I turn 29 on Friday, October 23.  Bottom line:

1. I don’t need any more stuff.  And there are people all over the world who live in crushing poverty.

2. Microfinance is the single best way to end systemic poverty, to teach people to pull themselves up out of generations of poverty.  Bar none.

3. HOPE INTERNATIONAL is an amazing organization that is making real, significant change in the Two-Thirds world right now.

What can you do?

CLICK HERE to give right now to support HOPE.  You can give as little as $1.00.  Or as much as you want.

Please give in honor of my big 2-9.  I’d love to raise $2,900 this week.  That would be 29 families lifted out of poverty in the next six months; 58 by my 30th birthday.  Nearly 60 families whose lives would be utterly transformed.

Once you’ve given, PLEASE TELL MORE PEOPLE!  More details below:

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Here’s the whole story:

I’m turning 29 this week on Friday, October 23.  My wife, Amanda and I moved to Dayton, OH about 2 1/2 months ago (a week after getting married) to work for Beavercreek Church of the Nazarene.  It’s been amazing so far (short version).

In fact, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how outrageously blessed I am right now.  And then, about one month ago, I read Tim Sanders’ blog about a guy named Ken Hertz who gave away his 50th birthday to CharityWater.org.  Ken raised over $50,000 by asking everyone he knew to donate to Charity Water instead of giving him anything.

I’ll all about copying a great idea, so I decided to give my birthday to HOPE INTERNATIONAL.  HOPE is a micro-finance organization, which basically means that they give very small loans (usually $50-$200) to persons in the two-thirds world.  I won’t bore you with the details (though you absolutely should research this for yourself), but here’s the bottom line:

Microfinance is the single best way to end systematic poverty in the world. That is not an overstatement.  I had the opportunity back in May to travel with a group to the Dominican Republic to witness first-hand what HOPE can do.  HOPE’s programs lift people out of poverty and give them dignity.  Their motto is “A hand UP, not a handout”, and they live this out.  This is a grassroots, hardcore, 110% committed company whose staff and president utterly embody the values and vision they’re communicating to their clients.  I got to watch what they do first-hand, and I can tell you that they are utterly transforming entire communities with what they’re doing.  This really works.

Check out their site, decide what you want to give and then CLICK HERE to give!

Thanks so much everyone, for helping to make my 29th Birthday my best yet.  Please spread the word about HOPE!

I know it has been ages since I have posted (there have been lots of things going on, and we all know I am not the most tech-savvy person…nor the best blogger, but i am trying people!)  but that doesn’t mean that there hasn’t been anything to blog about.  In fact, there have been plenty of things, I just haven’t had the time to get around to it.

So in this post, I want to share with you a story about how small the world can truly be. 

Several weeks ago, JR. and I went to Clarissa and Elizabeth’s house to meet up with a girl that had visited BCN a couple weeks earlier and requested more information about the Young Adult Group (side note – we are trying to think of a name to call this group –the 18-30 year-olds- and we haven’t come up with anything yet.  Thoughts?).  JR. had been in communication with her and she said that she was involved in a ministry on Wright-Patterson’s Air Force Base (right next to where we live) and wanted to see if there was a way we could partner/help with stuff.  She is married and her husband was shipped to Korea for a month or so…so she had a little bit more free time to meet with us. 

As we are waiting on her to get over to the girls’ house, we are chatting amongst ourselves when she shows up.  As soon as she walks in the door, I immediately recognize her.  Her name is Jean Taylor and she was a stellar cross-country and track runner my freshman year at McCluer North High School.  I was on the track team my freshman year, and idolized Veronica Bible and Jean.  I was deciding on whether or not to say something to her when I finally got up the guts to ask her a few questions.  I asked her if she graduated from McCluer North in 2000.  She looked at me like I was a bit weird and said, “yeah, why?”  I then explained I was a freshman her senior year, which was probably the reason why she didn’t recognize me.  (It’s always easier to remember people that are older than you rather than younger in high school, IMO.)  So anyways, we reminisced and chatted about different things and how crazy it had been since she had left and about good ol’ Flo-town.  It was fun.

