Weddings and Wisdom and Writing, oh my!

Wedding:  The wedding of my son, Noah, to his bride Hannah, was a beautiful and joyous event.  We don't have many pictures yet, as we relied on the photographer and kept our phones in our pockets, but I have a couple that I can share with you.  We welcome Hannah to our family (formally - she has been part of our family for six years already!).

Now we begin to focus on my daughter Hannah's wedding in less than four months!  Such joy!  Such blessings!

Wisdom:  I received so much excellent feedback from many of you as it relates to workshop titles that would resonate with North American pastors and church leaders.  Several of you actually asked your pastors for feedback, others of you proposed excellent alternatives, and still others proposed sound methodology that we will be taking under consideration going forward.  I feel so blessed that you take the time to read and respond in such thoughtful ways!  It makes the body of Christ very real and alive to me - thank you!  

Writing:  This past week had the additional joy of completing a year-long project of writing a paper for the BAM (Business as Mission) Global Think Tank.  The subject of the paper was "BAM and the Church" and involved three key areas:  the theological challenges inherent in the sacred/secular divide, the structural challenges of the local church in engaging the marketplace, and the cultural challenges found in many parts of the world regarding the view of work and the perception of the role of the church.

This was a group project with contributions from faith & work leaders from around the world.  Anyone who remembers doing group projects in college or high school can likely recall both their joy and the struggles, and when you add in about twelve time zones, different styles of writing, and different voices, it did become a complicated task!  But we are all happy with the final draft and we hope to be able to release not too long from now.  

God is good!

Pastor David Beelen, the pastor Noah has known his whole life, officiated the wedding.

Noah's side of the family including my mom, one sister, brother, nephew.  It was good to be together!