Pacific, our final stop, already had a special place in our hearts. Earlier this year, many of the ladies and girls in the church did a study on Sweet Journey. They had enjoyed their time in God’s Word while developing a sweeter walk with Him. This was part of their motivation for inviting us to stop at their church on this trip. When we scheduled Pacific, we decided that the first evening would be a conference and the second evening a concert with preaching.

Tuesday, was a restful day. We went over to the pastor’s home for lunch (thank you all!) and fellowship. In the afternoon, we set up the book tables, for the final time on the trip, and caught up on computer things.

We presented different sessions than we normally give during an evening conference, and they went well. I don’t have pictures of each session, because it was not convenient to go into the rooms without being a distraction. My photos can easily be a distraction in two ways. One way involves the location of the door I need to use to enter the room where the session is going. The second is the shutter sound of my camera. It causes those in the room to turn to look. Back in Chicago, during the panel discussion, I was holding my camera when Dad took it to take a few photos while we were answering the questions. As I heard the shutter click, I thought to myself, “No wonder I’m a distraction in the young people’s session when I take pictures. That click was pretty loud!” That evening, as we were having our post-conference chat in the bus, it came out that Dad had accidentally left his microphone on when he took the photos – a good explanation for an unusually loud shutter click. We all had a good laugh!

On Wednesday the church held a ladies’ luncheon for Mom to talk about scheduling and answer questions. It was a great, small group time, and I loved hearing Mom share!

That afternoon, the younger five practiced music in preparation for the evening concert. It was hard for us to believe that we were down to only one more evening!

Living in the bus is part of being on the road, and that teaches us patience! One can’t move more than five feet without bumping into someone. I’m serious. When preparing for a conference, you might find four of us in a small area: one using the mirror to fix hair, one brushing their teeth, another waiting for the mirror, and yet someone else wanting to get through the hallway.

We still have Mr. Mouse living at large on the bus. Although he was only spotted once, we found evidence that he had chewed into the oats bag. We have set several traps but no success as of yet.

Back to Wednesday. I had gone inside early, and before long an elderly man came in. He had heard about the concert the week before and drove about thirty miles to come! As we talked, my heart was so grateful to the Lord for the blessing of allowing us to share with others. That evening I was also delighted to see the groom’s mom from a recent wedding that Christopher and I had photographed and to be able to chat with her. Pack up time went very quickly. We had great help, and one man actually trucked out all the boxes for Jesse!

Our desire is that the Lord Jesus be glorified and that He would bring lasting fruit from each trip on which He sends us. We have seen clearly His purpose for every conference. We praise Him for the fruit He has given!

We look forward to four months’ of home time. It is a joy to be here and settling into everyday life.

Serving Jesus,
Sarah

“The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned,
that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary:
he wakeneth morning by morning,
he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned.”
Isaiah 50:4