Well, that was a little crazy. 🙂
My awesome friend Chris decided to come with me out to the East coast to help me with my shows on the weekend, and also so we could hang out – we don’t get to do that much since she’s from North Dakota. Yes, that’s what I said. ND.
So, on Wednesday, Chris drove 2 hours to Grand Forks, flew to Minneapolis, then flew to Columbus, and got to my house at 11:30pm. Then we got up at 5, flew to Baltimore, then flew to Providence, RI, rented a car, and drove 2.5 hours to Cape Cod, MA, dropped off our stuff, and went to sound check for a concert. We were a little tired. 🙂
Had a really fun time with the people at Cape Cod Covenant, although we couldn’t see anything because it was dark by the time we got there, and when it’s dark on Cape Cod, it’s really dark! But we met some great people, and they just made us feel at home. After the show, we got to hang out and eat pizza with some folks from the church, and the next morning our great host Steve (thanks Steve and Betsy!) gave us a whirlwind tour of Cape Cod, but alas, in the rain. My favorite was probably the old ship’s captain house with the garden gate made from a whale jawbone – now that is cool.
Chris and I headed out then to drive up to Pilgrim Pines Conference Center in New Hampshire. Beautiful drive! Why does the rain always clear up when you’re NOT sightseeing? Got up there late afternoon just in time to, you guessed it, drop off our stuff and go sound check. Then we headed to dinner and I gave a concert that night.
The weekend was really fun, and a little bit of a departure for me. I do a lot of women’s retreats, but this was a mother/daughter retreat for several churches combined, and it was so neat to see the moms and daughters interacting. Made me miss my kids even more than usual!
The retreat was on the theme of “The Amazing Race”. On Saturday I gave two talks. The first was on our need for Christ (signing up for the race) and the second was on the ways God trains us to run with him. In between, Chris and I took a much needed break, I studied, and we enjoyed the gorgeous view.
Sunday morning we had worship and I gave the last talk – running for victory, as Paul says in Hebrews, “Let us throw off everything that hinders, and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus.”
I really love how a retreat gives you the luxury of time with people. We really bonded with several of the girls and moms – it was so fun.
After lunch we headed back out for Springfield, MA, to Evangelical Covenant Church and pulled in, you guessed it, in time to sound check. This church was just an awesome host church – their people were wonderful, and made us feel at home right away! Loved the people, loved the food, loved the acoustics, loved the building, would love to come back! That about sums it up. 🙂
Then on to a beautiful host home (a fact we couldn’t really appreciate until the morning because it was dark) with a wonderful woman named Pam. Pam, we loved being with you! Thanks for your hospitality.
Then up early, drive two more hours to Providence, fly to Baltimore, fly to Columbus, then get up the next day to take poor Chris back to the airport so she could fly to Minneapolis and then to Grand Forks and then drive home. Are you tired yet? That Chris is a trooper!
All in all, we were exhausted, but it was such a great weekend, and we really felt like God did great things through the ministry. I was feeling so thankful to Him, which was good since we were heading into Thanksgiving. 🙂