Then…another random connection from this summer then turned into more randomness.  I went with JR.’s Parkade Youth group on their mission trip/camp as an adult sponsor to Philly.  The camp is called M-Fuge, and lasts all summer long with the same staff and different youth groups from all over the country come for different weeks.  It is an intensive mix of teaching/small group material plus a missions focus around the city.  Each youth group is assigned a staff liaison to help with whatever they need.  We were assigned Tonya, and since we didn’t really have anything we needed from her, we decided to see if she just wanted to eat dinner at our table the last night to chat about whatever and relax.  She agreed and met us in the dining hall.  We started chatting and told her how we were getting married the following month and then moving to Ohio.  She not only was from Ohio, but also from a SUBERB right next to Beavercreek!  How wild is that? 

Well, she came to visit us at Bridge the other week with two other staffers from M-Fuge (Ashley and Billy) and then added us as friends on facebook.  On facebook, we realized we had a friend in common named Peter.  Peter, who we randomly met through our friend Elizabeth (from her work who also went to the zoo with us in August) is a part of their small group with their church and happened to be in Bethlehem at the exact same time in 2005-2006!  Wild huh?

This has just made me think more and more about how we are all connected, especially as the greater Body.  Speaking of being connected, I am going to try and do a better job with staying connected with you all.  I apologize and hope you are all doing well!

*f-manda*

So most of you probably know that one of the main components of our Young Adult ministry at Beavercreek Church of the Nazarene is the Bridge Cafe.  A little background on the cafe:

The Cafe is located on the campus of Wright State University in Dayton; it’s about 4 miles from BCN.  We’re in our 5th year of operation.  It’s had several managers, and each has left his/her mark on the Cafe in some way.  The humor and random nature of the decor can be traced back to a guy named Phil, for instance, and the faithful clientele are thanks to Chad, for whom I took over.

Chad was an intern for BCN last year while he was finishing school, and he took over when the Cafe was at a crisis point.  It was struggling financially and BCN wasn’t sure if we were going to keep it open.  But Bridge Cafe has been a dream of Keven – our senior pastor – for a long time, and so he fought to try one more time.  Due to repairs and resupplying, the Cafe didn’t open last year until October, and from everything we can tell, Chad did an amazing job of creating a great culture there.  The Cafe became nearly sustainable for the first time in its history, and it was clear by the end of last year even to the nay-sayers that Bridge had some potential.

At the end of last school year, the tanning salon next door moved and BCN was able to lease the whole top floor of our building.  We tore down the wall and completely renovated the salon into a homey, living-room-esque space that more than doubled the room available for students.

Enter the Forasteros.  We came into a staff of three – Jordin, Nick and Kelly – all of whom worked there last year.  They’ve done a great job so far of helping us get acclimated and trained.  Additionally, JR. and Jordin (who is the business manager of the cafe) have been working to make the Cafe run more efficiently and have begun to take their first steps in marketing the Cafe to the campus (believe it or not, one of our biggest obstacles is that students simply don’t know we exist).

The results so far have been astounding.  We’ve been steadily busier than last year, and this week, we did more business on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday than we ever have before in the history of the Cafe.  We attribute this to four factors:

1. Chad built fantastic relationships last year.  Because we’re in the dormitory complex, most of our clientele traditionally has been freshmen.  This year, we’re seeing a higher number of returning patrons who view the Bridge as ‘their space’.

2. We were open at the beginning of the year.  For move-in night, we opened up and gave away coffee and italian sodas.  Every Tuesday is Free Weiner Wednesday, where we buy 250 hot dogs, cook them and give them away.  We learned our lesson from Tim Sanders and Seth Godin: if you are generous to your customers, they will reward you with business and positive buzz.  It’s happening.

3. We have more room and new product.  Last year, the Bridge was a place you could barely stand in.  Now we have places to study and play games with your friends.  It’s not uncommon for patrons to come in around 6 and not leave until mid-night.  This is a place with room for you.  We’re also selling gelato (Italian ice-cream).  We’re the only place in Beavercreek/Fairborn to sell gelato, and the only place on campus to get ice cream (especially after 7).  It helps that gelato is better and better for you than ice cream.

