Trip to Nigeria

A military checkpoint

A locust, cooked for a snack

Preaching

Burning a field in preparation for planting

Lagos, the largest city

Abeokuta, Nigeria

The Rock of Abeokuta

Father & Son Retreat

Our church(Hope Baptist) is going to have a Father Son retreat in October. Click Here for more information about it, and here for other Hope Baptist Church events. For past church events that we have blogged, click here.

Father Son Retreat - Day 2

Saturday morning, Daddy got up about at 5:30 (I don't think he actually slept) , I got up at 6:00, and Stephen got up about 6:45. Daddy went to the truck to work on his sermon, and I walked out to watch some of our friends from church fish. About 7:00 they served breakfast, which was french toast and sausage. It was very good! The first message was by Mr. Bradrick entitled "A Young Man's Roadmap for Victory." He spoke on how fathers need to train their sons to fight battles for God. I enjoyed it. After a short break, Mr. Brown gave another message on how sons should relate to girls in the church. Next Mr. Dohm spoke next on purity. These were all the messages for the morning. Here are some pictures:

Mr. Bradrick

Some people from our church listening

Mr. Dohm



Mr. Breagy and his son Samuel

Next we ate lunch, which was sloppy joes and potato chips. After we ate lunch, there was a time for the fathers and sons to be together and learn more about each other.

At 2:30, the games started! We were on the blue team. The first game was tug-a-war. It was the green team vs. the red team. It was really close, and each team won once. Then for some reason they decided to send us off the do different games, and then come back and finish the tug-a-war. This year we did "Highland" games, because we went to some in Scotland with Mr. Brown. First we did the tabor toss, and then we tried to throw a small rock from Iona, Scotland.

Me throwing the rock

After the Highland games, we finished the tug-a-war (which our team lost at) and did a canoe race, and another game where you had to catch water balloons in a tarp. It was a lot of fun, even though our team was not the best. After the games there was a little free time, in which Stephen and I went out in the canoes with a lot of other boys (and men) and tried to tip each other over.

I am the one on the left with the grey shirt on

After the tug-a-war

We had hamburgers for dinner, and after dinner Daddy gave a message on the spiritual, wisdom, and material inheritances that fathers should pass on to their children. It was a good message. After Daddy's message, we had ice-cream, and we went home late at night. I really enjoyed this father son retreat.





You can read the posts about the father son retreat last year here:
Day 1
Day 2

Father Son Retreat - Day 1

Last weekend, we went to a Father Son Retreat at our church (Hope Baptist Church). It started Friday night, and ended Saturday morning. It was a lot of fun! Stephen and I convinced Daddy to camp, so we left from work and arrived after stopping at Walmart to get a tarp, because the weather forecast that it might rain that night. For dinner there was pizza. After we ate dinner, we set up our tent, with the tarp under it. It wasn't too hard, and so we finished right before the sermons started. The first was by Mr. Brown, and he talked about what fathers and sons can learn from the relationship between God and Jesus. Here is a picture of Mr. Brown:



The next message was a short dialogue between Mr. Brown and Mr. Bradrick on how fathers exasperate their sons, and how sons need to honor their fathers.


After a short testimony by a man from Texas, Mr. Breagy, another elder at our church, gave a message about what we can learn from the story of Daniel. He said that we should resist temptation and not be enticed by the evils of the world around us.

Mr. Breagy

After the messages, we got to have smores, and we finally went to bed at about 11:30. We got in our sleeping bags, and then it started raining very hard. As the water poured down the side of the tent, it got caught under the tent by the tarp, so in a few minutes we were in a puddle of water! I got on the huge air mattress we borrowed from Mammaw (with my wet pillow.) And Stephen moved to the back seat of the truck! We spent the rest of the night trying to sleep!

Reformation Day

On October 31 Hope Baptist Church had a Reformation Day celebration at the Brown's farm. The first thing we did was to eat hot dogs for dinner, and then we gathered in the Brown's tent and sang A Mighty Fortress is Our God. Then there were different families from our church that discussed five great reformers: Jan Huss, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, and Oliver Cromwell. We were going to burn Jan Huss in effigy, but there was a burning ban because of the drought so we couldn't do it, but one of the men from our church, Mr. Sides spoke about him, and all the things he did, what he preached about, his imprisonments, his trial, and his burning. He spoke against the Catholic church and was imprisoned for his denouncement of selling indulgences. Before he was burned, he said, "in 100 years, God will raise up a man whose calls for reform cannot be suppressed."

Mr. Sides acting as Jan Huss.

Then another family, the Breagys, did a skit about Martin Luther. First they had Shea and Claire walk around the stage with big signs with the city and the year on them. Then they had Stephen Breagy, who played Martin Luther, nail the 95 theses to the church door in Wittenburg, Germany.

Claire holding up a sign in front of the church door.

Then they had Grace, Shea and Claire come up and ask Stephen some questions about what he was preaching, what was wrong with indulgences, and things like that. Then Stephen read a short paper that he wrote, and Grace sung a song that he wrote, based on the 46 th psalm, to the tune of A Mighty Fortress is our God.

Grace, Shea, and Claire interviewing Stephen Breagy.

Next Timothy Orr came up and read a paper that he and his brother Josiah wrote about John Calvin, about his life in Geneva, and his preachings and doctrine. He is most noted for his commitment to the absolute sovereignty and holiness of God, and the doctrines of predestination, election and grace.

Timothy Orr reading his paper on John Calvin.

Then Mr. Tsantles came up and did an overview on Oliver Cromwell who was an army general, a member of Parliament, and a great reformer. Then two of his children, Allison and Taylor, read two of his letters to his daughters, one to his wife, and one to a friend.

Then our family came up onto the stage and did a reenactment from the writings of John Knox from a conversation between Mary Queen of Scots and himself. Joshua was John Knox, Stephen was a guard, and I, Rachel, was Queen Mary. Stephen brought in Joshua for me to discuss with him what he said about me. Then he talked to me for awhile, and then Stephen said that dinner was served, and took Joshua away.

Stephen, Joshua, and I on the stage.

Then Daddy came up and talked about why we should remember the Reformers, then we sang It Is Well With My Soul, then we had dessert, and then everybody left.