Empty Nesters?

After being empty nesters for a year, our sons are returning home. James spent the past year at Emmaus Bible College, and the summer working at Camp Elim. He had a great summer at Camp and every so often brought some friends home on their day off...roughly noon Saturday until noon Sunday. They would do their laundry, enjoy some home cooking (I hope; although I heard the food at Camp Elim is very good), have one morning to sleep in and enjoy a little recreation. The would attend the 11:30 service with us at First Pres. before taking off to Camp. Above is a photo of him with two girls, Caitlin and Ana Lucia who we had the privilege of hosting. During that particular weekend they spent much of their time watching a "The Office" marathon. It was so much fun getting acquainted with them as well as Caleb and Becky. James has some great friends. He is planning to start classes at The University of Colorado in Colorado Springs this week and will live at home for the time being.

Sean had been living in a house in "the Springs" with good friend and roommate, Ben, until Ben got married to Melissa in June; a beautiful wedding to which we were invited. Sean shared being co-best man with the groom's brother.Then Sean was off to Hollywood for the summer, doing an internship for a film company producing A Dark and Stormy Night. Above he is shown in his cameo role as Ray Vestinhaus. Sean is going to live at home this fall and save up some money for...the next thing in his life.

We love having our sons home again. They are great people and it is fun to have them around. They also help me a lot with my computer and other technological issues.

Now if we could just persuade Sarah, Andrew and Henry to live with us too.

Church Dilemma

Finding the perfect church has been an important but elusive goal for Kim and I for most of our married life. (Of course anyone reading this may recall the adage that once you find the perfect church it will quickly become imperfect because you joined it.) Our faith is important to us and we long to be a part of a nurturing community that truly believes in God, will help us grow spiritually and where we can serve in a meaningful way. Yet we have been frustrated over and over. Finding the right fit has not been an easy process.

A few years ago we belonged to a church that while very much alive at one point ran into a series of difficulties and finally died. We were ready to move on but felt cautious. We decided to take a full year of visiting churches in our city before we made our decision where to settle. Sean and James were both living at home at the time and they were a part of this decision making process. Eventually the four of us felt unanimous about making First Presbyterian Church of Colorado Springs our church home. http://www.first-pres.org/We like the good Biblical teaching, both the traditional and the contemporary music, the leadership and the way the church reaches out to the members and the community with compassion. All aspects of the worship service are knit together through the teaching, music and right amount of liturgy to focus on a specific theme that is easy to carry away. Kim and I have gotten involved with the Stephen Ministy which is both fulfilling and challenging.

The only drawback is that the church is 25 miles from our home. Recently a land developer building a big residential community close to where we live, has donated some land to our church. The church wants to form a "northern campus" for the church and a group of church members are actively working toward this. We love the idea of going to a church nearer our home. It makes sense to be involved at a church in the community where you live. But we know it won't be the same. Would we still receive the same spritual nourishment that we receive from the big church downtown? We don't know.