Day off!

Wow, it's been a while...but today has been so great! As fun as last weekend was, it meant we haven't had an actual day off in two weeks, which is quite a long time. So i actually don't know where most of the people are right now, except a few went to an alligator farm which i would have loved to go to but i planned on reading this afternoon, but then one of the girls came back and asked if i wanted to go to old navy, so we went on a flip-flop run. Otherwise, this morning we went to church then i came back and took a 2 1/2 hour nap; i was/am way exhausted. But church this morning was pretty great. We're all getting used to amazingly long services...haha, he doesn't even start the sermon until at least an hour into church so the entire service usually lasts right around two hours or maybe a little more. It's a lively church with fun clapping and "hallaluah's" thrown out randomly, which is a lot of fun and pretty different from my northern friends :) One of the girls here mentioned a term that describes us perfectly i think - the "frozen chosen" I thought that was pretty great. But it was soo great to be at church this morning - it was packed! And when i say packed, i mean they had to bring in folding chairs and ask us to move in closer to each other and point out the open seats. It was so encouraging to see such a full church. Even if a lot of us aren't members, it's great to be able to just be there and give life and spirit into the building and hopefully be able to fill these people with hope that we care and that God will provide.
This last week I worked at the Vacation Bible School, which is way more tiring than any construction jobs i've worked at. Believe me, it was crazy. But we did get to see four children who said they accepted Christ, which was really great. We had the chance to present the gospel to all of them, so we don't even know what went on in their hearts or the seeds we could have had the chance to plant in their lives...so praise the Lord!
Next week i'll be working on construcion also. I don' tknow what specific job i'll have, wherever they need me i guess.
If ya'll could pray for tomorrow that would be great also. We will all be going to New Orleans to do initiative evangelism for a few hours on two campuses, so i'm sure we're all excited/nervous to see what will go on. It's really the first organized evangelism we've done and maybe the last that we'll do, which is kind of disappointing, but I'm confident the Lord will be with us, guiding us and helping us. We also have a lot of new believers on this project, i think, so it will be a lot of first-time experiences for people sharing the four laws and having the chance to share their faith, so it will be a great learning experience for them.
Random other thoughts - yesterday after work we went out to a mini-plantation that some guys have been working clean-up at in the past week. The ladies who own it wanted to invite us out to a barbeque. So we had amazing ribs, chicken, hummas, hamburgers, salad, homemade cookies and brownies, cake, chips, pop...it was all sooo good compared to the kitchen food. They also have really sweet grounds, like a few different houses, a huge dock right next to a great river that we swam in for a few hours, a trampoline in the ground, a big campfire pit, badmitten, and random places to hang out including a two story tree house. I had such a great time, i spent about 5 hours there swimming and eating and chilling out after our half day of work yesterday. Then I came back, took a short nap and went to the movie Cars with Scott S., Dan D, Michelle, and Heather. It was cute and fun to not have to entertain ourselves for a while. I think it was the first movie i've been to in the theaters since Christmas day...haha. Not to mention I was super excited to get to wear a light jacket because i was *gasp* cold. it was great...felt like home :) But the movie did make me miss home and wide open spaces and being able to see for miles.
Oh - and my favorite quote of the week comes from the pastor of our church down here. We were talking to him yesterday after our last day of VBS and he was telling us about the people around here. He said that "Katrina was like a big can opener prying open the hearts of the hard people."
Soooo hope ya'll have a great week!
See ya
lys