Jesus and Java

This weekend marks a huge turning point in the lives of a few friends here in Durham.

Jeremy Copeland, a close friend and church planter moved his family to Durham North Carolina from Southern California about the same time we moved here. Jeremy is the lead pastor of story church and this Sunday marks the official launch of their church plant here in Durham. Another friend I meet through Copeland, an Irishman named Alastiar Vance is leading worship for Story Church and does a brilliant job. His family moved here from the UK awhile back.

If you’re new to the area or have been here awhile, or maybe you have tried other churches or given up on church all together I would encourage you to check them out. Service starts at 10AM, below is the address, but don’t trust your GPS the school where they meet just opened this year.

Spring Valley Elementary School
2051 Northern Durham Parkway
Durham, NC 27703

So I’m asking those who read my blog to take some time this weekend and over the next few weeks and months to commit to pray for Story Church and the ministry God has already allowed them to do in Durham. You can follow Jeremy on twitter @pastorcope, Story Church @storychurch, and Alastair @alastairvance to keep up to date on what God is doing.

Midnight dinners at Duke can be very delicious but I doubt very healthy. My chicken salad sandwich will satisfy the taste-buds nicely with it’s green leafy stuff, sharp cheddar cheese, mayo, tomato, and banana peppers, all spread out on a couple nice pieces of sourdough bread. I forgot to mention the extra pickles the lady tossed in for good measure. Yummy.

Lauren is doing pretty good. She was moved out of the PICU late this evening and we now have a private room on the floor. This was not supposed to happen until at least Monday. It has it’s mixed blessings. The reason it happened sooner then later is due to the tear in her spinal drain tubing. They had to take it out to reduce the risk of infection which could be really bad since it is literal draining CSF from her spinal/cranial area. The good news is we may go home sooner then expected. We are hoping the CSF leak is fixed and will only really tell with time and healing. Lauren is still pretty swollen on the left side of her face and the area behind her ear has to heal all over again. The good news about the surgery is that it went better then the doctor thought. He was able to save her ear drum and the “hearing bones” of the inner ear. She may still need a hearing aid in the near future but we won’t know until they can do a hearing test after she has healed more. Another huge plus is that we have changed her feeding schedule while we have been here so she will no longer be getting a feed all night long. She will now have 6 larger feeds throughout the day instead of 4 smaller ones and the long night feed. This will make the transition to not having a nurse at home (when the time comes) much easier.

We’ve been praying for a few families we have meet here this time around. The first is in the PICU and we shared a room with them, it seems that the doctors are trying to figure out what is going on and it’s been a difficult process. Another was across from us in the PICU (in the next room) and was flown in from Texas via a medical transport, much the same way Lauren came to Duke on one occasion. The third I meet tonight, the mother and her family where looking at Lauren from the hall since she is such an outgoing person and apparently cute as all get out (I’m not bias or anything). They have been here since Tuesday and will likely be here throughout next week. Their son has seen many of the same doctors we have and we can relate to their heartache.

I’ve been able to interact with a lot of the Peds staff this time around and I’m grateful to hear their stories. I truly enjoy talking to people when they are willing to be open and engaging in return. It also helps that they are stuck in a room with you for their entire shift. We have had some good laughs in the last few days, not to mention the head or two that pops in to watch college football on your flat panel TV with you when your daughter is sleeping.

This next week is going to be busy.

Monday: appointment for Lauren with peds neurosurgery, OT appointment for Lauren, work at the church in the afternoon, meeting with Copeland to get speakers back, drop drum set off to Justin Teseniar, and work on service for refuge Wednesday.

Tuesday: Work on service for refuge & setup the worship area. Be home by 3PM so the nurse can leave. Stay with Lauren until the nurse comes at 11PM while attempting to work from home. Watch lots of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Fallout 3 Game of the Year Edition drops. Cook Dinner.

Wednesday: Up early for nurse to leave, finish service details/setup for refuge, pickup the outlaws I mean in-laws from the airport (I might have lunch with them if I am lucky), nurse leaves at 4 when my sweet wife gets home (she will be happy to see her parents). refuge at 6PM, freak out because I don’t have someone to lead music, then remember that my computer can handle it.

