With both the recent arrival of the Caruso family and Dr. Veasey joining us this weekend as a part of our Grasping God’s Word journey, Julie and I have found ourselves reminiscing about our time in New Orleans (where we first met all of the above serving together at the seminary). As a part of that walk down memory lane, I recalled a summer where my friend, Garrett, and I worked our way through the various flavors at the numerous snowball stands throughout the city, Sal’s and Hansen’s in particular.
While it may seem obvious, a New Orleans snowball, anywhere else, is going to be called a snow cone to some, shaved ice to others. In any case, it’s a mound of fluffy, shaved ice, flavored with sweet syrups – blue, raspberry, wedding cake, iced coffee, etc… and stuffed or topped with a plethora of mix-ins and add-ons – condensed milk, gummy bears… you get the idea!
While a part of the purpose of our area gatherings has been to share vision and direction, it has also been a valuable time of listening. And one of the takeaways I’ve heard the Holy Spirit speaking through you has been – in addition to our calling to pursue becoming disciples and disciple-makers – there is also a longing to build and strengthen who we are as a community. Simply said, we need more opportunities to just hang out and be the family we call ourselves.
So, with that in mind, while we brainstorm even more ideas, I wanted to let you know about two things coming up:
- Starting tomorrow, for the month of July (with the exception of Camp Winshape, July 8 – 12) our playground is going to be available from 9:00am – 12N for any families simply wanting to organize a playdate. (I’ll provide more information in my announcements.)
- Sunday, July 7, we’ve asked Jay Mauga to bring his Shaved Ice Truck as a simple opportunity to hang around for a few minutes and maybe meet some other members of our faith family while you a little refreshment. It’s on us, so enjoy!
I love this family!