Welcome to Winchester

This update was written on Friday, some more adventures gave taken place since then which mostly include our first fully sunny day of work, supper with two other families, s'mores, Church, and lunch with Pastor and his family!

Week one of the Kansas Mission is now in the books! Myself and 4 other young ladies have been coming alongside the local RP church and presbytery in their efforts to increase use of the 60 acre camp they own and facilitate.

Thus far we have done lots of tree trimming, sapling cutting, wading through poison ivy, staining of the caretakers’ house, fence set up, painting of the swing gate, window frames and grill. We have visited with members of the community almost every night of the week. Baked goods are our gift of choice when on house visits! Scones and muffins have been made thus far, we'll see what the choices are for our next hosts. Most mornings the pastor of the Winchester congregation, Kyle, comes out to the camp (where we are residing for the time being) to lead us in devotions. When he is unable, I lead our team time devotions. The caretakers just had a baby this week and have been away at the hospital while we've been staining their home so we are super excited to have it done in time for them to return to a finished house!

I am a firm believer that the Lord teaches us something with every thing that we do and I am learning to expect big things when my Creator is involved. However, the Lord has yet to reveal to me the big lesson within this trip. Something already impressed on me at this point is he importance of rural ministry. Pastor Kyle is very passionate about rural ministry and it has a wonderfully positive affect on his relationship and interactions with the locals. I'm confident in saying this because I have only been interacting with these church members for about a week and I already see the bonds the Lord has created through this in Pastor’s six years here.

In our devotions we are working together through the book “Living Life Backward: How Ecclesiastes Teaches Us to Live in Light of the End” by David V. Gibson. My mind and heart have thoughts forming yet incomplete which I'm excited to share with you when they have coalesced enough to write down!

Please keep our team in your prayers as some members will begin to travel home beginning on Monday. Others have caught a fair amount of poison ivy and are struggling with the effects of that.

Please pray for the progress of the camp and the hearts of those planning for its use.

Ask the Lord to lead and guide us to assist this community in the best and most honorable way.

Vacation Bible School is happening next week, please keep those running it and those helping with it in your prayers as we seek to share God's love to the children within and outside of the local church.

Blessings,

Jacqueline Horner

www.jacquelineann.net

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