4. We’re intentionally leveraging our market.  We’re using everything from sandwich boards to Facebook and Twitter pages right now to communicate what’s going on.  And when we use Web 2.0 Social Networking, we’re trying to consider how we can add value to our customers’ lives, not just get them to come in and spend money.

So what’s next?

1. Going Green.  We’re doing more and more to reduce our carbon footprint, and to communicate that to the students so that we can educate them and invite them to join us in living more responsiblya.  We’re also planning some fun events where students can learn about Fair Trade and meet some of our roasters, plus learn what makes our coffee and espresso different from say Folgers or Maxwell House.

2. Even more space and a new look.  Over Winter Break, we’re remodeling the old cafe side of the shop to be more efficient and handle our increased volume better.  We’re also working on a new brand (logo, merch, feel, etc) to go with it.  We’re going to be pumping all of this virally over Web 2.0, so that rather than lose momentum over Winter Break (which is what’s happened traditionally), we can build momentum and do a big welcome-back party when the students return.

3. Market. Market. Market.  We’re always looking for new events and new ways to market what makes us unique on campus.  We’re the best coffee.  We’re the only food + hang-out space open after 7.  The only place to get gelato.  The only place that takes credit cards.  And so on.  How do we communicate what makes us worth your time more effectively to the larger campus?  We have one idea that involves a pink gorilla suit…

If you want to keep up with us, become a fan of us on Facebook (search : The Bridge Cafe) or follow us on Twitter @thebridgecafe.

I know many of you have been wanting to see what our new place looks like.  (I will not mention that you could VISIT and see for yourselves   Manda has been working tirelessly for the past couple of weeks putting the place together (and JR. helped a little too), and we’re nearly done.  We’re definitely finished enough to throw up some pictures.  So here is a visual tour of our new home for your viewing pleasure:

We begin in the Living Room, where you enter in:

To the left, Kyle Jackson’s wedding gift.  To the right, a cork board, JR.’s comics and great fiction bookshelf and the art stuff that will hang in JR.’s church office.  Atop the bookshelf you can see Micah Ancheta’s gift to us, an origami flower bouquet in a vase.  Above the door is a placard that reads, “And they lived happily ever after.”

Many of you have asked how Kyle’s piece that you helped to create at the wedding turned out.  Here it is, both pieces.  If you didn’t make it to the wedding, Kyle put a picture of the two of us on a blank canvas, then invited guests to splatter-paint Jackson Pollok style on the canvas.  He then removed the picture and mounted it on a blank canvas.  The two pieces represent the mark we’ve left on our community and the mark our community has left on us.

Immediately to the left of the door is one of our couches with our sweet new black slip covers:

Here’s a better shot of the art above the couch:

On the top left is a piece by Adriene Simpelo.  She wrote that both Manda and JR. have served as catalysts in her life.  Top middle is a drawing we had done in San Francisco back in January.  To the right is a frame created for us that we have yet to fill, and in the bottom middle is a photo-collage of our last name from Travis Tynes and Sarah Harper.

On the next wall, to the left:

On the bottom right is an acrylic painting of us by Meghan Alexander.  Bottom left is a photo collage of us by Sheila Huseman and top left is a collage done by Jamie Steuerwald.

Next to all of this is our deck, and on the other side of that, on the far end of the living room, is our IKEA desk:

Here we have JR.’s ‘scholarly’ bookshelf and an explosion of as-yet-not-organized stuff.  The right wall is decorated with various travel memoribelia and one of our Amanda Iman originals (you can see another one in the far back left)  The back wall also features a pen-drawn collage by Meghan Alexander and JR.’s Terrible Towel.  A Nathan Bursac mug is in the foreground on the desk and one of the only extant pieces of Travis Tynes’ ceramic work is atop the bookshelf (the orange-and-blue square jar).

Standing at the desk and looking back towards the door, you see this:

Note one of our sweet wedding pics courtesy of Jessica Nichols, several board games left over from game night, and a SWEET hand-made pillowcase from Mexico courtesy of Christa and Tyler.

Turning now to the right (and towards the kitchen), you’re greeted by this:

You can see a piece JR. purchased from a street artist in the Dominican Republic (bottom) and a fantastic piece by Lauren McElhaney (top).

