Church Campout

July 20-22, 2007

We ended up having 2 church campout's on our property at Westbridge BC. This first one on July 21 was the official one, and was quickly planned to fit into our summer before Campmeeting and the rental of the cabin in August.

We had a nice group, some from Kelowna, and others from the local area.


Sabbath Lunch..........
The food was great,
and way more then we needed!!


Campfire Time!!!!!!!!!
Hot Dogs
marshmallows
Popcorn
Fruit
Cake
what more could we want?


Grandma wasn't about to cross that bridge!
Visitors from Malaysia.



August 17-19
The second Campout!

The beauty & serenity of the falls is so refresshing...
Al & Laura Pauls... "forever friends"




Campfire Time Again!!!

Food, Fellowship,
and ....




A Lesson from Nature

“Go to the Ant”

After the veggie dogs and marshmallows were roasted, and enjoyed, we settled down to close the Sabbath with a worship story. It turned out to be a tearjerker, which touched every heart present. After the story we spent some time sharing personal views, and reflecting on life. As we lingered enjoying the warmth of the fire and the friendships, someone pulled another big log onto the fire. Soon we noticed that there must have been an ant’s nest in the log, and the big black ants were coming out of the log, and running furiously in many directions.

I want to share with you some of the lessons we learned that evening.

1. We can be going about our own business, taking care of our homes and families, and doing our share of the workload, just like the ants of this colony, but suddenly our world can get thrown into the fire. The fire that comes our way can be sickness, financial devastation; temptation that we succumb to, breakdown of a relationship, spiritual degeneration, or in the near future the fire may actually be persecution.

2. The ants realized that something was wrong, their world was on fire, they came running out of the log, but there was no organized escape plan. They were running in every direction, some going one-way, and others going the other way. We could see some of them were carrying their larvae (or babies) and trying to escape, but there was no place for them to go, there was fire on every side. How are we going to do when we get thrown into the fire? As a church are we going to be running in all directions, or do we have a plan that has been carefully laid out? Are we as individuals spending time every day preparing our hearts, attitudes, and lives for that time of fire that is coming to us?

3. We started feeling sorry for them so we found a stick and placed it from the burning log to the ground outside the fire pit. Then we started to watch what they would do. There we stood, cheering for the ants. As one would get close to the stick we would get excited, and call out, there it is can’t you see the bridge we made for you? Go, Go, there it is, a way of escape for you! One person asked: “I wonder if this is how the angels watch us as we run around down here? Do they watch us from heaven, knowing that Jesus came as our way of escape, but somehow humans just don’t get it?

4. As we watched it seemed like they didn’t see the bridge we had made for them, or if they did, they didn’t realize that it was a way of escape, and they were running around trying to find a safe way out of this dilemma on their own. How like humans!! Jesus is our bridge, he provided us a way of escape, but we have to accept that gift, and we have to by faith take that bridge, it may mean giving up a cherished habit, or the acceptance of family and friends, or even giving up a job because it conflicts with obeying God’s laws, or God’s plans for our life.

5. Finally, one or two of the ants found the bridge, and to our delight they started to cross as we cheered them on!!!, But then to our disappointment they turned around, and headed back towards the fire. Some times humans find “Jesus the Bridge” and the angels in heaven rejoice! But then suddenly they head right back into the world, or into their old life style Just like the ants headed back towards the fire. Then we thought maybe these ones are going back to tell the rest that they found the way of escape, but as we watched, it didn’t appear that anyone was going to follow them, there was no great exodus down the stick to safety. This is the way it is with humans. Someone finds the bridge, they discover this is the way of escape, the way to safety, the way out of the fire that Satan wants to burn us up with. They get excited, and they go back to tell their friends, family, and community, but most people think they have gone crazy, or have become fanatical, so they don’t take the message seriously, they keep running in every direction, trying to find their own way of escape, and don’t follow the messenger to safety.

6. We kept watching, and shouting at the ants, there is a bridge; there is a bridge, why can’t you see it and escape? But they were still running around in circles on the log that was getting hotter and smokier by the second, many of them got to close to the edge in their search, lost their grip and fell right into the fire. Is heaven getting frustrated with us? They have provided the bridge, we have messengers trying to tell us about the bridge, who are willing to lead us across the bridge, but would we rather keep running around having fun, taking care of our own business, and searching for our own way of escape? Will we do this for so long that we too will loose our grip and fall away forever?

Looks like she had to many marshmallows!!

The Tree

A little excitement!! the morning of July 16 my aunt who lives in my moms house next door to us, came over and said that she noticed there was to much tree in front of her living room window. When she went outside she could hear cracking. So Hector went over to see what was happening, and he phoned me and said bring the camera. By the time I got the camera and rushed over there I got a couple pictures before the whole big branch came down, it was a good portion of the one side of the tree.



There it is, it came down on top of the Hazel Nut tree, causing it much damage and shock!!
It took Hector and his firend Ralph a long time to get that chopped up and trucked away.




Then on August 24, the City came and cleaned up the part that was hanging over the road in preparation for the "House Moving" event that will be taking place sometime in September.