Thursday, December 25, 2008

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to everyone! Hope everyone is safe while they travel. Enjoy your day or weekend with your family.

Love,
Rob

Thursday, July 17, 2008

home at last

2 am: we're back and i'm tired
we've been to washington and back
i missed a few days in the blog

i'm going to bed,
rob

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Day 8

I have uploaded almost all of Brittany's pictures at the time of this writing but I have no idea what kind of progress James has made. Hopefully we will be able to get some more videos rolling soon.

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Day 8: We started our day off normally until we were notified that we had to move all our stuff from the rooms we were sleeping in, into the gym where all the UGBC men are. So we did that and went on our way to breakfast. A man from UGBC, I believe, was driving our van and we have to pass by the school where we are doing our services. When we got past the school, a cop comes out and pulls us over. Apparently he was doing 49 in a 35, but the cop let him off with a warning because we had contacted the police department before hand in order to get approval on what everyone was doing. The weirdest thing is, we drove 3,000 miles across the country to get pulled over in the city we were staying in. So another day has gone by where something crazy has happened to a van. We made it to breakfast and after everyone had pretty much finished, a group of UGBC men started make fun of the strong men last night by putting on their own show. I wish someone would have tapped it because it was pretty good. They were doing the same things as the men but on a much, much smaller scale. Post breakfast, we went and did a few worship songs then VBS was sent out. We didn't have that many people in the park today as before, but a few of the kids from last time showed up, which was cool. Apparently there was a sign on the back of my shirt all day that said "Kick Me," because that's all a few of the boys AND girls did when they were around me. We did crafts, puppets and face painting again and had chili willies. At least, from what I was around, 2 people decided to make Jesus their Lord and Savior at the park. We went and had lunch and started round two in the park, which was similar to the first. Nothing really worth mentioning happened for a while. At the night service we had a cookout for students and a praise band to lead the youth in some songs. When Sterling Griggs started speaking, the smaller children came outside and we had a miniature vbs for them, with crafts, puppet show and games. We finished the night in McDonalds and now I'm back at church waiting on the next day. My memory might have failed me about today since its late and I'm tired, but this is about all I can think of.

Tomorrow, we are doing our Sunday services at the church we are helping then the plan is to do lunch then split into two groups. One group is going to be doing follow up for anyone that either seemed interested in the Gospel or made a salvation decision and the other group will be doing a mega-relay type thing with the children/youth there. After that we will be heading over to Mt. Rainier for a time of devotional and probably some free time if Hauser doesn't get too long winded.

Peace out,
Rob

Friday, July 11, 2008

Day 6-7

Pictures and videos are struggling at the moment. They don't seem to want to load completely. Who knows when we will get an entire album up.

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Day 6: Day 6 was the first day of our trip in the Seattle area and we started it off with a bang by sleeping in. The hotel we were at was fairly casual- People had dogs in the building just letting the walk around, so I'm thinking Hauser didn't drop too much money on the hotel if dogs were present. What a wonderful gift that was. The plan for the day was to go into Seattle and walk around the Pike's Street Market and see the grand sights and taste the delicacies provided by the locals. We had to check out at 12 and had nothing to do until supper time and no where to leave our stuff so we left a giant wall of luggage outside the hotel which really added to the scenery. We went into town with the intention of picking J up at the airport down the road at 3 and getting lunch before hand. Snow, Josh Clarkson and I got some fish at a local cafe and Snow proclaimed it was the best fish he had ever put in his mouth. For those of you who went to Alaska and got to taste the salmon, I would compare the two fish, but Alaskan being better. Some other people made their way into the Japanese restaurant and approved then we went into the first ever Starbucks right by the market. A handful of us departed out from the city toward the airport to pick up J. We made it there smoothly and wrapped the package and headed back to the town in order to pick up the rest of the people that needed the ride back. About 10 miles out from the exit, we got a call saying they were going to squeeze 22 people into one of the vans because they were tired of waiting or something. So we got off at the intended exit because it was the easiest and turned it around and got back on the highway. We had semi-directions to get to the school but were intended for coming from a different direction. We missed an exit and it was all down hill from there. J and I decided to whip out the map that was provided to us by the women who packed the boxes in our van. Who ever was in charge of making the roads and labeling them is probably one of the biggest idiots ever. The road WA-167 S is horseshoe shaped, so when you get to the bottom curve and start heading north, you are still on 167 S which threw us into a loop. We had to whip out the compass and figure out which way to go and still ended up in a completely different town. We stopped for directions at the first gas station that we came to. When we went in and asked the cashier, he questioned Orting and was expressing himself as how were we this far off. He gave us directions and we got back on the road and he said that he got us to a close location and should just follow the signs in (which there were none until we were right up on the town). When the directions ran out, we almost immediately made a wrong turn. We made it back just in time to get some supper and head into service. Brandon Carter and Sterling Griggs led worship and then we headed back to our hotel to set up camp for the night.

