Joy Hankins
Last week as soon as I got back into the office I got the call that my Aunt had died. She has had heart trouble for quite some time. When we were home last December to visit the family for Christmas we wanted to go and visit as she had recently moved out of my home town and to the east side of Michigan with her oldest son. Unfortunately we didn't make it over. I hadn't visited with her since last summer when she was still in town and made her regular visit to see us. Joy was a cake decorator for most of her life and I can't count how many cakes she made for my brothers and I as a kid, even as an adult, let alone my wedding cake and graduation cake that I still remember very well. I also remember her for her very powerful opera like voice that she was very proud of. She would sing an old hymn or favorite classic and literally raise the roof off the place. I know because I always sat next to her at church and even though I loved to hear her when she sang and did solos in the service my ears would ring all day long after-words.

The funeral was Saturday in Michigan and I needless to say spent my whole day at church here in Northern Arizona fulfilling my responsibilities for our 7 weekend services including our Good Friday set, Sunrise service and regular Easter services. I was happy she was in a better place and not in so much pain anymore but felt bad that I wasn't able to make it to the funeral services which put a damper on the weekend as a whole and was a big challenge. I just wanted to be present for the service and celebrate her life there in person.

Saturday evening in our first service I reached my point and I began to think about the events of the day as I was leading worship. Aunt Joy had always been a huge encouragement to me in my music ministry. Even when I left to go to college to study music I remember her excitement about it. As part of our worship we sang "How Great Is Our God" with the chorus of the old favorite, "How Great Thou Art" at the end. It was at that moment that I had an amazing thought about what was happening right there in the middle of our worship.

As I was singing and leading l could picture her also singing before God and belting out those high notes as she has always done. But now she like so many others was able to sing those praises to the Lord face to face. (luckily I'm sure God enjoys praise even if it makes His ears ring.) Amazingly enough at that same time I was also there singing too. Somewhere in that crowded throne room I was there leading my congregation in where she already was before God in ultimate worship of Him.

It sounds very strange and Sci-Fi I know but as I continued to think about it I realized how true it was. Through worship we all have access to the throne room and come together with everyone on earth and those who have gone before in a supernatural way to meet for the same purpose. To worship the King. We all can gather together in that place, before God, at anytime.

Both of us were in the presence of God, in worship and that was very awesome. I didn't get to visit her over the holidays or be there for the celebration of her life but in that moment we had the honor of doing something even greater, together.

So there we were on that Saturday.....
Joy face to face with God.
Me, singing & leading others in music to God and being surrounded by His presence.
Joy celebrating a new life in heaven and
me, celebrating new life through the ressurection and the Joy we've been given over death.

Thank You..... for Joy.

My Adventures of January/February 2008
It's February of 08 already and I just noticed it's been quite a while since I blogged last. The past two months have flown by since we got back from out visit to MIchigan and we have had a continual dumping of snow here in Arizona. Who would have figured. We've gotten at least 12 to 17 inches 4 different times and I think the end is near.

In Michigan over the holidays and into the first week of January we visited family and friends in Buchanan, Grand Rapids, Jackson, Woodhaven and Corunna pretty much covering the whole bottom half of the state but never had as much snow as here. We actually sepnt alot of time sledding on many different hills but when we got back home we got another several days of sledding time and the kids about 5 days off school. I have never been sledding this much in my life. (can you make a living doing this?) We have an awesome hill on the 14th hole of the golf behind our house and if you get a good start you can make it literally about halfway down the fairway. Pretty hilarious.

This past weekend I went with some friends up to Pagosa Springs, Colorado to Ski at Wolf Creek. Skiing was a blast but the road trip part in itself was worth it all. I had never been to Colorado before and it was beautiful and snowy. Then I made a wrong turn on the way back into New Mexico and we got to see alot of great views up by Monument Valley. Cruising through the northern Arizona stretch was pretty different. On the sun setting on the snowy mountains on one side and the rocky monumental pillars on the other. Stars were glowing through the sunroof and David Crowder playing on the car stereo. It was a pretty amazing setting to say the least.

