SHADOWS AND SUNSHINE

I was thinking about the fact that the work here is such a mix of happiness and sadness-sunshine and shadows, while I was driving up the hill to gather children for Sunday School. I always love to take in the beauty of the overlook when we go past it, and I saw the perfect illustration of my thoughts. I am not a wonderful photographer, but I tried to get an idea of the sunshine and shadow patchwork on the buttes. We started out this morning and arrived very early for church. It was very cold this morning, and Ray worked at the bus, trying to get it to start. It seems to have a weak battery, and the starter refused to spin. Oh, well, buy a new battery! :) Our people started coming in for church, and they are always so upbeat and cheerful. However, this morning, they bore the bad news that the son of one of the men who has come to church here passed away Saturday afternoon. It was sad for everyone, as the death was so unnecesssary. We prayed much for him. The father came to the church later in the afternoon and spent a couple of hours with Ray as he worked through the initial grief and pain of this death. We will be coming back to Lower Brule this week to attend the wake and possibly the funeral of this young man. Sunday School was fun this afternoon, though we ended up exhausted when it was over. Happily, the weather warmed up a little, and the bus chose to start for us to take the kids back home. We had an especially long Sunday School because the children crafted a little Christmas decoration that involved a hot glue gun. Clever idea, Charlotte!! I only used the glue gun so that no one would get burned, and they waited in line and became bored. Ha! This will be a lesson to me. They were not bad, but the noise volume increased a bit. :)Today is the last week of the semester there at Lower Brule Community College, and I will be administering semester finals today. I have enjoyed working with my students, and I will miss some of them as they will not be my students again. I am leaving this semester, however, with new friends. That makes me happy.

Thank you for your interest in Lower Brule Wesley Chapel.