Day 7: Today was our first day of going out and doing door-to-door, vbs or b-ball camp. The guys went in to get pancake breakfast (which were awesomely made by Chris Smitherman). We ventured forth to the church for our send out where a couple in the RiverChase Church led worship and Hauser had a devotional. Vbs was sent out first and so I have no idea what happened afterword. Our group headed over the park (which is right across from the HQ for the events) and started getting ready for the day. We had crafts, which involved making hats, sandals, tie-dye shirts and face painting. We also had a giant parachute which we started the day off with to attract some kids into the festivities. We also had a puppet show with a puppet that could talk with out moving his mouth and afterword the puppet master was giving out autograph(s). We had about 30 kids show up through out the day and had a really good time. We shared a lot with the children, handed out information and a lady in our group would 'survey' (anyone that has ever been involved with Frontliners knows what that means) their parents. At the night service, I saw some kids that were at our park wearing some of the tie-dye shirts they had made- and one of the girls that was at the second portion of our party in the park won the Wii that we gave away at night. After lunch we headed out to our second location, and it was desolate. We stayed there for about and hour and no one showed up so we headed back to our original park and started back up there. We did the same thing as the first time with a few less kids there participating. I thought it was pretty cool when a kid rode his bike up to us and asked if we were the ones giving out Bibles. Apparently Carl, Sherry and Laura had ran into this kid when they went out at the other park trying to find people to come and sent him over toward the city park. Either way, it was really good to hear a kid wanting the get a Bible. Since this was after lunch and we were right across the street from where we ate, A lady that helped with food brought a cooler of lemonade out to share it with the children. When we packed up and headed back to the HQ, a man came up and talked to the the lemonade lady and all I heard as I was passing by was something along the lines of "I really appreciate what you all are doing out here showing you care," and handed her ten bucks. I don't know if she took it or not because I was well passed her when this happened, but when I heard and saw that, I was blown away that someone so random and from what I remember didn't have any children involved with our vbs, wanted to donate to our cause. After all was said and done for the day, we shipped out and headed back to our lodging for a few hours. Snow and J needed some razors from Wal-Mart and I needed new shower materials since I left everything in Montana so I went with. If you can believe it... we got lost. Our first mistake was getting directions from Hauser. When we realized we were lost, I called in and Hauser got me on the horn with a local, who had no earthly idea where we were after I described our location out. When we finally made it back to the church she handed us a map and we were on our way. We made it back just in time again for food and the service. It was family night and had inflatables and a skate park, which is apparently pretty big in the area. At a certain time, the band performed and a few of us went out and helped take down the inflatables. We only got to hear two of their songs but the youth seemed to enjoy it. After that, some of the UGBC youth did a skit to a Lifehouse song which was pretty amazing and saying the did a good job doesn't really cut it. After that Power Force, a muscle group that is on an evangelical mission around the world demonstrated some of their strength. They were the main attraction and the speakers for the night. The two of them ripped up a phone book, license plate, a baseball bat, twisted an iron pole around a few times and tried to completely snap a solid metal hammer over their thighs. They spent some time on it handing it off, but couldn't pull it off. I think they were playing us since they would be back on Sunday for the service, so it was a cliffhanger until next time. If and when they do pull it off, it will be quite the sight.

