Specific Info about This Sunday's Service Project

Here's the information about Sunday's service project that my wife put on our Ridge Church Facebook group and emailed to folks. Not on our email list? Let me know and we'll take care of it! If you haven't signed up for Facebook, it's a great place to stay connected to other Ridgers, keep up with what we're doing and RSVP when we have events.

The Ridge is helping KARM with their Thanksgiving Basket Giveaway on Sunday, November 23rd, from 2-4 pm. We must meet at the KARM parking lot at 1:15 pm to meet up and check in as a group at the volunteer table. There will be NO parking there, but attached is a parking pass with places you can park. (Since there's no attachment, email Emily for one if you need it.)

Here are some helpful hints:

• You will be outside, so dress accordingly.
• No one under 16 is allowed at this event. We try to make all things kid friendly but this is not! So, we will have childcare available at Nicole Johnson's home. Emily will be staying there and Becca Thiele will be there as well. If you need childcare please email Emily or call her at 704.579.2022 to get the address. Also, Emily needs to know how many children we will have in case we need additional help, so please let her know before Friday November 21st! Kiddos will need to be dropped off at the Johnson home by 12:45 pm. We will NOT be providing their lunch, so send it with them or feed them before they get there.
• You will need to fill out a Volunteer Waiver and bring it with you. Email Emily to get one.
  

Please call us with questions! 704.579.2022 (Emily, the event planner) or 704.579.2235 (Kevin).

Directions to KARM are below. We look forward to partnering with you on Sunday and serving our community together! Serving Others is one thing The Ridge values greatly--it's not just something we do at the holidays.

Thanks guys! We are excited to hear who is able to participate so please RSVP...

Emily

From West:

• Take I-40 East to exit #388.
• Take the right hand split on the exit ramp labeled "Western Ave./Summit Hill".
• At the end of the ramp, turn left at the light. This will put you on Western Ave.
• Go to the next traffic light and turn left. This will put you on Broadway.
• Follow Broadway until you go under the Interstate overpass. We are the first building on the right after you go under the Interstate overpass.

From East:

• Take I-40 West to the 5 th Ave. Exit.
• Turn right onto Gill St. that is the second street to the right after coming off the ramp.
• Follow Gill Street to the first traffic light and turn left. This will put you on Broadway.
• Follow Broadway through the next two traffic lights. After you go through the second light, we are the last two buildings on the left in the next block. If you go under the Interstate overpass you have gone too far.

MapQuest Map to Knox Area Rescue Ministries

Why This Sunday's Ridge Church Gathering is Cancelled...

Hey, everybody! I hope you're having an awesome week. Our little girl Chloe is a week old today... God has blessed us with a healthy baby girl.

We have two prayer requests this weekend that are sickness-related. First of all, Christy Garrison's grandmother Virginia ("Tootsie") is very ill. Christy has been spending nights at her grandmother's bedside at the hospital and is exhausted. I spoke to Christy's husband Ken this evening and he let me know that they will be unable to host our Sunday evening gathering at our announced location, Panache Salon in Fountain City. So, we are cancelling this week's meeting, originally scheduled for 5:30 to 7 pm.

Second, Emily is sick with mastitis. She has been running a fever for several days now (pretty much since we brought Chloe home Monday night) as a result. It looks that God is answering our prayers and she is not going to need to be re-admitted to the hospital for IV antibiotics. (She has antibiotics in pill form instead.) She's also in alot of pain from her C-section and is still on pain medication.

Needless to say, our first week as parents has been a struggle, with Emily sick and me basically clueless about how to care for a baby! I'm learning slowly what to do... But we are both exhausted due to lack of sleep with a crying baby. Also, we're stressed out more than we have ever been in our lives due to being new parents. Your prayers on that front are appreciated!

I want to encourage all of you in two ways with this post:

1. It's all about God and people! Our gathering on Sunday is not as important as our hosts caring for their family in a time of sickness and need. It's also not as important as me attempting to care for my sick wife and our new child.
2. That said, everyone who is a believer in Christ is called to worship Him with our lives daily and with other believers regularly. Since there's no Ridge Church gathering on Sunday, check out a local church in our area Sunday morning or night. If you need a list of cool churches we've visited, let me know!

