Philadelphia, NY

Trey and I spent Spring Break in Philadelphia, NY. He was preaching the revival at Indian River Baptist Church, and a generous donor from the church purchases a ticket for Owen Ray and I to be able to accompany him for the week. I was a little hesitant about traveling with a 19 month old, but Owen Ray was a real champ. I had been to New York twice before in college, but I had only seen NYC. Upstate New York (or The North Country as they call it) is completely different. Philadelphia is very rural, quaint even, and only 20 minutes from the Canadian border.
During our trip we stayed with a wonderful family from the church, which consisted of an army doctor, his wife, and their four teenage kids. Young-ae, the matriarch of the family, was THE MOST AMAZING COOK. We also got to share meals with five other families while we were out there, and it was neat to visit with them in their home and get to know them over great food.

The highlight of the trip for Trey and I was visiting Lake Placid. Pastor Barry and Leisa of Indian River Baptist Church took us to Lake Placid Baptist Church which is a sort of mission effort on the part of the North American Mission Board. The pastor there, Derek, showed us the various ministries that are going on in the church. He was recently a chaplain at the Vancouver Olympics. This was a great fit because Lake Placid is one of the few places in the US where American athletes can prepare for Olympic competition. Thus, the church and Derek have a great opportunity to build relationships with people who otherwise live very transient lives. It was great to hear from him about how the Lord was working and moving during the Olympics, and even how the luge tragedy was being used by God to bring glory to Himself. I loved seeing the way that they were using their building to serve the needs of a community. They were hesitant to build a gym, but decided to go forward with the project in order to provide a safe, accessible place to the community. The church offers the use of the gym free of charge and even provides a free bounce house if families want to host birthday parties there. What a great way to form realtionships and make connections in the coumminity in the hopes of planting seeds. There youth room is being revamped to inlcude an internet cafe because the community has a large group of international seasonal workers that do not have a reliable or affordable means to communicate with family and friends back at home. Again, a really neat way to pave the way for friendships to be formed through service. Trey and I were most impressed with the way that LPBC seemed to have a very good sense of the unique aspects of their setting and the unique needs of their community that they could help to meet.