Hey everyone! And once again, it's Jess here, although luckily this time it isn't due to Lorna oversleeping.

Yesterday, after the fence painting at Wesley Woods was called off during the rain, we met at the church for our lunch, before splitting into two groups and visiting two residential homes for the elderly. The group I was in visited a home called Echo Ridge, where we were given the chance to sing, talk to the residents, and join in with their game of 'beanbag baseball!' The other group visited Shannondale Nursing Home, where they were divided into smaller teams, and went and spoke to several of the residents.

Later that afternoon, were all met up again in order to have a team meeting, to discuss the events of the afternoon. Many of us were extremely affected by meeting the residents. We were encouraged by the good spirits and fun nature of many, particularly Charlie at Echo Ridge, yet many who visited Shannondale found it difficult and sad to spend time with these more elderly and infirm residents who perhaps were very lonely, and nearing the end of their lives with all the associated health and mental health issues.

For dinner that night, went to a place called Petro's which served chilli. I think I can speak for everyone in saying that it was really quite delicious. After our meal there, we headed down to the Worlds Fair Park, for TNT. This is the mid-week session for High School students of CSPC, and so we were given the opportunity to meet with new people, who weren't members of the LINK team. We also played an England vs. America football (soccer!) game, and I'm delighted to report that the score was 6-2 to us! Nearer the end of our evening there, most of us participated in running through the fountains at the park, which soaked us all through, but it was definitely worth it. Also, for the first time since leaving the plane at Knoxville, we were given the opportunity for some separate FourForty time, as were the team from CSPC. It was good to be able to realise how much of a 'family spirit' FourForty has now, and we realised how lucky we are to have such a close and unique connection.

Today was spent downtown in Knoxville, at a place called Lonsdale. This one of the poorer parts of the inner city, and we were able to help with starting a community garden there, where food crops will hopefully be able to be grown in the future. In order to start this garden however, we given the rather unenviable task of shovelling 'Zoo Poo,' from Knoxville City Zoo, to act as a natural fertiliser for the garden. This has definitely been the most physically exhausting day yet, but to look at all of our work at the end was extremely satisfying, and we hope that the new scheme of the community gardens will be successful.

After this, everybody headed home to take a much-needed shower, and small group of people have gone out to buy the breakfast food for our work at the Volunteer Ministry Centre tomorrow morning. The rest of us are enjoying spending time with our host families once more. Hopefully there will be some more to report tomorrow about how we all spent our time!

Tomorrow morning is going to be a very early start, because we will be serving breakfast at the Volunteer Ministry Centre, which means that we'll have to meet at the church at 5:15 am! Hopefully everyone will be there on time, and that no-one will be too exhausted!

Thanks for praying!

Serving, playing and wondering

So Jess was being super kind yesterday when she wrote that I was "getting ready to go out". The truth of the matter is that I managed to completely ignore my alarm and was woken up by Jess and Nicole saying "eerrr...Lorna...it's 7:30" which was met with a giant leap out of bed and sprint to the shower.... I hate those kinds of mornings!!

Yesterday was a good day! We spent the morning on "Knoxville Secret Service" and had the opportunity to split into two teams and travel round to 3 high schools each and pray on their grounds. It was a great opportunity to learn more about serving in unseen ways, with the likelihood of never seeing tangible outcomes to our prayers this side of eternity. What a challenge to think about what it means to serve secretly......

We then went downtown to the Volunteer Ministry Centre where three separate sub teams shopped for, prepared, and served lunch. In our team time yesterday evening, Jack shared how he had been particularly impacted by a guy who just invited him into conversation. It mattered little to him about the circumstances each found themselves in, or indeed what side of the planet they came from, it was just two guys enjoying conversation.

As we finished up serving the meal, one of the homeless guys cranked out some Tennessee songs, and some Beatles on his guitar before playing one of his own songs for us. The line that stood out to most was simply "being homeless isn't fun". It sounds like such a simple line yet to stand and listen to this guy pour out his heart as he sang, but also sing too of Jesus' love for him was really significant. Andreas commented yesterday on the gratefulness of those that we served and how they had so little yet were grateful for what we were offering. I guess we have a lot to learn about our expectations and supposed entitlements!

In the afternoon we headed into the mountains, and enjoyed playing in the river as well as clambering up a trail towards a waterfall. Many of the team; Harry, Nicole and Amber noticed how people's care for each other was very real and very valuable as we clambered about. God is definitely using this time to bind together 29 different people's hearts! It's beautiful.

The evening was spent at Camp Wesley Woods, with their camp evening meeting. It was fun to be in the forest, singing praise to the creator of the mountains, as we enjoyed being in them.

This morning we were supposed to be painting the fence at Camp Wesley Woods but it's pouring with rain. Rain and fence painting don't mix! Welcome to England in Knoxville! It's discouraging, but Damon and his team are making some phonecalls and we're praying that God would use our time this afternoon as an unexpected blessing somewhere to someone....we'll let you know!

Just a small seed...

Hi everyone! It's Jess here, due to Lorna being getting ready to go out.

So, yesterday was a fairly busy day; we started off serving at the Salvation Army centre in Knoxville. We were all involved in a variety of tasks, including serving food, shovelling pebbles and pairing up donated shoes. Everyone found the time spent there really worthwhile; it was a time to serve God while being able to unite together as a team. One of the things I noticed was that back when William Booth started the Salvation Army, his initial idea was just to preach to destitute people on the streets of London. Over a hundred years later, and a worldwide charity has been formed, helping and feeding thousands of people each day. I think this is just one example of how a seed can be planted by God and grow into something miraculous and amazing.

Right now, we're off to do 'Secret Service,' which is something of a suprise, followed by shopping, serving, and preparing food for a soup kitchen. This evening we're off to spend the night at the Barton's cabin in the montains, which means if we don't update tomorrow, no need to worry!