I'm not sure what happened with the other VBS groups, but I did hear some reports on door-to-door. If there were people home, they didn't really seem too receptive. But this could just be a biased survey and some other teams really did well in other parts of the neighborhood.

Tomorrow, we will be doing the same thing, so continue to pray for us.

Over and out,
Rob

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Day: 4-5

All pictures/videos should be up on, hopefully, Thursday. New and improved with clickable links!

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Day 4: We started our day in Sheradon, WY with a good shower at the local YMCA. At this particular location, in both men and women's showers, we had community showers. If you get a chance to talk to a girl that went on the trip, ask about "Skittles" and you will get the full scoop on the shower situation that day. When we finally got on the road, we started our struggle toward Yellowstone Nt'l park. We were coming down a mountain, Emily W.'s ear started bleeding so we passed her to the UGBC van so they could take her to a hospital to get her checked out. She made it there and is now in fine traveling conditions. We made it to a little town in the middle of nowhere to get lunch and gas. We couldn't fill all the vans up at the same time so we had to set up a queue. We moved Swammy's van out of the way and continued filling up the others. When we were ready to leave and loaded in, Swammy's van wouldn't start. Something about a belt and compressor- No idea. It was absolutely amazing that we broke down in the parking lot of a repair shop. Whatever the problem was, it shut us down for about 3 hours. We had to find some way to pass the time so about 8 or 10 of us played a card game that Natalie and Lindsey made up that is somewhat of a concoction of 2 other games that we play every now and then. Three hours later, we were back on the road again. We stopped a few times to get some buffalo pictures then made it to the Old Faithful blasting. When we got into the parking lot for Old Faithful, we were greeted by a hippy that started reciting some poem about what, I don't know. I'm not sure what it was actually about, but it did leave a few of us breathless. After Old Faithful performed on time, surprisingly, we made our way to the church to spend the night in Gardner, MT. We had a few house guests there that were also using the church as a sleep stop as the were passing through.

Day 5: We awoke and after everyone was showered (Word on the street is the showers this morning were freezing, but I took my shower at night with hot water that scalded me a little bit) and packed, we headed out for a very uneventful day. Along the way, we got lost, separated and lost some more. There was a lot of talk a long the way of wind blowing across the road making it hard for the drivers. We got to the hotel outside of Orting around 9:30 and it was a blessing. Felt so good to know there wouldn't be any more strenuous driving (for 5 days). Since Hauser splurged and got us hotel rooms and it was a breath of fresh air to be back in civilization, we came into the room and turned everything on to get our money's worth. You can tell this wasn't a very eventful day when the most exciting things happening were getting lost.

The first half of our driving is over and I wouldn't trade it for anything. I feel like primary eight of us on our van out here have really gotten to bond and grown closer. The end of the trip hit at just the right time before people really started snapping. I'm glad it's over and only have four more days of driving to look forward too.

On the the horizon, we have door to door, bible school and basketball camp. Pray for us as we start with our evangelical mission in Orting, WA. I'm hoping to see a lot of lives change during the next few days and hope that we get good chances to be witnesses.

Thanks for reading and check back soon since I'll be coming back to the hotel (where the women are staying the entire time here) and having them clean out my underpants or whatnot and getting some blog updates during the wash.

Love,
Rob

Monday, July 7, 2008

Day 1-3

At the time of this writing, nothing has been uploaded to these sites of the trip so check back later.



Note: If you are looking through pictures and notice a squirrel that seems out of place, it's our mascot, Stan the Squirrel.

