Alabama - Day 2

Rise and shine! Literally the sun rises way earlier here than at home. We all awoke with the sun peeking in

the window at 5:30. But it IS pretty here on Upper Sand Mountain in the wee hours of the morning.

After mad dashes to showers and a lovely breakfast prepared by our own James MacDonald and his team.

We broke into our small groups and passed out the letters from our prayer partners. Many blessings and 

thanks to all of you who are participating in the prayer partners ministry. We were all touched by your heartfelt

notes. After reading the notes, we read our morning devotions and shared our thoughts about these

and the notes.

We then attended a most charming service here at Section UMC. Since there was no pianist or choir in

attendance we led the congregation in song and listened to an inspiring sermon based on the story of 

David and Goliath. The pastor Chris Cone made is feel very welcome and is a gifted speaker. 

After church, we returned back to the social hall for planning and free time, followed by scrumptious

pasta lunch to keep us going through a tour of the cannery and an evening church revival. During the 

tour of the cannery and parish center we learned that the parish center basically functions as the

"Goodwill Industries" for the area. Along with the cannery, the parish runs a food pantry, thrift shop,

provides clothing for and assists members of the community with rent and utility payments. After 

our tour of the cannery, we headed to Lusk UMC for a revival. Now I will be honest and tell you that

more than a few of us were very curious about what this would be about, and were relieved that 

the revival was nothing like what they show on television, no people speaking in tongues, nobody

rolling in the aisles filled with the Holy Spirit and no snake charming. What it was, was a lovely 

evening of various attendees expressing their faith in various forms. We were treated to a choir

singing old timey Methodist hymns, 3 young women dancing to contemporary Christian songs

a young man played a xylophone and my personal favorite, four young people who were members

of  a Praise band who  sang with very tight harmonies and much spirit. This was all followed by

an interesting, long sermon. The revival lasted about 1.5 hours and gave us a nice idea

of how the Methodists here on Upper Sand Mountain celebrate their faith.

We then returned back to our "home" base for a late dinner of pizza and berry/apple crisp.

We then retired so we could be well rested for our first full day of service on the mountain, which

is how we members of First United Methodist Church in Ann Arbor celebrate our faith. We are

learning on this trip how to be "instruments of peace" and that our work has purpose, meaning

and through this work we "sow God's love". And we are all most thankful to have this opportunity.

--
Deborah Wood

Senior Art Director