Here’s a close-up of Lauren’s creation:

Lauren used ceramics and MAGIC to create this amazing piece.  It’s got our monogram in front of the verses from Isaiah we used at our wedding (62:1-5).  Truly breath-taking.

As we move into the kitchen, you pass this tastefully decorated nook:

Atop a table given to us by JR.’s aunt and uncle, we have a piece called “Lovebirds” painted by our friend Mary.

And in the kitchen, we find:

This is immediately on the opposite side of the bar/window thing.  Top left is a mirror engraved for us by Jackie Roberts.  The top right and bottom left are pictures given to us by Bob and Janie Bohon.  Bottom middle are two beautiful pictures of Montana from Jake and Dawn Jones (which only make us want to go there MORE), and on the far right is a picture from Sid and Mona Werges of a view they experienced in Colorado.

The table is VERY temporary – far too big for the space.  The next two pictures are of all our storage, cabinet and counter space:

As we move down the hall, you’ll note a gift from Faith and LaRue:

This is a framed copy of the 1987 Spider-man comic in which he weds Mary Jane.  LaRue found it in a comic shop where he was originally looking for Batman, until he remembered Batman doesn’t date.  Isn’t it beautiful?

To the left is our single bathroom:

We’re putting a basket in for reading materials.  Gotta have the essentials.

The duck is a gift from my grandmother, who said it looks to her as though he has a lot to say.  He’s awesome – one of my favorite pieces of decor.

And immediately across the hall is our Guest/Game room.

This is immediately to the right of the door.  Behind the door is hung a Dark Knight One Sheet.  Manda didn’t think there was room for it on the back wall because…

This is our futon/guest bed.  We’re getting an air mattress to go on top of it, fear not.  The Spiderman was drawn by Rasmey Luos for a (high) school art project.  He gave it to me in my first year of youth ministry at Parkade.

To the right of this is the closet where we store the Wii/Guitar Hero stuff and our movies.  Which we watch here:

That Snakes on a Plane poster is now behind the TV.  And see that shelving?

‘Nuff said.

The last room on the tour is our bedroom, with our sweet IKEA-park bench bed.  Behold:

JR. has a tendency to leave his clothes laying around.  You can see several pieces in here, including more photography, a mosaic created for us by the Semer family, a sweet F monogram and some picture frames.

Here’s our closet, divided into His and Hers:

We finally managed to get both mirrors hung without killing ourselves.

And finally, here’s the back of our room, with TWO more bookshelves packed to the gills.

It’s a pretty nice little place, other than the fact that it’s pretty blazing hot in the back room.  Remember that window unit air-conditioner you saw sticking out of the wall above the desk?  That’s all we have.  So fans keep us – well, not ‘cool’ per say, but at least not melting.

It’s going to be a good little place for the next year.  Come visit us!  We don’t have a lot of room, but what we have is yours.

Manda and I took yesterday (Friday) as a true day off; we did almost nothing other than going out to dinner and to the River Walk.  So we took much of today off as well, and really only went out for the evening to a place called Target: Dayton.  It’s a ministry that our church helps out once a month, and this was that weekend.  So we loaded up our gear, plugged the address into TomTom, and made it downtown.

We arrived and walked into a building with several persons waiting in line outside.  They took us for volunteers and let us inside, directing us downstairs.  We found some more BCN peeps and got our assignment: Tables 11 and 12 (though we still didn’t know what that meant).

We quickly discovered that we were to serve food to the various guests who were attending – many of whom are homeless, but many who also simply need a free meal in this harsh economic climate (Dayton has been hit harder than most cities due to a GM plant that closed here).

Before we served, we attended the Target: Dayton worship gathering (about which I’m blogging on my Xanga).  Then we headed back downstairs and – after everyone was seated and a prayer of thanksgiving offered – we began to serve.

I’m not sure I can describe how thrilling it was for me to serve my guests.  I had six at my table – a man and two women, all together, and three other men who came by themselves.  Two of the men were particularly talkative and we shared stories while I brought them salads, sloppy joes with potato chips and ice cream for dessert, plus water and coffee.  They were all kind (most of them were understandably distant), and I found myself thoroughly enjoying this chance to serve them, to treat them as my betters, and to listen to my wife do the same a table away.  JC (our executive administrator) and his wife Sheila (our children’s pastor) served near us as well, and several of our new friends came too.

