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So today was the first day of school…
Hard to believe that they summer is over…
Hard to believe I have a kid in second grade…
Hard to believe I have a kid in Kindergarten…
Hard to believe that I am getting old…

Here is Jodi with each of the kids…

We are really excited….
Raylee will be with Mrs. Williamson this year in the second grade. and Camden will be with Mrs. Shipley (the same teacher that Raylee had in Kindergarten). They are both amazing ladies that Love God. The kids are once again at Jefferson Elementary (right across the parking lot from my office).

Camden and I are still planning on doing “Our Father’s House” once a week and I plan on having lunch with Raylee once a week (or until it is no longer cool to have your dad eat lunch with you in second grade).

The summer has been good…
Lots done:
Trips to Thailand, Guatemala, Cedarville University, Pennsylvania twice, The shore, the water park, the lake….
The older they get, the more fun it is.

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Raylee has been working on her photography skills.
We are working on “framing” and the idea that sometimes the face can go our of the frame…
Here are two of her latest works…

To see all the pictures - Click Here

To see all the pictures in Sideshow format - Click Here

My family ROCKS….

I just returned from Guatemala, it was amazing… more on that later -
but here is an email that I received from my wife while I was gone.

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One fun thing that happened today was that after dinner tonight we went to Dairy Queen for Ice Cream…on the way in an older lady held the door open for us. She was in back of us in line. I told the kids loud enough for her to hear us…that we were going to “treat” our new friend to Ice Cream. We were going to eat it there so they gave us a # so the lady (Mrs Banghart) had to sit with us….we had a good time. She is 74. Widowed. Her daughter, Hope, has cancer. The same kind that her husband died from 2 weeks after finding out that he even had cancer. She has 2 living kids and 2 kids that died. One at 4 months and the other at 15…He was killed by his twin brother in a hunting accident. She is a believer. We had a great time with her chatting. She likes to ride her bike on the trails where we ride…she told us to call her sometime. We were able to pray with her before we left….just a cool time with the kids and Mrs Banghart.

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Hard to believe it is already time to start another day. Team time is in 5 minutes.
I am anxious to see what God is going to do IN me today.

Last night we were able to hear Fernando’s testimony, it is like no other testimony I have ever heard in my life… His faith in God and how God has answered his prayers so directly is absolutely amazing.

Made me wonder why God does not answer me like that…

Oh… I have to pray first and seek His face…
Hmm…

Beautiful - that is about the only word to describe Antigua, Guatemala.

I arrived safely last night to the airport around 7pm. I left Johnson Street at 7:15 that same morning, so it was a long day - but it was about to get longer.

Fernando, the site leader for Guatemala was to pick me up at 7, but he was running late. And of course wonderful Verizon does not work here (I need a global phone - I am convinced of it now), so I was left wondering looking for anyone with a friendly face… just when I started to wonder if I would have to sleep at the airport, Fernando showed up… at about 8:30. What a GREAT MAN… after talking with him for a few minutes, Dustin arrived. We left the airport to go and get some food - the rest of the group was not set to arrive till 11.

(skipping lots of details) we arrived at our amazing hotel at midnight.

Today started with team time at 7:00. It was filled with introductions and worship along with reading Philippines 1 and Psalm 103. There are 16 of us all together. After team time was breakfast! I never knew that refried beans could taste so good at 8:45 in the morning. We had eggs, toast, fresh fruit, beans and orange juice.

Then we were off. First stop, the medical clinic. Words can not describe what it was like, we spent most of our time in the children’s section… this is for kids that are mentally and physically handicapped. The power of human touch… these poor kids, they are in awful shape and can not communicate, but once you touch them - they come alive… so that is what I did. Much like a faith healer (no my theology is still okay, but that is the best way to explain it) I just walked around and touched and talked to as many kids as possible. Tears in my eyes the whole time. I would just touch them on the head, the arm, their hands, their feet and just rub gently and while crying say - God loves you… he really does - I am so sorry you are hurting. Though they could not understand a word I was saying - they felt the love… I really think that they did.

After we were there for about 30 minutes… a lady came up to me and said - “I have to go, please watch Samuel for me… he is autistic, and is the only one that can walk here, so you have to keep a close eye on him. He loves to bang his head (hence the helmet he wore) and loves to steal the other children’s blankets…” and then she was gone! Gone… she just left me there… I had no idea what I was doing. But I did what I had been for the previous 30 minutes. Touching him as often as possible, just walked around with him. When he would find a wall to bang his head against, I would gentle grab his head and say “It is OK buddy, I am here - everything is OK…” and he would stop, grab my hand, look me in the eyes and smile.

