Time to Finish Strong!

Another week is coming to a close. This week, we have been in Petersburg, which is definitely the prettiest place we have been. We have been doing VBS at FBC Petersburg all week, and it went quite well. I got to teach 5 & 6 graders, Turner did her thing with the Crafts, Jake taught the younger kids, and Aaron did Recreation. Turner and I stayed with a young couple, Jim and Louise, and their two kids, Henry and Wyatt. We were pretty excited to get to stay with some young folks...not that staying with older people is bad...it's just nice to have some variety. So back to VBS...it was great. We only had about 12 kids total all week, but it's not always about the numbers! We started at 9 in the morning and did the whole schedule like we usually do. Me and my host mom did Bible Study together and I got the distinguished role of dressing up as Simon Peter the whole week and telling the Bible story. By the end of the week, I had a nice Crayola Marker Beard going on. I think I can now say I have done almost everything there is to do in ministry. Anyway, my favorite day of most weeks is Wednesday, because it's the day we get to share the plan of salvation. So this past Wednesday, (minus the Peter getup, because I wanted to actually be taken seriously), I got to do just that. One of the guys was really curious and asked tons of questions after I had told them the story of Jesus. That in itself was pretty exciting to me. I also found out that he didn't really go to church, so it really seemed like this was the first time he had heard much at all about Jesus. After Bible study I pulled Aaron aside and asked him to talk to this guy, because I felt like he would have rather talked to another male. So Aaron got to talk to him for a while after VBS was over that day, and lo and behold, the boy asked Jesus into his life! That was so exciting! It is always a priviledge to get to see someone come to know Jesus as their Savior. I am so excited that God has given us that priviledge several times this summer. Another one of my favorite moments of the week was on Saturday with the pastor and his wife. They are both around 78, but you wouldn't know it by the way they act. The pastor went out to recreation everyday and played harder than the kids. Anyway, they fed us lunch everyday, and after we ate Saturday, the pastor wanted us to have a prayer time. He told us that we could pray however we wanted to...if we wanted to all pray out loud at the same time, we could, if we wanted to pray several times we could...whatever God led us to do. He asked us all about specific things that we wanted to be prayed for and we all gave him our special requests. We then got to praying, and it was one of the most God-filled times of prayer that I've ever been in. We just prayed what was on our hearts and praised God.

A really awesome thing that we got to do this week was go out on a boat tour to a glacier. The people that Jake and Aaron were staying with run the buisiness and usually charge $300 for one of these tours. They were nice enough to do it for us for free! So we went out on this boat and glided through bright blue icebergs that were 3 times as big as the boat. We actually had to go through a lot of the really small ones and other little chunks of ice. We got really close to the glacier too. It was absolutely the most gorgeous thing I've ever seen. I hate that I can't describe it better, but here are a few pictures.

So Saturday night, well more like early Sunday morning, we got on our last ferry ride of the summer. We headed back to Juneau and got back at 8pm tonight (Sunday). We are doing VBS this week at Glacier Valley Baptist Church. We are all 4 staying together at a woman's house, well more like MANSION! This house is awesome. I feel like I am cheating by getting to stay here. Turner and I have a king size bed, our own bathroom with a jacuzzi style bathtub, and a shower so massive I could practically run laps in it. There's also a pool table and a fooseball table. It's ridiculous. We are very, very thankful for it.

We will be staying at this church for our last 2 weeks. We aren't sure what's going on the 2nd week though. It's so strange to think that this is almost over. It's very bittersweet. I miss so much from home, but I'm going to miss Alaska and my teammates so much when I'm gone. It doesn't even seem like it has been that long. All I know is that God has richly blessed our time here and has turned our meager service into much, much more. I know that what has happened this summer is so much bigger than me, and that God has worked so many miracles. I feel honored that he let me be a part of this.

I thank you for the prayers that I know are still going up. Please continue to pray for:
-VBS at Glacier Valley Baptist Church
-Energy, endurance, patience
-Finishing strong!
-That all of my fellow missionaries will finish their missions strong and will have safe travels back home.
-VBS at my home church this week.