Our Ridge Church service project is still on the calendar for Sunday afternoon, November 23, at 2 pm. Please make plans to be there and join us as we "tip off" (Vols basketball, anyone?) the holiday season by serving those less fortunate at Thanksgiving!

Pics of Chloe

Hey! Here are some pics of Chloe! There's a bunch that Emily picked out for your viewing pleasure, courtesy of box.net. You should try their file storage site if you haven't yet.

Have a great night... And thanks for your prayers and concern!

Our Little Girl is Here!

Yep! This morning at 10:29 am, Chloe Fionna Layne was born at Ft. Sanders Regional Medical Center in Knoxville, Tennessee. We thank God for her! She is and will always be a blessing to us.

Chloe weighs 6.0 pounds and is 19 1/4 inches long. She's got all her fingers and toes... Mother and baby are doing just fine.

We were also blessed to have Emily's parents, Bill and Sue, along with Emily's aunt Rosie come and stay the day with us. They live here in Knoxville and are a wonderful support to us.

My parents, Roy and Frances, also came to see us. They drove in from Chilhowie, Virginia and spent most of the day before driving home. I'm sure Chloe will see a lot of all her grandparents!

Here is a link to video I think you'll like, it's on Google Video and can be downloaded there... (Sorry the video disappeared earlier.) Links to pics are in the next blog post.

God, Sovereignty, and Our Kid, Part 2

The reason I shared all the info about Emily and having a child is to help state our belief that God is sovereign.

What does that mean? You can click on the definition above from Merriam-Webster's online dictionary, but what does it mean for us, in real life?

I've been reading through the book of Job. Not that I feel like him, not by a long shot! But, there is much to be gained by reading about how a man who encountered difficulty dealt with his own life and his relationship with God. One verse especially, Job 1:21, is an awesome one. After God allowed his entire family (except his wife) and all that he had to be destroyed, Job refused to abandon his God: "And he said, 'Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"

Now those are some big words! Could you say them if bad stuff happened to you? We pray that God allows little Chloe to be born "just fine" and score well on her first test: the Apgar test. However, we would love her no matter what happens... That is because we believe God is, as I said last time, "large and in charge."

Here's some reasons we believe God is sovereign. (Really, maybe you should click that definition above!) I've stolen the list from Norm Geisler. He's a smart man... A good representative Bible verse is after each point below.

1. God is prior to all things. (John 17:24)
   
2. God produced all things. (Colossians 1:16)
   
3. God sustains all things. (1 Corinthians 8:6)
   
4. God transcends all things. (Psalm 8:1)
   
5. God knows all things. (Psalm 139:4)
   
6. God can do all things. (Matthew 19:26)
   
7. God owns all things. (1 Chronicles 29:14)
   
8. God rules over all things. (1 Chronicles 29:11-12)
   
9. God is in control of all things. (Proverbs 21:1)

This is a pretty good list of ideas and biblical passages to support the concept of God's sovereignty. The good thing is that just as the old song says, "He's got the whole world in His hands!"

Please pray for us as Emily goes to the hospital tomorrow morning (Friday) to have Chloe! We will post info here when we have a chance!

God, Sovereignty, and Our Kid, Part 1

Today was another tough day on the "having a baby" front. Emily and I went to the doctor for her second amniocentesis this morning. I had a good feeling about the test showing that our baby was ready to be "taken out of the oven" but I was wrong. The lung-readiness test showed that she isn't.

The new plan is to have another growth ultrasound on Thursday morning, and if everything looks OK, have the C-section on Monday. If everything doesn't look OK, we will have a C-section ASAP after the ultrasound. If Emily goes into labor, we will have a C-section immediately. So, we don't know when little Chloe will be in this world!

Emily's pregnancy has been a difficult process for us. Many of you know that we've been married for 10 years. And, this is our first child. For a long time, we didn't feel led by God to have kids. We were student pastors for 10 years, and loved students. We were told more than one time that we had "plenty of kids already." And, for a long time, that was just right for us.

