A view of the mediterranean
James In Turkey - The Mediterranean from theadvance on Vimeo.
Read more...Turkey: Day #1 – Travelling
Well, my trip is finally here. I've kept a bit quiet on the blog over the last few weeks because life has been HECTIC getting ready for my trip to Turkey. It started yesterday technically and has just ended. In total, somewhere around 20-22 hours of travel to get from Ottawa to Antalya. So, let me fill you in on how it went. It started with a sorrow filled goodbye to Lindsey. We had our own Saint Patrick's Day lunch celebration at the Royal Oak before heading out to the airport. I got to the airport, said goodbye to Lindsey and was prepared for a great and extended time alone to think,...
Read more...Bibles, hymn books replace carnival masks
I saw this headline in the globe and mail's online edition and obviously I had to check it out. What an incredible story. Honestly, it stirred some intense emotion in me as I read the story. You can read it here. It's about how the people of Jacmel, instead of celebrating with carnivals are choosing to pray and worship God in the midst of terrible tragedy. They are committing to rebuilding a nation on the principles of justice instead of injustice, hope and peace instead of corruption and sorrow. Wow. What an incredible testimony to the strength of faith in believers in the midst...
Read more...No Mac Makes James’ Life Miserable.
So, for almost a week I was without my beautiful mac. It's logic board died and it had to go to the hospital for repairs. It was the beginning of a banner week for me. Not only did I not have my mac but I also stabbed myself in the arm. It's a long story, my arm is okay but one of those eye rolling weeks where you think about it and you can't believe all the things that could go so wrong actually went as wrong as they did.
Read more...Fuel Preview
So tonight is our junior high program called Fuel and I am really excited. We're doing something we haven't done in a while, we're using a pre-made curriculum package and so far it's been pretty good. It's called Get Your BUT Out Of The Way and it's from Simply Junior High. We did week one last week and the kids seemed to really enjoy it which is cool. They have handouts for students and we haven't really done that before but we tried it with this series and they really seemed to connect well to the handouts so we'll keep doing that for now. This week we're working through the excuse...
Read more...Learning To Let Go
From time to time we all come to a point where no matter how hard we try, no matter how convincing our arguments or how much time and energy we invest in something or someone, we have to let go. It's one of the worst parts of ministry, especially as it relates to people. The hardest thing to do is to watch as people you've poured into, you've watched grow up, you've seen experience God decide to walk into a giant cave of goo (that's a reference to my earlier post on Think Orange). I'm not sure how you deal with it, but for me, it means a time of mourning. Sometimes, I get really busy and I don't...
Read more...Superbowl XL…whatever
Well, the Superbowl is once again over and from now until the beginning of baseball the most important sport is hockey. Okay, I may be exaggerating, there's still basketball and I know a lot of people would choose it over hockey but I'm not one of them. Anyway, this year's superbowl was a lot of fun, we had a great time with our students at theadvance and I am looking forward to next year's big event. I'm thinking I want to have a chilli competition as part of the event. Where anyone who would like, makes their own chilli, we bring in a couple of judges and we give out a cool prize to the winner....
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