~7000 Miles To Go~

Today we left to go on a 7000 mile, 5 and 1/2 week long road trip out west. We usually do one big long west trip every year and one or two smaller ones. This trip we are going to be in South Texas, West Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Colorado, and finally end up in Tennessee! We have never been to California before as a family so we are excited about that! We ask all of you to pray for us to have a safe, breakdown free, trip! Also, please help us pray that we will have people saved and that we will be an encouragement everywhere we go. We are so excited about what the Lord is going to do!                                   Sometimes people ask us what we do with ourselves while we are traveling. Well we sing a LOT! Most of our practicing gets done while we are riding down the road. Also, we watch movies, read, get school work done, work on blog posts, pretty much anything we do at home we can do on the bus. We also do a LOT of fellowshiping! Haha! You would think we wouldn't have anything to talk about since we are together all of the time but somehow we manage to find things. I love sitting around and talking as a family. I think it makes us closer when we share things that are on our minds or even if it is just something funny that's happened. I really think that a family that prays together, and that communicates together, stays together! I know it makes us stronger as a family. We love what we do but I'm pretty sure we wouldn't love it as much if we didn't get along. Sure, not everyone gets along ALL the time. I mean goodness, we are in a 45 foot bus! There are going to be some struggles! LOL! But with the Lords help we can overcome whatever struggles we have. We are excited to see what the Lord has in store not only on this trip, but in our ministry as a whole. We are praying that He will work greatly through us! 

~Brianna, The Hero~

So this past week something new happened to us that had never happened before! We pulled up into the church to get our equipment out of the bus and we couldn't get the door opened! We couldn't figure out what in the world was keeping it from opening! We got a flashlight and turns out there was a little screw stuck in the door! Momma and Daddy tried different ways to get it out but we soon realized we weren't going to be able to get it out without a screw driver. Not a big deal right? Well, it wouldn't be except all the tools were underneath the bus. Yep, we were in a pickle! I thought, "I bet we are the only singing group ever that had to cancel a meeting because they couldn't get out of their bus!" Obviously we made it out or you would've most likely heard about it on the news. Haha! We were able to get an emergency window open. Then we had to figure out who was going to be lowered out. It had to be a small person because the window opening isn't very big at all! So my little sister Brianna decided to brave it and volunteer. So we lowered her out the window and she was able to get a screwdriver out from under the bus and we finally got the door opened! Brianna was the hero for the day!! It was one of those stories where if I wasn't there, I wouldn't have believed it! We all said, "only we can get stuck inside our bus." Never a dull moment around here!

*You Can Rise*

Many of us have been through hard times. You wake up and wish to go to back to sleep because that's the only peace you can get. You see some  people have trials that everyone knows about, then others that are hidden and they have trapped inside of them. You never know what someone is going through. But one of the most wonderful things about being saved is that we don't have to bear our own burdens.1 Peter 5:7 says,

"Casting all your care upon Him; for he careth for you." 

It probably would sound crazy to an unsaved person to tell them not to worry but let someone whom they've never seen take care of their problems, but let me tell you the most real things in the world are not seen. 

I know it's so hard sometimes because we want to fix everything on our own, but God (I promise) will do a far better job fixing your problems. Sometimes it seems like there is no end, you think you will just have to live with worry, fear, or whatever it is, but you don't have to. God wants you to give them to Him because He can handle them a lot better. So have faith in Him and you will RISE out of your darkness. 

Micah 7:8 

"Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness The Lord shall be my light." Through Him you can rise!

*The For Real Stage Fright*

When you are in front of people all the time you need to be prepared for anything. You can see things from the stage that's going on that no one else can see. You see people walking around talking, kids acting up, it can get interesting! We've even been in services where people have had seizures and had to be taken by ambulance to the hospital. I think the scariest things that happened while we were singing was about 6 or 7 years ago. We were on stage and right in the middle of the service these gangster looking guys came in with long black coats. Keep in mind that this was in the middle of July in the south so it was about 90 degrees outside! And if that wasn't strange enough, one of the men had one hand inside his coat like he was holding a gun! Now, I've seen this kind of thing in movies before so you can just imagine the scenarios that were going through my mind. I thought to myself, " I am going to die. It's going to be all over the news that two guys came into the church service and shot the singers." I was preparing for the worst as you can tell. I just knew we were going to be one of those martyr's that go down through history that have given their lives for the cause of Christ. Well, turns out they just came in and sat down and they stayed for the whole service and then left right afterwards! I guess I will never know about the coats or why the guy kept his hand in his jacket. Oh well, I'm kind of glad! Haha! I feel like they were up to something and the Lord protected us from it. So that is the story of how we survived a gangster attack on the church. ;) It just goes to show you that when you travel and sing, "there just ain't no tellins" as my Dad would say, what will happen! 

~Stay In The Fathers House~

Sometimes as young people you think that the world looks fun. It may be "fun", but it has it's consequences. In Luke 15:11-24 the prodigal son, I'm sure, did not think that going out into the world and seeing what it was like, was going to take every bit of his happiness, money, and comfort away and so much more! As the old saying goes, "sin will take you farther than you want to go and cost you more than you wanna pay." He took one step away from his fathers house and the next thing you know, he's in a pen eating with pigs. People sometimes make it sound like once you get away from The Lord you can always just run back to him. Will The Lord take you back? Yes of corse! Will you be the same person as when you left? No, you'll have scars and lose some things you will never get back. Will you ever go back? Not everyone does. If you have stayed with the stuff do not give up now! What is the best way to stay in the fathers house? Stay IN The Fathers house (church). Have a personal relationship with God, read your bible and pray. Don't even look out of the windows, don't go in the yard stay away from even seeing the world. You will never regret it! And if you are out in the world run back to Him. His arms are open wide. A part of verse 20 says, "When he was a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him." And then there was that elder son; he would be a good topic for another  blog. 

*~Mirror, Mirror~*

When you look into the mirror, all you see is your physical self. It doesn't show anything about your character or your likes and dislikes. It doesn't show who you really are. I have heard and said many times, "you just need to be yourself." And in a way, that is true! God created us all different and we don't need to try and be like other people. But I've been thinking, is "myself" who I really want to be? The Bible says in Romans 7:18, "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not." I know me. I have failed the Lord so many times I can't even count! My flesh thinks wicked thoughts, my flesh lies, my flesh wants to rebel against what I know is right! I don't want to be myself because I am a sinner. The only good that I have in me was put there by Christ when I got saved! So who do I want to be like? Well, the only one that hasn't ever thought anything wicked, that has never lied, that is always perfect is Jesus! He has NEVER failed! I could never be anything like that in my own strength but by His grace and His power I want to do my best to pattern my life after the life of Christ! So from now on instead of being me, I want to be like Jesus!          

                                          

 

Beauty Unexpected

About a year ago we were out in Colorado, kind of out in the middle of nowhere, at a church. It didn't really seem like there was anything around there to do. Well, my dad likes to hike so they told him of a place about 5 miles away. He went and came back and said that all of us needed to go because it was really pretty. We thought it would just be another tourist place that might have some cool rocks or something. So the next day we went and it was one of the most beautiful things we had ever seen!  

That night we went to church and told some of the people who lived there how beautiful it was, but some of them had never even been there before. Sometimes God has the most amazing things in the most unexpected places.