Sunrise to Sunset

There was like 3 posts in like 3 days and I have not really felt inspired as of late.  We had so many group appointments about two weekends ago we wore ourselves out.  We had 4 appointments in 3 days.  It was good to get to meet close to 50 new people and share about our ministry.  One of the nights after sharing, we went out swing dancing on UCF's campus.  I wish I could post some pictures but we forgot the camera probably because it was spur of the moment.  

The Monday after that weekend, the 9th, we had planned

to have a beach day and a celebrate Valentine's Day dinner.  Amanda wanted to wake up for the sunrise and I agreed because we do not always have the opportunity to do stuff like that even though I am more of a sunset kind of guy myself.  I felt sick when I woke

 up, but thought that it was just because I did not get enough sleep, I get sick to my stomach when that happens sometimes.  Little did I know it was the start of the plague.  I ended up throwing up on myself at the beach as I was trying to move the car.  I really did not know it was coming, it was kind of like a sneeze, and spending a lot of time in the beach bathroom.  I did get to see the sunrise in all its glory and spend sometime sleeping off my sickness on the beach. All in all that day I slept close to 7 hours from my original waking time and we had to cut our beach time short.

Amanda got sick the next day when I was feeling better and she recovered on about Thursday.  In the middle of the week we had 

a few appointments to share about our ministry cancel on us for various reasons, which was discouraging because it happened like 3 nights in a row, but it was okay because Amanda was sick anyway and it probably would not have gone well.  

Friday the 13th, we decided to reschedule our Valentine's dinner.  It was awesome to get to connect with the woman of my dreams and get to go on a special date with her watching the sunset and going off to dinner both on Clearwater Beach after we had transitioned to Tampa from Orlando on Thursday for a few weeks.  We felt like we were missing each other on a few different levels so it was really good to get to pursue her heart and her acknowledge mine.

Thanks for your prayers everyone, we have been meeting new people to share about our ministry and continue to pray for our time in Tampa.  Pray that people we are meeting with would make time in their busy schedule to hear about how God is moving in Salerno, Italy and how the we plan to share the gospel of Jesus Christ allowing it to take root in Italians' lives.

Bible in a Year=God's sovereignty

First let me say please read previous blog because we have done two in two days and my wife did the previous one and she is trying to do more so I do not want to knock her post down a notch with this one today.

You guys must be like whoa what the heck happened, 3 posts in a few days, but I felt inspired so I thought I would go for it.  I am not a native blogger, so when I feel like it I need to go for it because who knows when it will happen again.  

I am reading the Bible in a year.  The book I am reading is online called The One Year Bible.  You can click on previous link to read what I am talking about for February 2nd.  Do check it out one the actual website because you can start now too and just finish next February 2nd.  

The Old Testament reading for yesterday was about Moses escaping with the people to Israel and God parting the Red Sea and all of Pharaoh's men getting drowned when the waters fell on them.  I know that this story is always used to share about what is going on in their lives and how the Lord is using them or taking them through the wilderness, so I am weary about using it here, but it does match especially since (I looked ahead in the Bible in a year) and Joshua starts in April.  We hope to leave for Italy in May so it might fit for future bloggings.  Anyway, we feel in a lot of ways God has kind of led us out of Egypt which was our old way of life, working in our jobs and living in our apartment, thinking we would be done with support raising in January.  We are now in this February season at around 75% of our support, 

and not knowing where the rest is going to come, feel like we are in the wilderness explained in today's reading. I have compared and contrasted some points.

It took the people of Israel 3 days and it probably took us 3 months to start feeling hopeless, but eventually it will take us right around a year to be in our "support wilderness" but it took them 40 years :)  

The Lord gave them Manna everyday and I feel like in this season we get manna by taking everyday at a time.  

The Lord currently is preparing us for ministry and those 40 years prepared the Israelites for the promise land because they were not ready.

The people of Israel really felt like they were going nowhere and some days we feel exactly like that complaining and grumbling.  

In leading Amanda and I, I feel like Mr. Inadequacy himself, Moses, but I know he has called me to be a Joshua and enter the promise land eventually!

Pic on right is people gathering Manna.

On a lighter note, I went to my first Orlando Magic game of this great season that they are having and last game for a long time this past Thursday.  We are probably start doing "last times for a long time" for a lot of things that we enjoy doing that we cant do in Italy as it gets closer to us leaving.  I have been a huge fan for a while and found a good deal on a great game against LeBron James and the Cavs and the Magic pulled it out in the end!

Fun around town

I just wanted to post a few pictures of some of the fun things that we've been going recently.  This season of support raising has allowed more free time than we've had in awhile so we're trying to take advantage of the time when we have it.  We know that it's only a matter of time before things get crazy again.  

We went out to a 

local piano bar

 with some friends from church.  Here's a picture of us with Ryan and Sherry (they are the couple that we live with when we're in Orlando).  

We realized the other day that we didn't have any

 pictures of the four of us, so now we have at least one!

Rodney also took me out on a fun afternoon date.  We starting by having a little picnic at a park that I like.  The park has a big open field, but it also has this pretty fountain.  

After the park, we went to the humane society to play with some cats.  One of the hard parts of our support raising has been that we gave up our cat.  Jeremiah now lives with my sister.  He seems to actually like her more than us, but we still miss him :(  The first picture is Jeremiah, he's "studying" with my sister as you can see.  The next picture is the gigantic cat at the humane society who wanted me to pet his belly forever.