He Leads Me Beside The Still Waters.....

From Day "1" of our sabbatical, we have purposed to be strategic about our time away. We are now moving into a time of reflecting and recharging our soul.

Reading Psalm 23:1-3 "The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul." As we think about this portion of scripture it talks about the still waters. What comes to mind is that the best way to see your reflection is to look into waters that are stilled. I think this talks to us about getting to quiet places, removing us from our every day hustle and bustle and taking the time to reflect. As we do so, the scripture says, "He restores our soul". What a great promise!

For those that attend Bend Christian Fellowship, we want to let you know that we won't be at the church campout this year. We wrestle with this decision because we love being with you but we also know that in order to have our soul restored, we need to be by the still waters. We will be praying that you have a great time as a church family and look forward to September when we are together again.

Love, Pastor Dave & Kimi

Reading the menu doesn't fill you up; eating the food does.

The refreshing of a soul sometimes takes time. Knowing what refreshes it and doing what refreshes are two different things. Kimi and I are in that process. We are so thankful to be able to have this time to remove the harness and stop the plowing for awhile. The every day tasks for pastoring carries some burdens that can wear on you at times. Being freed up from those have been a great blessing, but then we have to be disciplined enough to lay down by the still waters. Saying no thank you to people, stilling yourself down to be refreshed is harder than you think when you are use to plowing. To quote Wayne Cordeiro "Reading the menu doesn't fill you up; eating the food does." We are off to eat some solitary pie.

“Free at last; free at last; thank God Almighty we are free at last.”

The title of this blog is a quote by Martin Luther King and accurately states the truth whether we are enjoying the freedom as a country or our freedom in Christ. As we have returned from our travels in Israel and Greece we are so thankful to be back in the USA celebrating our freedom on the 4th of July. Whether we were in Crete seeing the fighter jets flying over daily bombing Libya, the riots in Athens, the shooting off of live rounds from tanks in the Golan Heights, crossing into Bethleham through Palestinean territory or seeing military on the roofs of Jerusalem or swarming the streets, it makes us very thankful for where we live. To them it is a way of life, to us, we are so far removed. But today, we want to say we are extremely thankful for the place that God has allowed us to live! It is our prayer that you enjoy your day with whoever you are with, very aware of the things that God has blessed you with. We are currently in California spending some time with family, again thankful for all the blessings we enjoy!

Why We Do.... What We Do....

As we celebrate our 22nd anniversary with you from Israel, we have titled this blog... "Why We Do, What We Do", because of the picture to the left. This picture was taken of a sign that hangs just outside the Church of the Annunication. A church in Nazareth that represents the place where the angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she was with child and that she would have a virgin birth, as it states in Isaiah. The Muslems have put this up and we think the sign speaks for itself.

Even tho we aren't there, we are celebrating our anniversary with you. That's what we are all about, the proclaimation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ! He IS the Way, the Truth and the Life! There are many detourants and obtacles to that message, but as you stand strong, we stand and celebrate with you! We wish we were there! We love our church family and are thankful for the call of God that put us in Bend, Oregon! Enjoy the tri-tip! We love you all!

Pastor Dave & Kimi

Thank You!!!

Wow! We started our tour two days ago and man have we traveled and been busy! From Jaffa to Caesarea where Cornelius and his household heard the Good News of the Gospel and the Lord opened the door for the Gentiles to be converted. Then to Megiddo, which is the site of Armageddon where "the game ends", that was amazing to see and as you look over the valley, you could see Nazareth, the Mt. of Transfiguration and also where Gideon fought the Mideonites. This land is power punched in every place you look there is a Biblical stories played out before our eyes! There have been so many places, we can't mention them all, but today we took a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee (see picture) and to our amazement, they played beautiful worship music that we sing in church as we crossed the sea. About 1/2 of the people on the tour seem to be Christians and it was a very moving experience. We saw sites like Tabgha, the site where Peter caught the fish with the coin in his mouth, and the other picture you can see Dave got one of those too! We visited the place where the Sermon on the Mount was and Caesarea Phillipi where Jesus told Peter, "I will build my church". We also traveled to Capernaum where 5 or 6 disciples were called and saw the house where Peter lived and Jesus did the miracle healing of the parapaligic. Days full of great Biblical sites, watching the Bible come alive is a trip of a lifetime!

On top of all of the Bibical sites, we traveled through the Golan Heights, from there you could see Lebanon and Syria, the place where the Yon Kipper war was fought. In fact, when we were traveling through you could see the Israeli army doing military exercises and you could see shooting from their tanks and watching them explode. Our tour guide, who is a reserve soldier explained the Israeli lifestyle as living with a gun in one hand and a shovel or agricultural tool in the other. Meaning, you could see military sites and neighborhoods right across the road. The average Israeli lives with that reality on a daily basis. It sounds like the days of Nehemiah

We want to take a moment to thank those from BCF and all of the others that have made this trip possible for us! This trip, in the first couple of days, has been more than we could have ever imagined, and we are reminded that it is because of all of your generosity to us that we are even able to see and take in all of these things. For that, we are forever grateful!

Thank you so much! Pastor Dave & Kimi

Jaffa

We have now been in Israel for a few days, we are staying in the Jaffa area which overlooks Tel Aviv on the Mediteranean coast. Jaffa is mentioned a handful of times in the Bible. In Acts 9 & 10, where Peter raised a woman from the dead named Tabitha and he also stayed with a tanner named Simon. This is where he had the vision of the sheet being lowered, which ultimately opened the door of the Gospel to the gentiles. In fact, as we were wandering around the old town of Jaffa, we came across a little house that is thought to be Simon the tanners house, which is the picture you see. As we looked over the ocean, we also realized this is the place that Jonah fled from God and was swallowed by the whale. Amazing! As you see the ocean, you can also imagine the log rafts that came into this area for the building of Solomon's temple. We find it exciting to imagine all of the things that took place in history in a place like this.

