Headed Home

Hey Vintage Church,

Annabeth, Bolt, and I are on our way home. We have had a great time of rest and refueling. Everytime I travel around the world I am reminded of the greatness of God as well as the size of the mission that He has entrusted to us. I am writing everyone from the Kuala Lumpur Airport in Malaysia. EDMUND'S MOTHER LAND! Believe it or not, I just had a caramel macchiato at Starbucks. We will be leaving here in a few hours to Shanghai, China...hang out there for 2 hours...and then a 15 hour flight to ATL. Then a 7 hour drive home. I can't wait to be back.

There are a couple of major things that have been confirmed in my life on this trip:

#1: I love Annabeth and Bolt! Without them I am absolutely a mess. Bolt has been amazing and we have literally dragged him all over the outback from camping on a beach, to watching a cricket match with crazy crowds, to even going through about a million security checks at the airports. You are going to be blown away by how much he has grown up. His new habit is sticking his tongue out when he is happy. I have included a picture of him doing this with AB. On the way to Australia he slept 12 out of the 15 hours from ATL to Shanghai. Please Lord, grant us this mercy again. Secondly, I have loved being with my wife. She is the most amazing person in the world. Watching her raise our little man and love me at the same time has made me fall even more in love with her. I will never apologize for taking time away to be with them. Outside of Christ, they are number 1. Thanks for allowing me to set aside a couple of weeks to live this out in my life.

#2: I love Vintage Church and the city of New Orleans! Australia is a great place. We spent the majority of our time on the Sunshine Coast (just north of Brisbane). It is one of the most beautiful coastlines in the world. Over 15 years ago we connected with a family called the Scales. They rolled out the red carpet for us and we had the time of our lives. I even did some surfing, but yesterday broke my toe on the surf-board. This has not made my trip home any easier. With all that being said, there is no place like home. My personal time with Christ was spent reading 3 great books, listened to preaching podcasts (great job Page), starting a new year in the One-Year Bible, reading the book of Acts in preparation for our upcoming series "Be the Church", and receiving dreams and visions for our mission with Vintage Church in the city of New Orleans. I don't want to go into too much detail, but I believe that when we come to this point next year we are going to be blown away by all the things that Christ is going to do through our church in 2009. I am praying for Christ to use us to the fullest and that we would pursue at all costs the TRANSFORMATION OF PEOPLE'S LIVES THROUGH THE POWER OF THE GOSPEL FOR THE EXCLUSIVE GLORY OF JESUS CHRIST. I spent a lot of time praying and thanking God for this opportunity to serve and minister in the city of New Orleans. There are a lot of people who need Jesus. What a great mission! Let's get to work.

Thanks again for all the prayers during our time away. Christ has renewed our hearts towards His. See you Sunday as we begin "BE THE CHURCH".