BABY TREBESH
We have a lot of travel plans coming up! Our first trip to visit family, friends and donors in the Northeast over Thanksgiving week. We will also be attending the Staff in Training Conference in CO the beginning of December, then Clint will be in a wedding right before Christmas. We will spend a week with Clint's family over Christmas and then also fly to SC to see my family for a week over New Year's! Whew - please pray with us that this pregnant momma will be able to stand all the traveling, particularly long car rides. Earlier in my pregnancy I had a lot of back problems and was not able to travel long distance by car for a few weeks. We are hoping everything will be fine for the trips we have planned these next couple months. After January 5 - I plan to stay in Albuqueruque!!!!
Thanks so much for your prayers and excitement about this new stage in our life!!! We couldn't be happier and can't wait to see all that God has in store for our family!!!
Just some updates...
We always give a lot of ministry updates but neglect to share what is going on in our life personally! Thought we would give you a little snapshot of what has been happening the past couple months:
*** We have joined a great community group through our church. They are a very fun group of young couples that we are really enjoying getting to know. We meet together on Friday nights and discuss the previous week's sermon together, pray for one another and just hang out. We are so excited to be making some new "couple" friends and thank God for this answered prayer! They are really understanding too - there are about two Fridays a month that we are unable to join them because of retreats or our monthly Friday Night Bites event for students. These new friends support us in our ministry which is a real blessing!
*** I am starting a "Block Book Club" with two neighbors on our street and my good friend Becky. Please pray that this will be a great chance to get to know the people that live the closest to me! Our first gathering time together will be April 15 and we are talking about the book The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa. Does anyone have any good book club recommendations???
*** Clint has been enjoying a lot of good "guy time" lately. This includes lots of ultimate frisbee and flag football playing, going to some UNM Lobos games, teaching guys how to change their oil, and lots of other random things. One really encouraging thing for him has been a small men's accountability group that kind of sprang from our community group. There are 4-5 men that meet several Saturdays a month for coffee and just encourage one another in their marriages and walks with the LORD.
*** I turn 30 next week and Clint is taking me on a surprise trip! I have NO idea where we are going - it's so much fun!!! I can't believe that there are only 3 days left in my 20's... many thoughts have been accompanying this huge milestone - but mostly I am just so grateful for the wonderful, full life the LORD has blessed me with!!! :-) I will be sure to post a few pics after we get back from our trip!!!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Our own 2nd anniversary was October 14 and we celebrated by staying PUT for a weekend! With so much travel, we just really wanted to enjoy time together at home. We took a ride on the tram up to the top of the Sandia Mountains - something neither of us had done before. We had dinner at the top over looking the city with a beautiful sunset. We also saw a movie, slept in, went out for ice cream etc. etc. It was so wonderful to relax together! We enjoy marriage and partnering together in ministry so much! It will be so much fun to see what God has in store for us this third year!
We also had a special treat with Leigh Ann's folks getting to come for a long weekend. It was so fun for us to have them here to show them around Albuquerque and Santa Fe and even have an early Thanksgiving dinner together. The next week we spent the Thanksgiving holiday with Clint's family in CO. Pictured below are our wonderful families! We are so excited to be able to spend Christmas with both families this year. We will spend several days in CO and then several days in SC as, well where we are especially excited to see our precious niece who just turned 10 months!!! She is such a joy!!! We have also included a picture of our first REAL Christmas tree! :-)
As 2009 comes to a close, we are reminded of many blessings from the hand of God.
Isaiah 16:5 says "In love a throne will be established; in faithfulness a man will sit on it - one from the house of David - one who, in judging, seeks justice and speeds the cause of righteousness."
God is so good to fulfill prophecy send us Jesus - a Savior who is full of LOVE and FAITHFULNESS. A Savior who seeks justice and righteousness... We hope that you will take time to rejoice in the goodness of God this season!!!
God's Economy
One of the most exciting blessings we want to share is our house!!!!!! This home pictured is the place we lived last spring with our two teamates Kim and Allison. This house is so wonderful for ministry, we hold many events, staff meetings, Bible studies, dinners, movie nights etc etc. here and the students are familiar with this place. It is a great street with great neighbors, a wonderful walking area for Leigh Ann, and we love the area of town. About a month ago, God so graciously opened the door for us to live here again, at a price that was actually cheaper than apartments we were looking at!!! This house allows us to have an office, as well as a guest room (so come visit!!!) and we give all the praise and glory to the LORD for making it possible to live here! The house is for sale right now, so technically we are renters and will be asked to leave whenever it sells... but we are trusting in God's timing for that too!!! Hopefully we will post more pictures of the inside soon - but here is a sneak peak!!!
29 years young!
This week I turned 29!!! I can't believe it! Although I was having a bit of a personal life crisis about this fact (it's the only time I have ever felt sad on my birthday... a foreshadowing of things to come???) Clint, my "housies" as we call Kim and Allison, our teammates who we live with, and lots of other family, friends and students helped to make this a special birthday! Clint took me to see an Off-Broadway play at UNMs performing art center and out to dinner and wrote me lots of sweet notes, my housies gave me special cards and gifts, my family sent me a fun new outfit and gift card to go shopping and Clint's family sent me a YUMMY basket of chocolate and wine and fruit etc. One of my favorite things was that I got calls, emails, texts, facebook notes, etc. ALL DAY LONG from my wonderful family and friends! I was very blessed and felt very loved! The girls pictured to the left are part of my Tuesday night Bible study. They all got together and baked a yummy cheesecake, wrote the sweetest notes to me, and gave Clint and I a gift card to Chilis for a date night!!!! My other Bible study on Saturday morning bought me a new purse and took me out for a pedicure!!!!! How special are they??? What a blessing to walk through life with these women!
