September/October 2009

Well, for some reason, the last update I wrote, did not save - sorry to all those who are trying to stay up to date with things here in Atlanta. I will try and give you a quick overview of the past 4 months!

Rhiana is doing really well. She is now enjoying 'High School' full time. She is now at 6 months post-op and has a month full of appointments and tests. She will have another MRI at the end of this month, which will determine how things have turned out with her spine surgery. She is having some pain in her left shoulderblade at the moment and is still very limited in the activities she can do (still nothing other than walking and a bit of bike riding). She is finding creative ways of picking things up (her feet are now her second set of hands!) and she is still unable to carry anything heavy. She has been diagnosed with 'Restrictive Lung Disease' since her surgery. This is due to one of her lungs being compressed by the spine - the curve was around 80 degrees and was pushing on the lung, compressing it. They had hoped that once the curve was corrected, the lung would re-inflate - however this is not the case ..... yet! Please continue to pray for Rhiana - it's still quite a battle for her and yet she remains her very cheerful and optimistic self! Love her!

Jordan is doing very well in Middle School and still loving Math! (something I cannot understand for the life of me!) He is doing really well in his new soccer team - so far they have won all their matches this season. He has continued to enjoy playing both accoustic and electric guitar and has now joined the worship band and plays twice a month - plays and jumps around the stage!!

Trev is still working full-time at REVIVE and loving every minute of it! The store is still growing (actually, it's bursting at the seams!) We have now employed over 20 part-time staff, from both the church and the community. Four of our staff have recently become Christians and two of them have now been baptised!!!!! SO EXCITING! We have recently had two other Newfrontiers churches send people to get training in starting a consignment store in their area and we really look forward to seeing those start and flourish. It really has been such a God-inspired idea in helping Church Planting!

RESTORE (the new initiative with the poor in our community) has already been affecting those around us. We are currently do a 'food run' every Friday, taking hot food and drinks to the homeless in Acworth and Woodstock. Through doing this, we have met a number of great guys (and gals), one of whom is now attending church and on the current ALPHA course!!! He has also just signed up to help on the 'set up' team on Sunday morning and has joined the team on the weekly 'food runs' to serve others in the same situation as himself! We are also serving a single lady who lives near to REVIVE who is very unwell with a brain tumor. She is struggling financially and having to live in a room at a long-stay motel. She cannot get out easily, can't drive and has almost become homeless twice since we got to know her. She has started attending Jubilee and we have someone from the church meeting with her weekly, to take her out shopping/for coffee etc. Please pray especially for a couple we are involved with helping. We got to know them around Christmas last year, after they had been living in their car. They are now coming to church and have both felt that they want to commit their lives to God and make some major changes in their lives. This has not been easy for them - in fact, it has been a HUGE battle. Please pray that God will give them both the strength they need, in getting help and trusting Him to provide for them in that. At times it has felt too much for them and yet they are still pressing forward. Please also pray for wisdom in how we should help them. We are very involved in their lives right now and are really relying on God's leading and sustaining in this very difficult situation.

Well, the sun is out and the floods have pretty much subsided around us - it was a really bad couple of weeks for a lot of neighborhoods around us. For those that hadn't heard, we had major flooding here a couple of week's ago. Many have lost their homes, and belongings. Temporary shelters where put up in various counties, and hundreds of people were evacuated and will now be trying to get their lives back on track as the shelters close. Please pray that we, as a church, will be able to bless many of these families, through REVIVE and RESTORE and that our resources stretch far enough to do so!

Thank you all for your on-going prayers and love and support. We really look forward to being back at Christmas for a couple of weeks and seeing some of you then!

God bless!

