We have arrived

We have arrived. Our first day included a long walk along the prom, breakfast outside at a marina café, afternoon tea in the beautiful back garden, oh and evening meal as well. The evening saw us relaxing by a log fire. This is the life. We are experiencing culture shock though and everything seems to be taking so much longer. I say culture shock because when we parked in the city centre for the big Inter Church Evangelistic meeting with J.John called 'Soul by the Sea' on Saturday night, we came back to a parking fee of nearly £9!! We won’t be doing that again in a hurry.

A God who answers prayer
The run up to us leaving was predictably hectic but by Wednesday evening we were boxed up and ready to go. However looking at the the things that we wanted to take with us I said to Rita there is no way we are going to get all these boxes into the car tomorrow. So the prayer was, Lord would you condense it all as it goes in and then expand it as it comes out. Well I don’t know if that happened but we did get every thing in the car, just, with Rita having books and boxes around her legs and a trouble free journey down.
A second prayer that evening was that I might be able to get broadband (when you’ve had it you can’t do without it) and low and behold the guy who is living in the house with us on the top floor is training to be a web designer and had it already installed in the house. PTL
A third prayer once we were down was for a good bed especially important for Rita who suffers at times with a bad back. We were invited to go to a house that was being cleared of its contents in a few days to take what would be useful to us at Coleman Ave and you’ve guessed, there was two single beds with great mattresses that we have been able to put together to make one large double.

Great welcome
We have had a fantastic welcome from the church on Sunday and are already feeling very much at home. They have lots for us to do and yet are very conscious about not overloading us.
Our first activity was being on the response team of the J.John evening. It was a huge success. Over 100 people responded and the plan now is for us to help with all the follow up work. It was very significant that this was the first inter church meeting in the run up to a Merseyfest type of event they are planning for 2008.
Tonight we are involved with a 10 event. It’s a follow up to an Alpha Course they have been running in the church and is based on the Ten Commandments. Later on this week I’m speaking at a luncheon club meeting.
Well we are just off to meet with the Elders to find out the details of what they have for us over the next 3 months so more later.