That's it for now...thanks for praying!

Every tribe and tongue and nation...

The book of Revelation in the Bible talks about heaven, and refers to a scene in which people from every tribe, tongue and nation will join together in worshipping God. Clearly, we can't say today has been that exactly, but most definitely a glimpse! A chance to see what it looks like to be God's people together irrespective of nationality. What joy to sing new songs with new friends, and familiar songs with people that serve the same God but live thousands of miles away, to hear God's word and pray together.

We had a great morning at church, kicking off with the high school (FourForty age) Sunday school group and then into "big church". Damon had a moment to introduce the history of the LINK, which involved photos..on LARGE screens, multiple large screens in fact! It was cool for us to hear the story again and see how God has been at work in the last 5 years. The afternoon was spent with our hosts; involving, for different folk, meals in various restaurants and homes, adventures to the mountains, and downtown as well as looking around the famous Neyland Stadium. Our evening involved some opportunities to play together at the church before continuing to dig around in Luke 13 and Philippians 2 as well as taking a chunk of time to pray together.

Tomorrow will be a day serving with the Salvation Army; manual labour shovelling shingle, sorting clothes, serving in a charity shop and some other quiet, mainly unseen opportunities to be others focussed.

Everyone is in high spirits, we're looking forward to serving together. We see God at work. We're thankful for you all.

Getting stuck in...

Evening all!

We're back from a full day. The earliest recorded wakeup was Chloe at 3am though some of us weren't far behind at 5.30am ish. A few unamed boys however made it through to 8ish... Impressive!

We spent the morning at church; playing a game together, learning about our week and committing to pray together and for each other. We learnt together about the power of unhidden, small things from Jesus teaching about the mustard seed in Luke 13:18-19 and have been challenged to be "noticers" of those things.

You'll be pleased to hear that Jess, Nicole and our new friend Haley are here with me and they're going to take over now...but I might come back later. Watch out!

Hi everyone! Jess here now. So, as Lorna said, the morning was spent at church, followed by lunch. Some of us, myself included, were very excited by the fact it was in brown paper bags! We then went down to a local outdoor swimming pool, where we spent the afternoon, swimming and just hanging out. The weather was really sunny, so lots of sun cream was applied over this time!

After a bit of time spent at our various hosts' homes, we went to see a baseball game! The two teams were the Tennessee Smokies and the Mississippi Braves. Unfortunately, the Smokies lost 4-1, but it was still really great, and a good time was had by all!

Me again! Tomorrow promises to be a full day, worshipping with the Cedar Springs Family al lmorning and spending time with our hosts, in the afternoon before more time as a team reflecting on God's word and looking towards Monday's activities...more on that tomorrow!

What a gift it was to us as leaders to sit towards the back of our group at the baseball game and see US and UK student talking, laughing, and enjoying being together. We are so looking forward to what God is going to do in and amongst us as a larger team. Please continue to pray for the relationships that are growing and for the picture that is of God's kingdom.

ps lots of your children have new hats.

pps I am using a borrowed computer. If you are missing your child's beautiful face check out Lea's blog (www.kellylondonmission.blogspot.com). If you aren't...you can look anyway!

Love from us all. x

Safe and Sound

We're here! Had a slightly mad dash to catch the connection but the team were BRILLIANT! Really on the ball, did absolutely everything perfectly, looked out for each other; couldn't have been a better start.

We had a massive welcoming committee at the airport and we're now all at our host families homes for the rest of the evening and then bed! Tomorrow is a full but slower day getting to know each other and what we'll be up to. We're excited!

Thanks for praying!

And they're off...well nearly!

In about 23 hours we will be touching down in Knoxville, Tennessee.  I'm not sure if any of us really know what these next ten days will look like...which I think is great actually.  Ten days of living life together; loving God, serving the folk of Knoxville and wondering about how big or small the world really is!  We leave Gatwick at 10:10am UK time tomorrow, Friday 24th August.  We'll arrive pretty much 12 hours later.  And the adventures will be just beginning!

Just one more thing right now...

Lea Kelly will be postingon LINK 09 from her perspective on www.kellylondonmission.blogspot.com.

Whoever you are...

Whoever you are as you read this; this is a place to read all that is written.  It's a community blog I suppose!  It may be that folk will write comments to you, the readers, as much as to the LINK team, the writers.   In fact that's already happened!  Feel free to explore what others are saying...

You're welcome in the story...

This is a place to come to to get updates on our time in Knoxville.  We'll try and post daily but that won't always be possible.  Others may also post on our behalf.  I can't guarantee that there won't be some ponderings and musings from me along the way!  Please do comment, so we can share those together.  Looking forward to some adventures together...

Beginnings...

LINK 09 : London is Near Knoxville began way back in 2002 when I spent 2 months at an outdoor centre in Costa Rica and had the opportunity to work alongside a team from Cedar Springs Presbyterian Church when they came to that same camp for a week.  Funny how some folks just connect isn't it?!  Several emails, phone calls and years went by and I found myself on staff at that same church, as High School Intern working for Damon Kelly and Lucinda McCay between June 2004 and June 2006.  A fantastic 2 years working alongside new friends and high school students was not, thankfully, to come to a close in a neat fashion and buried deep in the annals of church history.  LINK was born! In 2005, I led a team from Cedar Springs, back here to Wallington to get stuck into some locals schools.  This was followed by a visit from the Kelly family in October 2006, a team in Summer 2007 and again in 2008 and most recently 2009 (last week in fact!)  Now it's time to REVERSE THE TIDE.  We are heading West to serve and learn and grow alongside our American friends.  What God is up to in all this is yet to be seen but it's exciting to be a part of His big story!