that I listened to God and not my personal preferences because that was one of the best decisions that I made.

• July 5 - We spent some time with our mentors at Centerpoint Church in Prattville sharing our vision for Ecuador. Centerpoint is in the process of adding Missional communities as a small group. We became passionate about the nations through our time at Centerpoint. 

• July 7: We packed papa Frank’s truck and started our journey towards Indiana. 

• July 8: After stopping in Kentucky for a nature hike, we arrived at the OMS headquarters in Greenwood Indiana just in time for dinner and a chance to meet our team. My mom came with us to help Sophie get adjusted to the area while Lacey and I start our training tomorrow morning.

• July 10: LAMP language learning day: We spent the day learning how the LAMP method works. The method is to memorize 5 or 10 sentences that you would use in a conversation such as: “Hello, my name is Clint and my family moved here to learn the culture and language. Would you be interested in helping me? This is the only Spanish that I know.”

We will say sentences like these to around 40 to 60 people each day adding new words and sentences each day. Our goal is to build healthy relationships with the locals by learning from them. In order for this to work, we must truly love the people we are sharing with. We cannot treat this method or the people like a project, but rather we must truly love them and want to do life with them because we understand how much God loves us.

• July 11: We spent the morning intentionally praying and sharing with strangers at the local mall. We finished the evening off hanging out with my mother as we prepared to say good bye to her. Sophie did not enjoy saying good bye to her best friend.

• July 12: We went to 2 church services. The first one was a Pentecostal, and the second was a Burmese church that lasted for 3 hours. Then we had dinner with the rest of the CROSS cultural team and got to know them.

• July 18: Our first day off! We went to downtown Indianapolis for a paddle boat ride down the canal. Then we went to a water park for a swim.

• July 19: We visited North Point Church with our Mobilizer, Brent Morrell. Had lunch with some new friends from OMS.

• July 20 - 25: A lot of class work. It was a long exhausting week and Lacey and I are still battling colds.

Fears we all are dealing with before entering the field

• Friday, July 25: We went to a local minor league baseball game. Similar to a Biscuits game in Montgomery. We had a great time with about 100 others from OMS.We also got the rest of our shots today. Sophie had to get 2.

• Saturday, July 26: I went to a Nascar race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway with a good friend from our training. It was an amazing experience. We got to walk around the infield and meet the drivers. We also walked through the Museum. The race was great as well. Sophie and Lacey caught up on rest.

• Sunday, July 27: Sophie is not feeling well so we stayed in and watched Church of Highlands live on our computer.

• Tuesday, July 29: Went out to eat with some of our classmates to say farewell to one who is leaving Wednesday for the South Pacific.