All in all, I loved a chance for us to affirm the humanity of these people; many of them have been devalued by larger society, and I believe that Target:Dayton has found a kind and compassionate way to serve and love them without condescension.  And they do it about 6 times every week.

So if you’re visiting us some Saturday, we’re probably going to take you.

In the two weeks we have lived in Dayton, we have already had several opportunities to serve the community around us (in fact, we get to go tomorrow to a project called Target:  Dayton with a group of people from the church).  Last Friday, during the youth group’s mission week, we rode in two church buses to downtown Dayton to a soup kitchen called the House of Bread.  They were expecting about half of us to show up, so they were more than overwhelmed with the amount of people willing to help.  We arrived in enough time to prepare the tables, divide up the desserts, get a few loads of donations from Trader Joe’s, fold some laundry, and hang out with the daily volunteers as well as some of the people waiting in line for the doors to open.  We were able to feed over 200 people that day.  We served them their food, a warm smile, fun conversation and clean up the mess afterwards.  All of the students were willing to serve the entire time and I did not hear them complain once (which is totally awesome!).  We encountered several different types of people (the owner of the business explained that during economic times such as this, they will see anyone from the average homeless person living on the streets to a businessperson or entire families…just because they cannot afford to spend the money on food).  For example, there was a man that had a personality disorder who told stories and riddles just to get a laugh out of someone.  We also met “D” originally from the Bronx and found himself in Dayton with his three kids, an ex-wife, and some hard time spent in jail.  JR. had the opportunity to talk to one of the volunteers who gave us a tip for a radio-station called Radio U, which plays hardcore Christian music as well as other (crappy) stuff.  Needless to say, it was humbling to be a part of the organization and we hope to go back and serve some more (especially once we get all the college and career stuff figured out with the bridge cafe). 

The second project we participated in was an ongoing thing BCNaz has been doing all summer.  It is a project called LOVE Beavercreek.  They began the week we flew out for the interview in early June and we were able to participate in the last project.  Their goal was to beautify the local parks and help the City of Beavercreek.  We heard that this is the largest volunteer project they have ever taken on.  Needless to say, people came out of the woodworks to paint, plant trees, lay mulch, and other various projects.  The representative of the city public parks and recreation is coming to speak at the church next week to thank the church and all the volunteers for all of their help.  Also…speaking of volunteers…I forgot to mention in the other post that there has been madness all around Beavercreek the week we arrived because Extreme Home Makeover was here working on a home.  Ty Pennington and the crew were all over the place!  (or so we hear…not too many people could get too close)  They asked BCNaz to be the main transportation for the workers to and from the site.  For the LOVE Beavercreek project, the church had t-shirts made and actually donated t-shirts to the entire cast and crew of Extreme Home Makeover.  The episode will be aired sometime in the fall….so be on the lookout!

That’s all for now…an update on our other services opportunities soon!

*manda*

Many of you have asked what is up with our new last name, what songs we used in the ceremony, or about various other aspects of our wedding.  As such, we wanted to put together as much of that information as we could in one place.  If after reading this post you still have questions, ask us in the comments and we’ll be more than happy to answer them all for you!!

My step-dad graciously scanned and uploaded all our wedding program stuff so you can have it… thanks, Rich!

The Wedding Program (contains: explanation of the ceremony, micro-profiles of wedding party, explanation of unity symbols – tattoos and last name)  **I recommend downloading this one, and then using the settings in Acrobat:Reader to rotate it so you can zoom and read at your leisure.

The Wedding Fan (contains: order of ceremony, family and wedding party lists)

The Wedding Invitation (self-explanatory?)

All of these were designed by Amanda Iman, who is amazing.  You need to  hire her for any and every graphic design project you have.  For real.

Also, don’t forget to look at our previous post for the wedding videos that Allan Thompson put together.

And, the very talented Jessica Nichols has posted her pictures from the wedding.  You can see her sweet slide show here, or if you want the whole shebang, here’s a link to the 1,000+ pictures.  While you’re at it, check out Jessica’s sweet T-shirt company, Spend Yourself.  Buy a shirt while you’re there!

