During supper the other night Ellie wanted to know what the little red bottle was. I told her that it is tabasco sauce and Ellie immediately wanted some.
I put one little drop on the edge of my plate and told Ellie to put her finger in it, which she did. She liked it and three times came back for more..
..and then it hit her.
Dear Friends,
As we come to the close of 2007, we look back at a year that has “dripped with the Lord’s abundance.” Amongst the hundreds of answers to prayer, we want to highlight just a few:
#1: We have experienced the Lord’s guidance and direction as we have sought His wisdom regarding our future in ministry.
#58: We are thankful for the friends and church families the Lord has provided for us. What an encouragement you all have been!
#89: Churches and individuals continue to stand behind us in prayer, financial support and through many acts of encouragement.
#125: Provision of free transportation of all our worldly goods across the country. Thank you, Bruce!
#128: Our move from Owen Sound to Olds went very smoothly. Everything made it in good shape and we had lots of help with loading and unloading the truck.
#130: Provision of a place to store all those worldly possessions at no cost until we find a place to rent.
#132: Provision of temporary housing with Naomi’s parents until we can find a place to rent in the New Year.
#141: The girls made the transition to their new home quite smoothly and happily. They are enjoying more time with Grandma and Papa.
#153: A good time of teaching and encouragement at a recent GoodSeed staff conference. We also enjoyed connecting with our coworkers from other parts of Canada and the United States.
#179: We can see the availability of housing increasing. Already, we’ve had a number of offers for a place to rent.
#306: Opportunities to share our ministry with others continue to pop up. This month we were able to share with First Baptist Church in Olds and New Sweden Mission Church in Wetaskiwin.
One in Sixty Update:
We are encouraged in GoodSeed to seek out sixty partners in ministry. These partners are not just financial supporters, but those who will faithfully pray for us and seek to assist us in many other practical ways. The Lord has provided for us 31 partners in ministry. This includes individuals from across North America and a number of churches. We’re so thankful for this team of men and women who have chosen to stand behind us and enable us to “do the work of the ministry.” If you would like more information on how you can join our team, please contact us or the GoodSeed office.
Prayer Requests:
We’d appreciate your prayers in the following areas:
Ellie is now an energetic, 2½ year-old chatterbox. In true western fashion, she loves tractors, trains, airplanes and animals of all kinds. She can’t wait for more snow to come and loves her time spent outdoors playing in it. She has a strong will, but also a sweet personality. It is a joy to watch her discover and grow. She is having to learn many lessons in sharing and playing with Adelaine, but for the most part, loves being a big sister.
Adelaine, 1 year old in December, is eager to be doing whatever Ellie is doing. She crawls with great gusto and, we’re sure, hopes to be walking soon in order to better keep up with her sister. She also has a sweet personality–very mild and laid back. She likes to be in the center of everything and isn’t shy about going to strangers. She loves to cuddle with whoever is willing to hold her.
We love our two girls dearly and pray they will grow up to love and follow Jesus.
Thanks for your interest in our ministry with GoodSeed
Troy & Naomi
This weekend we took the girls to see the Christmas parade in town. It was a nice, small town parade with lots of local people involved in the rides and contributing to the festive spirit. It was also the night for the lighting of the trees in the park downtown.
Santa made his customary appearance at the end of the parade, after which everyone was encouraged to head over to the Cow Palace for some free hotdogs, popcorn and entertainment.
While the Cow Palace is a great indoor venue located close to the route taken by the parade, the bovine odor inside was not conducive to making me hungry for the supplied hot dogs.. but I digress. Inside there was face painting, balloon animals and crafts for the kids. There was also some entertainment by a clown and some singing of children’s Christmas songs..
..none of which enthused Ellie with the Christmas spirit. That’s my girl! Bah humbug to the core.
Ellie’s friend Evan was there too and they had a great time with our glow sticks, which Joe and I were kind enough to share with the kids.
There was a very nice choral piece of Christmas music. Following that was a solo by a young fellow singing Felice Navidad.
Also for our entertainment, the Divine Dancers stopped by for a performance at the Cow Palace.
Joe didn’t know what to think of the Town Crier as he announced the grand finale..
.. which included a confetti cannon! Cannons are always good.
With that we headed home for more fun with the glow sticks..
which eventually made it into the bathtub! Glow sticks are cool.