Thursday: Lauren’s surgery. We love visitors but Duke is not allowing ANYONE to visit other then immediate family members and no one under 18. Clergy are an exception, which covers just about all the people I know! However please call my cell before coming to see us. Lauren will spend at least the first day/night in the PICU of her 5 day stay and no one but us can be in there with her.

Friday: Stay with Lauren in hospital, hopefully on step down, pending how she recovers. Work on service stuff for Sunday. Push lauren around Duke in her stroller for 12 hours (pending how she’s doing). You laugh but last time we walked around Duke that much with her. We saw the fish tank (her favorite thing at Duke) every few minutes.

Saturday: Stay with Lauren in hospital.

Sunday: Morning service & movie night at church, stay with Lauren in hospital.

The Canes are out of the playoffs so I have shaved the “hockey beard.” Lucky for me the Canes are my favorite team (since we live a few miles from their home ice and I think you should root for the teams where you live) but my home team is still going strong and I can still root them on. Go Wings! Detroit as a city really needs something big this year with all the General Motors junk and bring the cup home would brighten that town a bit.

We have moved. The new apartment is coming together, we like it much better then where we were at before.

The in-laws (out-laws hehehehe) will be here in about 30 minutes on a flight from Florida. We are looking forward to some well needed family time.

Lauren had her 15 month well visit this morning which included shots. Can you believe she is 15 months? I’m still trying to grasp her running to me crying and laying at my feet signing daddy when I walk through the door because she wants to be picked up. I’m going to enjoy it while I can cuz it won’t be long and she will be interested in boys, graduating college, and not wanting to be held by her daddy. I’m such a sucker for my kid.

We have now lived in Durham for a year and still love it. We are coming up on our 1 year anniversary at this church and our 6 year anniversary in July of our marriage. God has done amazing things in both those time frames.

This is how life roles when you can’t get a break in life. The first house we had under contract has fallen through and we lost some money, granted it was not a large amount to most people, but to us it was. We where able to get the rest of our money back, thank God. The more our agent dug into things the more fishy it became. I’ll post details later. We want to put an offer on another house but can’t until at least Monday when we are officially pulled out of the current one. If this too falls through we will be stuck in a rental for at least another year. We are really tired of having to move, especially with Lauren’s medical condition, it makes it that much more difficult. We never did fully move into our apartment as some of you who have seen it can attest.

Lauren is doing well, taking first steps and signing more, I will work on getting some photos up of her doing this. She is after all growing like a weed. We see the plastic surgeon in July to get on with the next leg of surgery and hopefully in 6-9 months or more removing her trach, but we are done holding our breath for that to happen (pun intended).

I miss posting photos for Photography Friday and hope to get back at that soon, there is so much to shoot here in the triangle. Finding time is a whole other road I’m not going to travel down.

I was actually going to take a sabbatical from blogging but well… I did for a few weeks. Hope all is well in everyone else’s world.

As a side note, we have raised between $700-$1,000 for the Ronald McDonald House of Durham, If you would like to help out please click the link in the right column to donate.

So Lauren is going into surgery tomorrow to biopsy a mass in her nasal area to see if it’s tumor or just scar tissue from a previous surgery. They are also going to look at the tube in her left ear, downsize her trach, and do some other stuff. Please keep her in your prayers.

The tentative plan is to keep the trach until after the plastic surgeon does his work to repair her palate which will be some time after July of this year. So we are looking at least another 9 months (we think) or so of her having the trach, we where hoping to get it out within the next month or two but that is no longer the plan.

She is going very slow with the eating by mouth thing and is not taking in enough to even do a swallowing study so we are a long way (at least 2 years) off from getting that taken out unless she decides to make a drastic change. Every time we make some progress forward we go backward because of a surgery or something.

We are very thankful of the people who work with us here, they are some of the best in their fields and do an amazing job.

We are also making an offer on a house in our area and there are a lot of variables so please pray that if it’s God’s plan it would work out.