Nathan has assured me that his pictures are forthcoming, so get ready to double your fun shortly.

We are seriously so blessed to have so many stunningly talented friends and family.  You made our day the amazing, special event it was, and we’re eternally grateful!

Well my friends, I am excited to make my official debut on the Forasteros Family blog!  We apologize for the delay in blog-posts…we have had issues with the internet and have also been quite busy getting to know the city and hanging out with several different types of people as we begin this journey in a different town.

As you all know, we headed out to Dayton the morning of August 1st.  We stopped in St. Louis to have brunch with some family (Mom and Dad Kohnen, Aunt Sharon, Bub, and our little brother Mike).  JR. and I then began our journey together (in separate vehicles packed to the gills with our wedding presents and other possessions) east.  This time was spent by making phonecalls to long lost friends and catching up with various people, only having to make one stop.  We were greeted by JC (our executive administrator at the church) and his wife Sheila (the Children’s pastor) who then helped us move our stuff in and then took us to El Toro for some delicious Mexican grub.  They gave us the low-down on what the next week would look like and we had some time to just get to know them.  I forgot to mention that when we got into the apartment (that was a disaster with boxes everywhere!) there was a gift basket, flowers, and a welcome card made by our new friends Heather and Clarissa.  It was such a treat…we felt (and feel) so welcomed!

That evening, we sluggishly unpacked several items and tried to get as settled as possible.  The next morning we headed to both church services (9:00 am blended worship and 10:45 EPIC) where JR. and I were presented as the new College and Career Pastor and his wife, who also loves college ministry.  We (as I have already mentioned) were warmly welcomed by several people (even had a sweet old lady slip me a $20 and told us to go out to lunch on her).  We then made the trek to IKEA (which was quite ridiculous and I am sure that JR. will tell you all about it in a different post) and purchased a bed, some endtables, some funky mirrors, and a desk.  We came back, attempted to assemble (most of) it (and almost killed ourselves and our bedroom walls in the process).  We unfortunately discovered that we have a queen size mattress when we had originally thought we had a king.  So we will be saving up for a mattress in the next few months.  Until then, our mattress is just a wee bit smaller than the frame allows for, but we are managing just fine.

That evening, we were invited to Elizabeth and Clarissa’s house (two college and career ladies, one of which just got back from Honduras on a mission trip) to play games and get to know several people in the college and career group.  Though we had extreme amounts of things to do, we decided that people are more important than us getting our unpacking finished…so we headed over and played Cranium and got to know a little bit about our new friends.  We were invited to the Cincinnati zoo the following weekend, which you all will hear about as well!

The next day, we attempted to get our Ohio driver’s licenses and failed.  We also opened new bank accounts at City National Bank and were able to do business with a really sweet lady named Brenda.  In the afternoon we picked up some chinese food (supposedly the best in Beavercreek) and worked on unpacking some more.  Though the task seemed like it would never end, we made tons of progress in the first few days.  On Tuesday while JR. was at staff meeting, I tried to get as much unpacking and organizing out of the way as possible.  Can I say, if I haven’t already, how much I HATE and LOATHE moving/packing/unpacking?  I know, its unfortunate because I just changed my last name to ‘traveler’ which means I may not be in one place for a really long time…but STILL?!?  It is just really frustrating.  So to take breaks, we took advantage of the opportunity to hang out with tons of different people from the college and career group at BCNaz.  They are quirky, fun, and we are really excited to be a part of their community.

We discovered that several of the boys were addicted to Steve Jackson games, so we invited them over for a game of Ninja Burger.  We have also introduced them to the ridiculousness that is Paper Trail, among other things.  One day this past week, our friend Kendra came over on her day off and worked with me in the kitchen to organize the cabinets and downsize the amount of counter space we were using.  It looks fabulous (trust me, pictures to come) and we appreciate her!  Also, we have just about all the art we received at the wedding displayed in some sort of fashion throughout the apartment.  We have a general theme of ‘us’ in the living room with lots of pictures, monograms and the like, then the desk/office area are travels and knick-knacks, the kitchen is a little more into the nature theme, the guest bedroom/gameroom is all about the movie posters, and our room is a hodgepodge of other things that we like to look at.    We even hung an ‘as i lay dying’ poster in our bathroom because the color scheme just WORKS. 

