Through my eyes...

Being Christian….

A new school year has brought many new challenges. 6^th grade is a whole new ball game. Switching classes, 5 different teachers, new curriculum….its all different! But luckily, I have all the classes with my friends and that’s all I could ask for.

One obstacle I had to get past was that I had to make new friends. At school, I am a very open person. I try to be open about my religion also, talking about God in certain classes if I can. That lets people know that I am a Christian. I sometimes get made fun of for being so open about it. Those guys, yes, are my friends, but they just don’t get it. Many of you have seen on Facebook that my friend, Summer, is Greek. She is very, very proud of that. But, she doesn’t believe in God. She told me her mom was a Christian, but stopped believing when her mom got married to her dad, who is from the island of Crete in Greece. My goal this school year is to show her how much I care about her by showing her the love of Jesus. Starting with Facebook. I want her to choose to love God. And I am going to help, in any way I can.

Through my eyes……….People should love God no matter what country they are from!

Abby

Through my eyes...The Olympics

Olympic season is going on and 2012 brought an abundance of great athletes to put on the table. Experienced athletes and new athletes were brought to London to pursue this life long dream. New athletes are probably really proud—and old ones are proud to watch.

The Olympics is a world tradition. Every four years, we watch for hours to see who wins gold, silver, and bronze in our favorite sport. Michael Phelps ended his career with the most medals in Olympic history, the Lochte Nation is rising, Gabby Douglas is the new all-around champ, Missy Franklin got her medals, and Katie Ladecky (The youngest Olympian) won gold in the 800 meter all at the 30^th Olympiad. I can’t imagine being named the best athlete at a sport.  Gold medals? Not in my book there isn’t one. Michael Phelps has like 20 gold medals! All the athletes have endurance and determination. An guts. Swimming, Gymnastics, whatever sport your doing in front of billions with a chance of falling---that takes constant hours of perfecting, practicing, and repeating. I"m proud of U.S.A are you? 

Through my eyes……….Our athletes are hard workers and do the things they love in front of millions.

                                                            ABBY <3

Kristian's Kaleidoscope: The Final Installment

            How truly blessed I am, God has blessed me so much through this internship at NBCC and in my walk with him.  I want to first thank all of the staff. You all were wonderful and dealt with me lovingly. I know there is a special place in heaven for you now. I learned so much from each of you and will take what I have learned and use it to further God’s kingdom. Do not worry your words did not fall on unwilling ears. Your thoughts, ideas, and actions will be used in my life and I am extremely grateful for each lesson I was taught.

            Second, I want to thank the church members for all the love and support. I am still astonished by the welcoming I received from each of you. Not once did I feel unwelcomed or out of place. Everyone was generous to me and received me with warm hearts. I owe you each a sensory thank you. I pray that God will keep you and bless you and may his face shine upon you.

            Third and most importantly, I want to thank my Lord and savoir Jesus Christ for all that he has done for me this summer. I praise him and continually thank him for such a loving and teachable internship. May he be glorified for all that was done in the church and in me.

            I am sad that this is my last blog. This blog was therapeutic in many ways. I was able to vent and express my feelings in ways I never have before. I enjoyed your feedback and was glad to write to an audience who would read my thoughts. Rather than a journal which is so one sided. It was a pleasure to be able to communicate my feelings and ideas with people. People who new me and truly cared about what I had to say. I thank you for reading and taking the time out to hear what I have to say. I hope that you have been blessed by me as I have been so blessed by each of you.

I know that God has a plan for my life and my prayer is that I will fully engage in his kingdom whole hardly without selfish means, so that his gospel is spread to all nations and disciples are made. 

Krisitan Beasley

Former Ministry Intern

Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plansI have for you,” declares the Lord, plans to prosperyou and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” 

Through My Eyes...hanging with the Jetts!

Summer is already almost over! (Well, for me anyway.) This past week was a little thing I like to call VBS. I have been going to VBS since I was really little. I even have a certificate from when I was only a few months old saying I went to VBS! My summer has been great, starting with BigStuf and I’m ending it with a week of Lake Aurora with my best friend, Miya. 

A few days ago, Bethany Jett invited me over to her house for wings. I said yes. (Of course, I couldn’t pass on wings…) It was basically my first time going over to Bethany’s house as a “Youth Groupie.” I went over there, and I thought it was going to be a lot of people. I walked in and Jedidiah and Josiah were eating while watching Jeremy play Lego Batman on this gigantic screen TV. The Jett boys are all boy...all I can say. They are probably the cutest, squirmiest kids on the planet. So, since Sean, Kagan, and Justin were playing video games, I took the opportunity to play with them. Jedidiah and I played for a while, then Jeremy came in, and little Josey walked in, too. I walked out when Bethany put the kids to bed. Justin, Sean, and Kagan went to get the wings when Janine walked in. Bethany, Natalie, and I were playing a game of Hand and Foot. We squeezed Janine in and played for about another 15 minutes. When the wings came, they were in a big tin basket, almost the length of an oven. They were pretty good wings! We watched a show called Psych. It’s about this dude who pretends to be psychic to solve crimes for the local police. I stayed till about 11 p.m. I had a lot of fun, so I hope I can go over again.

Through my eyes…..I loved going over to the Jett’s house.