***If you have not done so and would like to donate to the Ronald McDonald House of Durham you can do so by clicking the link in the right column of my blog.***

This morning I meet pastorcope over at Dayspring Church on 9th Street along with 20 or so other pastors from our area. It was awesome. I’m still thinking about it. We prayed, serious prayed for our city. I truly believe God was moving among these pastors in our area and I’m looking forward to next week and I wait in anticipation for what God is going to do for this city.

It’s odd, but as we prayed I could not get Blue Tree’s (Chris Tomlin covered it) “God of this City” out of my head. I realize we where praying for our city but I have to tell you this song brings me to my knees and fills my eyes with tears when I hear it, it reminds me of the burden I carry for Durham. I hear it all the time, day and night, when I think I have it out of my head it returns. It’s a constant reminder of God’s longing for his people to return to him, for the people of Durham to seek him.

As these pastors prayed it reminded me of God’s longing. Here are these men who are called to shepherd Durham and they know that without God they can’t do a thing.

So I have finally been getting back to finishing unChristian by Kinnaman and Lyons and wanted to share a quote with you from the book as it relates to ministry and I feel more specifically the ministry that I am actively involved in.

“I believe that today, young adults are starting to see the church as a place that has not dealt well with the poor and the outcast, whether it be a homeless man in the city of Atlanta or a suburban teen who struggles with pornography.

Young people will not communicate with and seek help from parents, pastors, and teachers whose lifestyles and passions do not match their words and faith. They will go to those who will embrace relationship with them; those who are also hurting and who are willing to share it.

Young adults are turning away from a modern church that they see as nothing more than hypocritical. Standards and rules without sacrifice and solidarity is hypocrisy. Christian rhetoric without tangible acts of love is hypocrisy. Churches on every corner with hurting people outside is hypocrisy.

A large building with little connection to the streets in essentially empty.”

::Leroy Barber
president, Mission Year

OUCH! What do you all think?

I want to thank you all for your support and prayer for Lauren, she is now a whole 1 year old and we could not be more amazed with this child God has blessed us with. It has been far from easy as many of you know, but this is the life God has blessed us with and we continue to live it one day at a time. I have to say someone asked me if we could go back and change everything would we? The answer is no, we would not change a thing, Lauren is Lauren and we have grown into who we are because of this last year. We where told recently that we treat our child like a baby not like her illness/disease/diagnosis or whatever you want to call it, that made us feel good. We desire to be parents first.

So on that note I wanted to share that we raised $632 for The Ronald McDonald House of Durham at Lauren’s Birthday Party and people are still calling the church about donating. This does not include any online giving which some of you have said you have done. I hope to find that out soon to give you a more exact figure. I want to thank you all for your support in this. Rebecca and I are looking forward to taking Lauren and the money we raised on her birthday to the Ronald McDonald House of Durham later this week. If you would like to donate you can still do so online at any time, I’m going to post a link to do so on the right column of my blog later this week, but for now you can click here.

So here is the video I showed at her party of her 1st year of life, it’s not the best quality since we don’t own a mamajama video camera but I think you will enjoy it just the same.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8s348MdqdJU&hl=en&fs=1]

February 27th 2009 seemed a distant dream when I took this picture, such a long time away, and now it’s around the corner. Remember they gave Lauren a 10% chance to make it to her first birthday so we are wanting to do something huge. Not for us, but for others, to celebrate Lauren’s life.

We are going to be having a birthday party for Lauren but instead of giving her gifts we are asking for people to donate money in her name to the Ronald McDonald House of Durham, NC. who so graciously provide a place for us to live for a good while and does so for many families. We are going to take up donations online as well as at her Birthday Party, please remember to put in honor of Lauren Browne in the tribute section of the link below so they can track how much we raise. Our goal for this money is to help others who are in need. We really feel God leading us to help those who are facing the unknown as we have over the last year. We could not have made it this far without God and help from individuals and churches alike. We are asking that you share this with others, churches, and businesses, with anyone you like to.

Click Image to Donate

You are invited to a PINK PARTY in honor of
Lauren Browne’s 1st Birthday

Saturday February 28th, 2009
Farrington Road Baptist Church
Chapel Hill, NC
2PM-4PM

Don’t forget to wear PINK!!!

To know more about the Ronald McDonald House of Durham CLICK HERE
To read Lauren’s story and see pictures CLICK HERE