May Update

Well, Rhiana's progress has been amazing. She is now pretty much doing everything for herself - except bending and lifting - this she is not allowed to do for a couple of months yet. She will not be able to do any sport/exercise for a year but other than that she is doing great. She is 3 inches taller (same height as Mum now and still growing!!!), she is beautifully straight and learning to keep her new posture (since a lot of her muscles were so over-stretched before the surgery). She is no longer in pain which is wonderful and on no medication now! PRAISE THE LORD. She is able to now sit for long periods of time, without getting back ache (which was such a problem with the curve!) One thing we would really appreciate your prayers on - Rhiana now has a shunt in her spinal column, which is to drain off any fluid. As you know, after her brain surgery last year, she was experiencing a lot of headaches, which was because of a build up of fluid on her spinal column. In the past couple of weeks Rhiana has had a couple of fairly mild headaches when laughing or coughing and we would we ask that join us in praying that the fluid would not build up again and that the shunt (which is now surrounded with metal work and solid bone!) would do it's job and that she would be 'headache free' again! Rhiana will resume school in August when she starts High School!
Jordan is anxiously awaiting for school to end this Friday! He will then have 10 weeks holiday before starting Middle School! He is done extremely well this year and is especially happy to have been asked to join the worship team at Church, playing accoustic/electric guitar! He is trying out for a new soccer club this week and hopes to make the team so that he can get some play in during the summer holiday.
Trev has recently been asked to join the Leadership Team at Jubilee Church as an Elder which we are excited about and would appreciate your prayers towards. He is very busy, managing REVIVE, which is continually growing and making more money! We now have almost 4,000 consigners which is pretty mind-blowing. The challenge is continuing to grow in the space that we have (whoever thought that we couldn't fill 8,000 square feet was SO wrong!)
Tracy is really enjoying heading up RESTORE - Jubilee's latest initiative in helping the poor in the community. We are currently helping 9 families/individuals with varying needs and are now praying towards a venue that we can work from and would appreciate your prayers in finding somewhere and the provision of finances to rent the space. One of the ladies who came to us for help back in December last year, is now coming to church regularly with her husband and is being baptised this week!!! We are VERY excited about what God has in store for this community and are looking forward to seeing many peoples lives 'restored' and brought into the Kingdom!
That's about all for now! Thank you all for your continued love and support - we appreciate you all so much! God bless.

Sorry for the long delay in updates. Rhiana is doing very well. She is getting more and more active. We still have to help her get out of bed but she is taking walks up the road now. It is great to see her strengthening day by day and we still have not gotten used to how she looks so tall and elegant! She is still sleeping in the living room but she did do the stairs 3 times yesterday so that could soon change. Thank you so much for your prayers, love and support.

WE ARE HOME!!!!! The pain doctors prescribed a new pain killer for Rhiana that is in the form of a patch that lasts 3 days. We decided to go with it and just come home and try it out rather than stay in hospital. So far so good. The great thing is that we do not have to wake her during the night to give her pills. The car Journey was just about bearable for her. Thank you all for your prayers.

Hi Everyone! Rhiana is doing well. Infact we have the all clear to go home as soon as they get her pain medication sorted. A bit frustrating really as they should have done more about that by now. However, hopefully we will be home tomorrow. Rhiana can walk now with no other support than just my hand. We can almost get her out of bed with only one of us helping her. Please pray re the painful journey home.

Good news! Rhiana has just emptied her bladder! We think that we have finally got the medication rite too!! Her breathing is still an issue but it has improved. She is still not eating but that is not too unusual. Thank you so much for your prayers. Rhiana is doing well with walking, tomorrow she has to attempt going up 5 steps.

Ok so you will all be pleased to hear that Rhiana has farted. She has also walked a full lap around the nurses station. Her lung capacity has increased quite a lot too. Unfortunately Rhiana has some fairly hard things to get through still and we would appreciate your prayers. She is back on a catheter. It is almost exactly the same situation as the last surgery, they removed the catheter, Rhiana was unable to go, they re catheterised her to empty and then removed it, Rhiana was still unable to go, they catheterised her and left it in and now she has an infection down there. She is also struggling with her pain medication which is causing her to hallucinate seeing people in the room who are not there etc. Please please pray about her breathing. She is struggling to breath while she is asleep and it is horrible to watch. At its worst she only takes a breath when she is desperate for it and then she gasps for air. This often semi wakes her and she whimpers because she feels as if she is suffocating but then immediately stops breathing again. This could be due to the pain medication but they are also talking about this possibly being a lasting issue. It is also very painful still. She still has not eaten. On a positive note she has not had recurrence of the headaches that she had after the last surgery.