But, a couple of years ago, we really felt that God wanted us to adopt a child. Since we had already "adopted" tons of other people's kids, that just seemed natural for us and felt as if it was God's plan. However, after a couple years of pursuing adoption, we finally got a straight answer: we did not have the net worth, financial stability (living on support is not a plus to social services!) and residential stability that the child-placement agencies wanted.

So, we didn't know what to do. Then, we felt that God told us it was OK to try ot have "our own" child. That was a step of faith for us, since Emily has some major physical issues (I call it "battle damage") from a car accident in college. Her pelvis is plated together, and won't expand for natural childbirth. She also has a hip replacement (a residual problem from the car accident) and epilepsy that is controlled by medication. All in all, Emily is as healthy as any young woman her age, but for having kids there's lots of potential issues. Besides the structural stuff, epilepsy leads to a much higher risk of birth defects.

So, with God's leading, we attempted pregnancy early this year. To be honest, we didn't even really believe that Emily could get pregnant. We didn't know what kind of issues she might have with her plumbing as a result of her surgeries. But, God blessed us and Emily got pregnant almost instantly!

That was a buge blessing, but then came the waiting game for weeks and weeks as we had test after test to check for the possibility of birth defects and major spinal issues. We knew that our baby could have serious problems. We also knew that no matter what happened, we'd love our baby and treat him or her as a blessing from God. We were repeatedly offered extra tests that were intended to allow parents to abort their unborn children if their kids had major birth defects. We rejected the ones that we could, but doctors insisted on several.

To make a long story short, this has been a stressful time for us. (Plus, we just moved to plant a church, and we rely on the gracious financial gifts of others for our living expenses.) So, if we sound super-ready to have our little girl, we are... We just want to get the pregnancy thing done and see our little girl. But, no matter what happens (and thank God, all systems are go so far!) we will love little Chloe.

I want to ask you all to pray tonight for another Acts 29 Network pastor, Brad Hovis, and his wife Haley and son Owen. Brad and Haley's daughter Molly was born two months ago. She was expected to live just a few minutes after she was born. But, she held on until last night, when she died on the operating table as she received an organ transplant. Brad and Molly and Owen could really use your prayers, so please remember them.

God is truly large and in charge. His ways are not our ways, nor can we always understand them. Some children are born healthy, and some are not. We'll talk more about this in the next post... But for now, please pray for the Hovis family. They are hurting in a way I hope I never feel.

On God and Autumn Leaves

Yesterday, Emily and I drove up the road to Maynardville to look at the autumn leaves... We didn't have a ton of time on our hands since it was kinda late in the afternoon. But, I wanted to drive her someplace out in the country where we could get away, have a nice drive, and check out the colorful leaves as the valley and Knoxville gave way to the bigger hills and smaller towns. We hope Emily is going to have a C-section on Tuesday, so this was probably our last chance to drive around "peacefully" for awhile.

The funny thing I noticed was that the further we got from Knoxville, the less colorful the leaves seemed to be. There were some really cool colors, like lemon-lime, UT orange, and maroon-red. (I won't say 'Bama crimson!) But, the intensity we expected just wasn't there. Apparently the weather hasn't been all that great for leaf colors. It was a little disappointing, until we drove back to Knoxville late in the afternoon.

What we noticed is that some of the most beautiful colors are just outside our front and back doors! Black Oak Ridge is showing some beautiful fall colors. And Emory Road from Halls to Gibbs and Tazewell Pike from Gibbs to Fountain City feature just about the most colorful displays we've seen this year.

So, on the day that we left town to "see the leaves," we realized that the very trees I pass every day on the way to work at the HoneyBaked Ham store, and the leaves we pass on the way back from Wal-Mart are just about as cool as any out there this year.

Isn't it true that we often fail to see God at work around us, in our lives, and in the lives of our friends and family because we are too focused on other places, things, and people? Sometimes we just need to open our eyes to things around us. Sometimes, we will see God at work in our lives. Other times, we will see ways that we can love others in the name of Christ. It's something to think about as you go about your daily routine, whether it's driving down the road or in your daily relationships.

There's no super-duper verse in the Bible that talks about fall leaves... But Psalm 1 is a cool chapter in a cool book. Check it out and enjoy a book that's been the favorite of many over the years.

Have a great week!