All in all it was a fun night out with the family in the (mostly) fresh air.
I have started the training I require to get up to speed on the tools that I will be using in my ministry at GoodSeed. We have a subscription to an online training video site (lynda.com) which covers a wide variety of software programs. Here is a list of the courses I plan to watch:
| Hours | |
| Photoshop | |
| No Pixels Harmed | 1 |
| Photoshop CS3 One-on-One: The Essentials | 8.75 |
| Photoshop CS3 One-on-One: Beyond the Basics | 10.75 |
| Photoshop CS3 One-on-One: Advanced Techniques | 9.5 |
| Photoshop CS3 Extended for 3D + Video | 6.25 |
| Photoshop CS3 Channels and Masks: The Essentials | 12.5 |
| Photoshop CS3 for Photographers | 13.5 |
| Photoshop CS3 Creative Photographic Techniques | 11 |
| InDesign | |
| InDesign CS3 Essential Training | 9 |
| Illustrator | |
| Illustrator CS3 Essential Training | 13.5 |
| Final Cut Pro Video Editing | |
| Digital Video Principles | 2.5 |
| Final Cut Pro 6 Essential Effects | 9.25 |
| Final Cut Pro 6 New Features | 1.5 |
| Final Cut Pro 6 Essential Editing | 10.75 |
| Final Cut Pro Optimization and Troubleshooting | 2.25 |
| Aperture | |
| Aperture 1.1 Essential Training | 6.75 |
| Aperture 1.5 Beyond the Basics | 3.5 |
| Other | |
| Blue + Green Screen Production Principles | 0.25 |
| Digital Video Principles | 2.5 |
| Total Hours | 135 |
A grand total of 135 hours of watching video! There is over 73 hours of Photoshop stuff alone. If we assume three hours a day of this kind of video this will take me to the middle of March to complete, and this does not include other training on video and sound equipment. My mind is already starting to smoke..
These training videos are very good and I have already learned quite a bit. This morning I learned some neat tricks about changing colours. This is a picture I took on Grand Manan island last year and the result of some playing around with the colours. How many colour changes can you spot?
I haven’t even started to scratch the surface of what these programs are capable of, but I look forward to learning more and then using them in my ministry with GoodSeed.
Recently I came across an old email I had sent several years ago to a Christian college in Ontario. We had been invited to go to a youth event in Southern Ontario to set up a display, so we decided to take a couple students with us. The goal of the event was to share the Gospel with the youth in the town through a special drama presentation being performed by students and staff of that Bible college. We were pretty excited when we got there as there were over 300 teens in attendance and this looked like a great opportunity.
Unfortunately, the presentation of the Gospel in the drama was so muddled and messed up that anyone who was not already a believer must have been really confused. What was more disappointing was that the drama was written by the school’s president! This raised some serious concerns about the school.
On the way home I asked the students what they thought of it. I figured this would be a good opportunity for discussion. They also had noted the confused message that was presented in the drama and were upset over the lost opportunity to share the simple Gospel truth. I was so angry with the whole event that the next day I decided to send an email to the person at the school in charge of evangelism.
From me:
“I have a question.. What do you think is necessary for salvation?”
Response from the person in charge of evangelism at the school:
Interesting question to find in my email.
I think someone needs to be very human? and somewhat broken and humble because these are the things that God finds so attractive and the… one needs to pray and give up, that is, verbally in prayer, surrender to Jesus Christ, knowing that He died for all of our sins and that by surrendering our control of our life into His hands, we become changed, new and we become fully integrated into the family of God, that is, we become His children. This is what he wants, for us, to surrender to Him and be His children. This is salvation… This is what I believe and what my Bible tells me and I believe this with all my heart.
Huh? I can’t quite follow what he is trying to say.. What I had hoped for was something like how the Apostle Paul answered the same question in Acts 16:
Then he called for a light, ran in, and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. And he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” they said, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved“
What a contrast… Believe on the Lord (God) Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Promised Deliverer) and you will be saved, vs. the strange, vague response about submission and humility. That has to be one of the most confusing attempts to explain the simple truths of the Gospel.
Needless to say.. I’m not real impressed with that Bible school. When the answer to the most important question in the world is so messed up and confused, I can’t imagine what the rest of their teachings would be like.