                                                                      Abby J

The Golden Years

It all began at a very early age, I think somewhere between 9 and 11. That was when I took my first job selling newspaper subscriptions, then in the fifth grade I bought produce from my neighbor who had a farm, taking the produce in my wagon around the neighborhood and reselling the vegetables and fruit.  In May of 2007 it began to come to fruition.  That is when I turned 59 ½ and the government let me do with my 401k investments as I wanted without penalty.  Then in November of 2009 I hit the magic number of 62 and became SSE (social security eligible).  I put in my paperwork to retire on June 30^th 2010, choosing this date since the company I worked for was changing, reducing and just messing with our retirement money on July 1^st 2010.  Had I known that I was/am this good at doing nothing, I would have planned my retirement much, much sooner.  I say that in jest, as it now seems that I need to return to work just to take a break.  I never had this much going on when I was working and now do not know how I find the time to keep it all going.  God has blessed Kate and I with enough of what we need that we can do many of the things we want to do and because He has blessed Kate with a good paying job that we Pray she can keep till she can retire in April of 2013.  I would urge anyone who reads this (regardless of your age) to attend one of Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University courses, I promise you that it will make a great positive difference in your financial situation and the way you handle your finances.  Just as when I worked Monday through Friday and took Saturday off and used Sunday to worship our Lord, I still do the same thing in retirement with a few exceptions.  I now cut some of my neighbors yards during the grass growing season to pick up some extra spending cash, my grand kids spend much of the summer with us and I take them to the water park Monday through Friday (adventure island has a summer pass that is $50.00 and the kids can go every Monday through Friday), we still go to the airport and park on the top level (first hour is free) and watch the planes takeoff and land, riding the long term trolley as a small train going nowhere and then go to the third floor and have breakfast and visit some of the shops.  One of the most special things I get to do now (again, I would urge any and all of you who can, to do this as often as you can) is work for the Church on Tuesday afternoon.  While the Church staff is in their weekly meeting, I get to update some of the reports, prepare drive-in service bulletins, answer the phones and anything else Shirley will let me do.  My Prayer every Tuesday morning is that my work at and for the Church will make my Lord smile (Having done some stupid things before that is not a far reach if He is watching me).  I think sometimes when it sounds like thunder outside, it is really the Lord laughing at me or something I did or said.  I am also able to devote more time to our Missions Program at NBCC and to more easily go when we have trips planned.  One of the more personal things I am able to do in my retirement is read those books I was not able to during my working years.  One last story for you about my retirement.  We do not always have a weekly income  and for decades I have been accustomed to tithing on a weekly basis, not too long back I had no income for the week and could not bear the thought of not writing a tithe check, so I wrote one (my concern was for breaking my habit, since we had plenty of money in the bank to cover the check) and put it in my envelope and went to Church as usual to do my 8:00 AM greeting and pass out bulletins.  In walked two of my favorite people and he handed me a CASH for three times the amount of my tithe to help me pay for the missions trip I was going on.  AIN’T GOD GREAT?!!!!! 

John Hartley

elder 

Krisitan's Kaleidoscope: North American, Microphones & Crazy Kids (Installment 10)

For those of you who were wondering where your ministers were this past week. We were at the North AmericanChristian Convention, and it was incredible! The convention was held in Orlando at the World Marriott hotel. The convention was a week long and consisted of two main sessions a day with several classes to choose from in between. While there, we got to hear such speakers as Rick Warren, author of Purpose Driven life, Bob Russell, and Christian comedian Chonda Pierce. The theme for this year was Refreshed, and that’s what we got, refreshed and renewed in the Lord. I have to say out of all the great speakers and classes my favorite part of the trip was getting to spend time with the staff that went. We had a blast together! We even volunteered to help count offering for the NACC, and that’s were we had some of the best times. All who went to the NACC were truly blessed!

Well, I hope you were at the ten-thirty service this Sunday because I got the chance to preach. What an experience and opportunity it is to preach the word of God! I just thank everyone here at NBCC for letting me get the chance to speak. I truly love preaching the word of God.  I preach again at all services on the 29^th so no excuses as to why you cant hear me then. And for all those wondering this time I will check the microphone before I get on stage. For the record, I just want to say I did turn the mic on; it just didn’t work. So not my fault, but all in all I had a great time up there, and I thank you for all your support. I just want to say that I really love speaking here at NBCC and being with you all and the reason is, I feel so loved here. I am not so scared to mess up when I preach, and I don’t get so nervous because I know no matter what, at the end of the day, you all love and care for me.

By the way, last night was our first night of Vacation Bible School, and it went great. The kids are learning about God on Promise Island, while here great stories, and doing fun activates. I ask you all to be in prayer for VBS, please pray that God will plant a seed in these kids so that it may one day grow into a beautiful tree of the knowledge of God. Oh, and I ask that you will as well keep those helping out at VBS in your prayers because kids are crazy, they have more energy than they know what to do with. 

Kristian Beasley

Ministry Intern

Through My Eyes...Friends

Hey, everyone! This past 2 weeks, I was in Leesburg! It’s a little town near Orlando where my grandparents are renting a house for a bit.

Today, I want to talk about my friends. God has given me so many new friends by switching schools. I appreciate them so very much and love them all. We made a little group on Facebook so we can stay in touch. (Most of my friends live in North Tampa or some where in the middle. Not very close to where I live!) My church friends I’ve known for the past 6 years and love them also. Most of you do know them. They are all very valuable to me. We have all laughed together, and that’s my favorite part. J I was gladly dubbed the funny girl this year at school, cracking jokes and making my friends and I all laugh till, sometimes, our sides hurt. Just like my father that makes all of you laugh. (Secret Sights: If he wasn’t teaching or a minister, he would like to be a stand up comedian.) So I was invited to parties and had fun at all of them. It was bittersweet when we all left. I cried when my teacher wrote me a letter on how great I was. I didn’t cry when I left my friends, because I knew we were going to stay in touch though the summer and that most of them were going to middle school with me next year. I know it’s not normal for a girl like me to say this, but im excited for school to start again. I get to see all my friends. I am new to middle school curriculum and up to the challenge. I’ll have all my friends to cheer me on.
Through My Eyes...friends are important to me and they always will be.

    Abby B J