“I think there were many memories. Making smores over the fire. Having great talks while hiking through the woods. Card games by a colman lantern. Laughing at Alan’s Praying Bear Joke. Or just the importance of desperately seeking God through prayer and doing it first, not relying on yourself first.”

The weekend started with everyone trickling into the campsite as early as 3 pm.  Everyone set up their tents and gathered their tent chairs around a crackling fire by 8 pm that evening.  We sang together and had a great lesson by Alan Hess.  Alan asked us to imagine what God's Facebook page would be like and what would he gift us or "throw" at us.  He encouraged us to think of God intimately and personally.  After the lesson we had the campfire favorite – smores! 

After a good night's sleep everyone woke up to a wonderful breakfast of crepes and berries, thanks to Buzz!  The amazing breakfast was followed up by a lesson from Buzz about the power of prayer.  He talked about the story in Joshua 10, where Joshua prays for the sun to ... More »

Mount St. Helens

The middle of July 1979 Lisa and I pulled into Concord, Massachusetts and stopped at an ice cream spot where I learned that a milk shake in New England is not what it is anywhere else in America. We'd driven all the way up from Chattanooga in a rented Toyota Corolla to visit Kip and Elena and the Lexington church of Christ with the notion that we might move there. Now we had to find the Gempel's house and since the national markers had not yet been placed pointing the way to their famous living room, I had to make a phone call to get directions. Throwing away my milk with a little squirt of chocolate, I found a pay phone in the corner and dropped a quarter...I think it was a quarter then, could have been a dime or maybe even Indian beads...and waited. After a couple of rings someone picked up and I heard an incredibly deep, "Hello?" I was surprised to find out it belonged to a kid two years younger than me. That was the first time I met Doug Arthur. I'd be listening to that voice for the next three decades. It's a voice that comforted me through thousands, yes literally thousands, of miles in 2003 when I was crying, driving from chicken farm to chicken farm wondering if God would ever let me ... More »

Steve and Lisa Johnson with Mike and Anne-Brigitte Taliaferro

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, "Your God reigns!"  Isaiah 52:7

Mike and Anne-Brigitte Taliaferro paid us a visit this past week. Coming all the way up from San Antonio, Texas, they graciously extended the 'right hand of fellowship' to us and encouraged us to trust in the awesome power of God for all of our needs. In fact, that was the message Mike preached to the congregation on Wednesday evening which can be heard on our website and inspired so many of us here. Along with the Scriptures he preached, we were all encouraged to hear him tell good news from other brothers and sisters who are serving the Lord with all their hearts around the world. God does reign. Always has; always will.

Mike and A.B. are legends in some church circles and not total strangers to folks here in Portland. Mike has written many books which we've had on our book table in the back of services since before I moved here in '06. "The Lion Never Sleep ... More »