There is a whole lot of nothing out there. Open land and random gigantic rock formations that make you stop and think how in the world did this happen? God certainly had something different in mind when he laid all this out. In fourth grade I remember hearing about my principal's visit to the four corners and on our way back we stopped there. Speaking of nowhere, its amazing how exactly in the middle of nowhere this place is. I wonder how many people actually visited this spot and stood on this small marking on the ground to make their claim to fame that they stood in four states at one time. Whatev(then I wonder how long it took them to actually find this location.) Whatever the case. I was one of those people and enjoyed the stop and the road trip with everyone. Below are a handful of pictures and some of the group at each place.

December
In the past 4 weeks a ton has happened here and I got some great pictures so I wanted to share. It all started on Thanksgiving as we had our small group over for a huge feast. I actually a few days before managed for the first time ever to put all our outside lights up and started spinning the Christmas music. I have never done that before so Im not sure what's wrong with me.














If that wasnt strange enough late on Thanksgiving day over 80 elk showed up in our back yard and hung out to have Thanksgiving dinner on the green. Here's a picture as we spotted them around the corner a few days later.




















In Phoenix a couple weeks ago Kathy and I drove by a group of hot air balloons landing in the sunset and got alot of pics. It was a beautiful day and
of course great weather for December


Speaking of crazy for the past four months we have been working on ou Christmas musical which we finally did last weekend. It went great as over 1300 people came and were touched by the story and the message. (pictured below is Kathys scene with the Grinch.)




Also last weekend we got pounded with almost 20 inches of snow so the kids got two snow days and we spent 3 afternoons building a snowman, sledding and making forts. Check out these awesome pictures taken in the snow.

The Ginny Owens/ Jamie Slocum concert
Here are some pictures of the concert and me playing the with the band on a song.

California Adventure 07
We finally got to make our annual California trip this past weekend so we headed out on Friday and drove over to Irvine, CA just south of LA for our 4 day vacation.

On the first day, Saturday we spent the whole day at our families favorite southern California hangout, Laguna Beach. Its an amazingly beautiful beach with a great view of the town and the ocean. Let alone the fun spent jumping waves is the tide pools you can find at the southern end of the beach. The kids love these spots as you can spend hours exploring muscle shells, small fish, am and even a star fish.
As always we cram alot of things into a very short time so while we were there we also did another drive down Hollywood Blvd., a tour through NBC studios (where somewhere Tom Cruise and Jay Leno were getting ready for the show.) a day at Knotts Berry Farm, a visit to Mr. Bones Pumpkin Patch in Beverly Hills and a service at the Mosaic Church to hear Erwin Mcmanus speak. Great time and the kids had a blast. I have a ton of pics I'm putting online so you can check out the trip and everything we did. Click HERE to see the pics!

Family, Fall, Flagstaff

So it's fall around through the Aspens and pines near the peaks to see the fall colors with our friends Joel, Monite and their kids (Justin seen in the bottom right of the climbing picture) Flagstaff is a very unique place as outside of all its ponderosa pines you can find many fall colors. On our hike near the peaks there were not only great colors but all kinds of other strange things around the forest (like piles of lava rocks, pine cones the size of softballs, engravings on most of the trees and strange whistle as the wind passed through the leaves at the top of the trees. What a very awesome place to see God's handiwork and spend a fun fall afternoon.

Summers Almost Over!

Believe it or not the summers almost over and here I am chillin in our hotel room, We wrapped up our first summer here in Flagstaff by actually heading out of town and spending the weekend at the Hyatt Regency downtown Phoenix (for $49 a night thanks to Hotwire.com!!) , riding the slides at Sunsplash water park, hitting the outlet stores in Happy Valley and having Ethan's birthday in the revolving restaurant 24 floors up. Of course it was a blazing 108 all weekend but we had a cool time getting away. School starts here on Thursday and the summer is over. I hope to get all the pictures of ou summer here in Flag on the site soon.