Well this is finally our first time around internet access so we can get an update out. We have been through NC, VA, WV, KY, IN, IL, MO, IO, SD and now in WY. Doctor has planned our trip to go through all the states that start with the letter 'I' and now we only need ID. We have logged a lot of quality hours together. Hauser, DR, James, Foster and Swammy have done most of the driving with Snow and Rick helping along the way.

The first day we traveled into St. Louis, MO and went up into the archway and got to look down onto the flooded river and the capitol building. We missed the fireworks that night because it would have put us out on the town too late, but we did get to see some on the drive out of town along the highway. Bonus story for all the people who went to Washington D.C. on the mission trip for the Fourth: We were getting back on the tram to get out of town and there we were getting onto the car too slowly and some of us got left behind and waited on another tram. The first car got to the parking lot where we got off and I called Hauser to get his ETA. They were riding on the tram and over the loudspeaker they were told the tram was going out of order so they were shoved off the tram at a random spot and told to wait (Very similar to DC, just not in the ghetto or told to wait on a bus). They got another one a few minutes later and arrived (Chris Hauser is a curse). We went on down the road to the church and laid down for the night after over 700 miles of driving.

Day 2: Some awoke around 5 to fight for position in the shower line. Everyone had to share one shower in the guys bathroom so that was a little different. We were told we needed to be out around 8 am and ready for service but service didn't start until 9:30. Since we had some time to spare Dr did a little Sunday School lesson and Snow did a few songs then we headed over to preaching service. They had somewhat of a special service. A few of them went to El Salvador on a mission trip and about 7 of them went up and spoke a little about the trip. It was pretty impactful hearing their testimonies about a mission trip when that's the entire reason we had stopped by their church. The pastor there was a little more energetic than Dr. He did some kind of a fight song and after the closing prayer, it's ritual for the pastor to say "Ready" and the congregation would follow with "Break" and a single unison clap. He mentioned that if he wasn't a preacher, he would be coaching a football team somewhere. After that we got a group picture then headed out again. For lunch we made our way into the McStop and had McFood and only spent about 90 McMinutes there for unexpected McShopping. We spent most of our day in MO and ended up in Sioux City, IO. When we had for the most part settled into the church, Drew and Zach were being a nuisance and Hauser took a pvc pipe and javelined it into the back of Drew's back and then Zach was hanging from the basketball goal and someone mentioned he looked like a pinata and Hauser thought that's what he was and gave him a good whack. That simmered them down for a while.

Day 3: Today we left out heading toward Mt. Rushmore. In South Dakota there were around 500 signs about a store called Wall Drug, which is wallways in season. Since it was apparently such a big landmark we had to make a stop there. Brittany and Paige describes Wall Drug as, "An old-timey western outlet mall." I'm not too sure that the guys really appreciated the stop as much as the the girls, but it was a good time to get some food and free bumper stickers. After departing there, we were only a few hours out from Mt. Rushmore. When we got there we tried to get a picture of the group holding up the Ripple. We had to get some one else to try and get the picture for us so we could all be in the picture. After 3 unsuccessful photographers who didn't seem to think that we would want to get the entire Mt. Rushmore in our picture with it.

For tomorrow (Day 4): We are looking forward to going into Yellowstone and hopefully see a buffalo.

P.S.
Paige, Carl and DR are losing their minds. Brittany doesn't seem far behind.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Welcome

This is our first blog. Really just a first post showing the capabilities of how awesome and great the internet is. Check back after Saturday (July 5th) for, hopefully, some updates as we travel out to Orting. Our first stop is going to be in St. Louis, Kentucky and the real mission will be finding somewhere with internet access to update the blog. Not sure if we really have any faithful readers yet but we (All of the fools riding out to Washington) hope that you will continue to pray for us, UGBC and the Riverchase Church and community during the next few weeks. Nothing to see here... please disperse (for now).