Needless to say, we actually ARE getting settled around here.  We have had a few people over a few times and have even had a chance to cook for them!  And…when we go out around town, we don’t even have to use the tomTOM as much, so that is super exciting too!  Dayton is much like St. Louis or Kansas City in the sense of TONS of (and sometimes too many) options; now don’t get me wrong, I love Columbia with all my heart, but there are only so many things you can do at the mall or WALmart.  Here, just in Beavercreek, on the main drag, you have the option of eating at any given burrito place:  Qdoba, Chipotle, Moe’s, or HotHead.  We have a Target, WalMart, Sam’s, Kroger, Meijer (which by the way is AWESOME…we even found Coconut Creme Coffeemate!!!), and several other chains like Fashion Bug, TJMaxx, Old Navy, Bed Bath & Beyond, Kohl’s, Sears, Home Depot, and Lowe’s.  So there are plenty of things to keep us busy (for now). 

Well my friends, I hope that I didn’t scare you away after this post.  Many people critique me by saying that my writing is much like the way that I talk…so I apologize if that irks you.  But…I would have to say that this is a great way for me to catch up with you all…so instead of reading the post it is like us talking on the phone!  We pray you are all doing well and look forward to hearing from you as well!

Con mucho amor,

A. Forasteros  (or….Fmanda if you will) 

So far, we’ve really enjoyed the four worship gatherings of which we’ve been a part at our new community, Beavercreek Church of the Nazarene.  We have two gatherings each Sunday, a ‘blended’ worship gathering at 9:00 am and a more ‘contemporary’ gathering at 10:45 called EPIC.*  We’ve been attending both gatherings so far.

The first week, they introduced us in both services and asked for $23,000 to remodel the Bridge Cafe.**  We also celebrated our LOVE Beavercreek summer emphasis (more on that in an upcoming post) and enjoyed the second installment of our senior pastor’s current series on holiness (see below), while our teaching pastor talked with us about temptation.  Our worship leader did a great job with both the choir (9:00) and the band (10:45).  The second week we witnessed not only Holiness Week Three, but also the kick-off of our Family VBS during EPIC.  Our lead children’s pastor gave a short sermon after a fantastic opening drama and high energy music by the band, including an excellent version of “Happy Day” by Todd Fields (and covered much improved by Steve Fee).  Did I mention that our children’s pastor is a woman?

A couple of things we’ve noticed being Nazarene instead of Baptist:
        1. Nazarenes are a ‘Holiness denomination’.  This means that they place great emphasis on a lifestyle of personal holiness (this can lead to legalism, but it doesn’t have to).  Nazarenes believe that, in addition to conversion, each person has a moment of ‘entire sanctification’ in which s/he is cleansed from the taint of original sin, and, at least in theory, completely sinless living is possible.  Apparently, Nazarene churches traditionally do two altar calls – one for ‘getting saved’ and a second for ‘getting entirely sanctified’.
        What I’ve seen this mean thus far is that both Baptist and Nazarene congregants employ similar rhetoric.  Nazarenes complain that the church just doesn’t preach Holiness anymore; Baptists often talk about needing more ‘preaching of the Word’.  I am anxious to explore this further.
        2. Nazarenes have no problem with female ministers.  Both our High School youth pastor and Children’s pastor are female; we’ve already sat under our children’s pastor as she’s preached to us.  Again, so far as I can tell, no one has any problem with female ministers here.  In Baptist circles, women are less able to serve as vocational ministers; at the best of times, they are called ‘Directors’ instead, if they are able to serve in vocational positions at all.

More to come as we get more accustomed to gathering with our new community.

*A quick (recent) history for those who are interested: about four years ago, we had two gatherings, an 8:30 and 10:45.  Our senior pastor hired a teaching pastor to start the EPIC gathering, also at 10:45 in the gymnasium.  A couple of years ago, we combined the two blended gatherings into one 9:00 gathering, and EPIC moved into the main auditorium.