Our accomodations are at Beit Immanuel Hostel for a few days, which is a great place to rest and relax before we join up with a tour group in a few days. The hostel serves as a place of prayer and worship. It was so refreshing to go down to breakfast the first day and hear worship music coming out of the kitchen. We were invited to attend their Messianic Jewish service since we were here on the sabbath. The worship was so beautiful, all in Hebrew, but made us miss our BCF family all the more!

We have been wandering the streets during the day, stumbling upon little shops, flea markets and Biblical sites all around. It is very warm and muggy here so we are always drinking lot's of water and spend short shots of time outside for now.

Until next time, be blessed in every way!

Pastor Dave & Kimi

John's Cave

We will be traveling today back to Kos Island by ferry after finishing our time here on Patmos. The picture you see is in John's Cave. On Sunday morning, we were able to go back to John's cave for a church service with the Greek Orthodox Priests. We couldn't understand what they were singing, but it was beautiful as it echoed out from the cave. After their service, we were able to take communion together in the cave. We spent some time reflecting on what we were experiencing while we were there. We believe in time there will be other things revealed to us about what was imparted to us while being there.
We have so enjoyed our refuge and quiet place here on the Island of Patmos. It is slow season, so few travelers, at times we have felt we had the whole place to ourselves. We were upgraded to a nicer room, a really nice room. We found out today, that it is saved only for "special guests", which has confirmed once again that the Lord's favor is resting on us. Thank you Jesus for your continued goodness to us.

We love and miss you all! God Bless you TONS!!

Pastor Dave & Kimi

God IS Good To Me!

It's been about 5 days since our last blog. Since then, we were able to catch up on some much needed rest after traveling for so many days. We have heard from the locals that the weather actually changed the day we got here. We heard reports from a lady on the ferry that they had been sailing with 12 foot swells the week before. I (Dave) made a log in my journal that said, "perfect weather, great smells and beautiful song birds singing, God is good to me!". What a great way to rest.

Our game plan before going to Israel (where Harlee says, Jesus lived) :) has been to go to Greece and spend some days catching up on the time travel and acclimate to the area. We love visiting Biblical sites because of the sense of reality that comes to pass when you stand in the place of those well known Christians that have gone before us. That is what we are experiencing here on the Island of Patmos. Whether visiting with the locals and listening to their views of how majestic and divine this place seems to be even to the present day. Or sitting in the cave where tradition has it that John received the "Book of Revelation" it's hard to explain the experience. It just seems to be amazingly good. Our hotel manager, JoGina, says this Island is "Blessed". We can testify to that personally, she even upgraded our room to an upstairs room with a beautiful view of the pool and the Aegean Sea! Dave keeps saying.... "God is good to me"! Kimi says a BIG Amen!

Texas BBQ

We've begun our travels, in fact we are sitting in the Athens airport checking in with all of you! It's been a long time traveling since we left early Thursday AM and it's now early Sunday morning. In a few more hours we will to our first destination on a Greek Island called Kos where the Hypocratic Oath originated many years ago. We will be able to rest there a few days before we head to the island of Patmos.

On our travels, we had a layover in Texas and were able to go to dinner with Isaac and Kailey at Papa's Texas BBQ! We had such a great time with them. They look great! We even had a homestyle Texas breakfast at the Waffle House! :)

Much love to you all! Have a great service at Bend Christian Fellowship this Sunday! Our hearts are right there with you!

Pastor Dave & Kimi

In Search of a Solitary Place

As we ventured out for the first time during our season of rest, we went to Duncan Reservoir to find a solitary, quiet place. We were not disappointed, we hiked up a draw to find a beautiful view of natural beauty. As we took time to look close, the tiny things that God has made seem to become "big". We enjoyed, rest, reading, hiking and even some fishing.

The Lord blessed and refreshed us for 3 1/2 days. We are now home, doing last minute planning and packing as we leave May 12th for our trip to Israel.

We would treasure your prayers so that we remember all of the things necessary to take with us, and especially for "protection" and "connections" as we venture away from home. As always, you are near and dear to our hearts.

Pastor Dave & Kimi

Wonderful!

We were so blessed today, we are still in town working on details for our Israel trip and haven't made it to the "woods" yet. Waking up this Sunday morning, our hearts went quickly to Bend Christian Fellowship. With no plans to leave town today, we were excited about getting ready to go to church. The simple things of God and family are being appreciated and enjoyed so much.

We love our family, friends and church. Thank you for letting us be a part of your lives!

Pastor Dave & Kimi

"Checking In"

Here it is our first week on sabbatical and we just want to give all of you a quick report on how things are going. We have had Bob & Lori Mehan and some other friends from Adel with us for a few days and even had a lunch with some of the staff at Chan's! We are spending this time resting and preparing for the last minute details of our trip to Israel.

I've (Dave) had some great times with the Lord already this week. He has been filling me with faith that He is very much in charge and watching over BCF. He has been giving me great words of encouragement to be refreshed. I think I've had a divine appointment with an old book of my Great-Great-Grandmother's published in 1900 that was on our hearth, called "Christ's Object Lessons". It speaks about the lessons we can learn through His parables and nature.

We love you and wanted you to know that you are close to our hearts and as names and faces come to our minds, we are praying for you. Congratulations to the Buntjer & Hernandez families as their little boys have arrived on the scene! Until we write again, blessings to all of you!

Pastor Dave & Kimi

It's been a few weeks since we started our blog. Been in Ireland on a missions trip for a few weeks. Pictures and more information to come!

First Time On Our Blog!

We are trying something new!