I will never forget my 20 minutes with Samuel… how could I, I am not the same person now.

After the clinic, we were off to 2 schools, a medical clinic, lunch, an agricultural site, and now we are back at the hotel.

Now we are off for a walking tour of the city.

I will be in Guatemala till Saturday - I hope to give updates… but not sure that I will be able to.
I would appreciate your prayers.

Thanks!

Today is Jodi’s birthday (age will remain withheld, although 1975 was a good year). I love that woman so much. Before we were married, well actually when we first started dating, you heard old (insert wiser here) couples who had been married for years would talk about how you grow to love your “loved one” MORE over the years, and I used to think… “Yeah right, you are just saying that… how could I love her more than I do know?” Well, they were right… That woman never ceases to amaze me.

1) Her love and passion for Christ
2) Her tenaciousness in seeing her kids love Christ
3) Her care for me
4) Her servant’s heart
5) Her management of our home
6) Her fearless attitude
7) Her commitment to her friends
9) Her outer and inner beauty
10) Her yet to be discovered and named qualities

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Camden is beginning to ask lots of questions about his faith. What does it mean to be a Christian?
What if I do not know what God wants me to do in life?
What if God is not really in my heart?
So last night, he decided to ask Christ into his heart AGAIN, since he did not remember the first time. Repressing the need to communicate to him that he did not need to do that, we are allowing his faith in Christ to evolve. Last night he prayed to “make sure” that God lives in his heart. What fun to watch your children struggle with what Christ is… and see them begin to grapple with what it means to live a life dedicated to Christ.

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Raylee is really struggling to know what to do with the money that she is saving. She has been saving for months to one day be able to buy an i pod Nano. She loves music and is constantly listening to it in her room. Some could (and maybe should) argue the need for a 7 year old to have an i pod, but we have agreed and seen the benefit in saving for something that you really want. But in the last few days, she has begun asking, “how do you know what God is trying to tell you?” Upon further conversation… here is the issue. She is wondering if she should buy a Nano or save the money for our trip to Manila next May. What fun to see her struggle… what fun to see her learn what it means to listen to and for the voice of God.

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Saturday was a FUN, yet DEPRESSING day. We finally pulled the trigger on a van. That was the fun part (except all the money we spent…) the depressing part meant the end of the truck. The truck that God gave me. The truck that was a constant visual reminder of what it means to be a giver and not a keeper. The truck that I will never forget and forever point to as an example of sacrificial service and commitment to listening to the voice of God. Megan… the truck has morphed into a van. THANKS!

The Grace Women’s Soccer Team is in Peru on a missions trip…
here is their first blog entry….
you can follow the trip on their site. Click HERE to go to their blog

We are in Peru!
Wednesday, July 30th – day 1. We are in Lima. Well the day started early at 3am. It was more like one continuous day from the 29th since most of us slept less than a few hours. Personally it was a 20 minute nap for me. We had great support on our night before. Coach Briscoe and Scott Feather came and prayed for us last night. In fact, even Jeff Burriff came and prayed for us as we left Winona Lake at 3:30am. The women were really moved by the commitment and backing of all of the Grace Community.
Obvious is the fact that we are noticed as we travel, so it provided many opportunities to share our passion for Christ and soccer. Story for the day. We got to encourage a Cuban man on the flight from Chicago to Florida. I noticed he had a “Santa Biblia” and I asked him if I could see it and then teased him why he would read that. Turns out he was a Guantanamo Bay detainee for over a year. He was released in Panama and accepted Christ there. He was going back to Panama after some time on his first mission trip. He was pretty nervous but excited so we shared several passages and used Danae Walker’s Spanish/English dictionary to break down some word barriers. It was awesome. He recently lost his son and we got to speak about how scripture relates to this as well. Wow! Pray for us that we will not only be transformed but that we will be able to share of the God who raised the dead and made the lame to walk and is mighty to save. We want to be like the friends who carried the lame man to Jesus in Mark 2.
The women are doing well and travelled well. Other than crazy pictures of all of us in funny plane sleeping positions and napkins stuffed in mouths of the drewlers….nothing to report. We met up with MAI’s Paul Shedd in Chicago and he travelled with us. Pray for us. Out from Lima.

So it was the Second Annual Feather Family Trip to Deep River Water Park. This year we went with the Jones family and had an AMAZING time…

Here is a video of the kids going down the “big one”.

There are tons more…

Click on any photo to see the how “lot” of them.
OR
Click here for a slideshow.