**For the uninitiated, the Bridge Cafe is the coffee shop on Wright State’s campus that BCN owns and operates.  It’s going to be our primary point of contact with College/Career students; Manda is going to be serving as a barista and working with JR. to coordinate ministry through the Cafe.

        It’s been just over two weeks since we got married and one week since we moved to Dayton.  We wanted to give you just a little taste of what our new community here looks like.  We really interact with three different groups of people so far – our BCN staff, the BCN college and young professionals, and the Bridge Cafe students.  Since Wright State doesn’t start until September 8 (they’re on quarters, not semesters), we’ve not gotten to interact much with Bridge students.  And you’ll be hearing more about the staff later as well.  This post is dedicated to our week spent with the CYP of BCN.

        We had previously met Clarissa, who has been coordinating a lot of the collegiate/young adult activities for the past couple of years.  She left for Honduras the day we arrived in town, so she wasn’t in town this week.  Her roommate Elizabeth came up to us at church on our first full day in town, however, and invited us over to their place to hang out with and meet everyone (we would find out later that this is WAY outside her comfort zone, so in retrospect we’re even more grateful).  We took a trip to IKEA (more on that later) and spent the afternoon putting together furniture, so we were pretty wiped.  We almost just stayed home, but we decided to at least put in an appearance, to be social.

We got to the party about an hour late, and walked into a game of Cranium.  We quickly joined teams and right away JR. had to do a Christopher Walken impersonation.  After Cranium, we played a game called ‘Four Men on a Couch’, which involves everyone having fake names, so we probably didn’t learn names as quickly as we could have.

Wednesday was LOVE Beavercreek (more on that coming soon), and after that we got some Cold Stone and went to Kendra’s house to hang out for a while.

We’d also found out on Sunday night that several of the guys are big fans of Steve Jackson Games, so we invited them over on Thursday for a rousing game of Ninja Burger (Todd also brought over Munchkin Bites, and though we didn’t get to play, it looks awesome!).  Elizabeth and Kendra played with us as well, so we have high hopes for a Munchkin tournament in the not-too-distant future.

Friday was Bible Study night, so we went again to Clarissa and Elizabeth’s house.  Kendra led the last lesson in a series on Abraham, and we discussed Genesis 22 – the sacrifice of Isaac.  JR. found himself reflecting on Abraham as a sympathetic figure – he had been called to leave his homeland and follow God into an unknown country (though so far we think Ohio has been much more welcoming than Canaan).  The lesson was all about vision and following God no matter what, and we were encouraged by the level of excitement evident in the group because we had come to BCN.  They all are thrilled to have a staff person, and we see a lot of potential for the group.

Saturday was our journey to the Cincinnati Zoo; I got to drive the church van (w00t!), and we all loaded up at 10:00 am and headed out.  Here is a visual recounting of our day:

We began the day with a group picture. From the left: Elizabeth, Kendra, Manda, Joel, Benjamin, Peter, JR. and Robert.  The only one missing is Dani, who came later.

We found this peacock wandering the walkways of the zoo.  He had twice the autonomy the giraffes and tigers do!

These flamingos made JR. nostalgic for his former neighbor in Columbia.

 
For all you SBU alumnae out there, here is a real, live BEARCAT.  We always thought they were made up.

Here are the lovely ladies of our group: Manda, Kendra, Dani and Elizabeth.  This was at a play area we’d found.  Where are the guys, you ask?

Well, JR. found this sweet turtle shell in which to hide.  The others were quite excited.

So excited, in fact, that they all wanted to try it out.  Here’s Joel.

It got… awkward…

So they all went and played on a spider web while small children watched with envy in their eyes.  JR., Peter and Benjamin.  We’re not sure whose elbow that is.

We ended the day with a meal at the Old Spaghetti Factory (which was delicious and reasonably priced).  Clarissa was set to get home from Honduras around Midnight, and several of our crew were there to greet her when she got back.

All in all, we feel very welcomed so far.  Our new friends are awesome, and even though several of them are leaving for school in a few weeks, we know this is a great place to start.  We are so excited to continue to get to know our new friends (and to introduce them to our old friends when you come to visit ::ahem::).  For now, we’re just trying to figure out exactly what our place in this new community is, and how we can best contribute our gifts and strengths.

Stay tuned!