Secrets of the Vine
An update from Leigh Ann:
John 15:4-5 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
These words spoken by Jesus have taken on a special meaning this semester. As the busyness of our life continues to whirl around us, I have often felt overwhelmed, exhausted, discouraged… The Lord used another staff member at a recent weekend conference FOR STUDENTS J to really speak to me on this issue of “abiding in Christ.” More and more I see how important it is to give God the best part of me, my waking thoughts, my anxious heart, my trials and tears as well as success and joys. If I am not filled with HIM, I will be empty for the students I am trying to minister to. This is a huge lesson for me, and one I have definitely not mastered yet! I am reading a great book for my personal study called “Secrets of the Vine.”
Here are some things that are going on that I need to “remain in the vine for” this semester here at UNM:
* My Bible study with 6 Senior and Alumni young women. This semester we are going through an excellent book called “Calm My Anxious Heart: A women’s journey to contentment” I take great joy and responsibility in walking with these women through decisions like grad school, career moves, long term relationship issues, family illnesses and more. My prayer is that they (and I!) cling to truths such as Philippians 4:11-13 and 1 Peter 5:6-7 that we are studying in depth through this book. Please pray for us on Tuesday evenings as we gather together in my home or a local coffee shop to discuss, pray together and do a lot of laughing!!!
* Our weekly large group gathering for students entitled Collision! When Faith and Life Collide. We have about 30 students coming regularly to this meeting that explores how to handle it when everyday life comes head to head with our faith. Please pray for us on Wednesday evenings as we rush up the stairs to the third floor of the Student Union Building to engage with students in worship, prayer, teaching, small group discussion and fellowship!
* The 6 women (in the picture above) that Kim and I lead in an in depth study of the book of James are learning what it really means to put their faith in action. Exploring topics such as “trials and temptations” and “not showing favoritism” and “taming the tongue” has been very challenging as these are things we all face everyday. Please pray for us on Saturday mornings as we share a breakfast together and dive into God’s word in our home or a local cafe!
There are many other things I could tell you about. Pages could be written on our monthly meals “Friday Night Bites” which bring 30-40 students to our house for free food; or our leadership training called the “Caleb Team” where students are learning practical tools for things like sharing their faith, telling their testimony, and exploring a book entitled “The Master Plan of Evangelism”; or our Bible Study Leaders Training where Juniors and Seniors in our ministry share about their experience leading Bible studies on campus and get continuing help in the skills they need to do this; or the 3 women I meet with weekly for discipleship (focusing on things like scripture memory and praying together) and the 1 student from China that I continue to share the Gospel and explore the Bible with each Wednesday. The bottom line is – there is A LOT going on!!!!!!! Please pray for me as I continue to seek the Lord for His wisdom and strength day by day… pray that I would “remain in the vine.”
*** Clint will give a personal update soon about how things are going for him!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!
Hello everyone! Leigh Ann writing here for both of us! We hope you are having a blessed start to your New Year. We have been in a whirlwind of travel since the beginning of December. Here’s a recap of what has been going on in our lives.
December 7 we left Albuquerque with a packed down car and a 6 hour drive to Colorado Springs for a week of EDGE Corps training. This was a wonderful time gathering together with many close friends and co-laborers from schools all across the country. One of our favorite parts of the training “summits” as they are called is relating to these other EDGERs. We encourage one another, pray together, share meals and have a lot of fun. The other aspect of this week includes great workshops and continuing education for collegiate ministry work as well as dynamic, challenging speakers. This winter, our devotional topics each morning were on leadership models and principles from the speaker’s favorite Biblical characters. It was wonderful drawing truths we can apply to our own lives from the life of people like Esther and David (and many others… I think those were our two favorite!) After our training, we stayed on at Glen Eyrie for 3 more days to work at the EDGE Corps preview. This is a mini conference for juniors and seniors in college who are considering EDGE Corps after school is over. This was an exciting and HIGH ENERGY time!!!
December 16 we hopped on a plane and headed to SC for a great week in South Carolina. It was wonderful to be home with the Conder part of our family. The weather was a beautiful 72 degrees the majority of our visit – Clint couldn’t get over it! We all had a lot of fun together playing new games, attending Christmas drop-in parties and baking and cooking a lot of food! Clint even made an appearance as SANTA at my mom’s Christmas party at her preschool. He was a hit!!!
December 24 we hopped back on that plane and spent Christmas Eve traveling back to Colorado. I have a very cool devotion reflecting on Mary, the mother of Jesus, from the Houston airport! Haha! We spent that night in Evergreen at Clint’s aunt and uncle’s home with the rest of his immediate family as well. Then we returned to Clint’s hometown of Glenwood Springs, CO for the remainder of the Christmas week and BOY was the weather different there! We had the white Christmas going on for sure, and the temps rarely rose above freezing! The visit with Clint’s family was so nice as well… we played lots of games and ate a lot of food (sound familiar) and watched a great HBO series called John Adams. We HIGHLY recommend this, it was fabulous!
We rang in the New Year with several good friends in Breckenridge, CO. Clint got to go skiing and I got to go dancing that night so we were both very happy!!! J The next week was spent in Colorado Springs, which was SO much fun! We saw and hung out with so many dear friends and caught up with students from UCCS, visited with donors in our ministry, etc.
We were sad to leave each of these places… but glad to get back to Albuquerque as well and begin the semester. I am reminded over and over again during these traveling times, just how much each person and each place has shaped who we are today. We have so many people that we love so dearly scattered all across this great country – and for this we feel so very blessed.
That brings us to today, which is actually a huge prayer request. At the writing of this blog entry, we still have not found a place to live for the semester. We are so grateful to be staying at our teammate’s house for a week or so – but more and more I realize that we have to get settled SOON! Please pray that the Lord would open a door very soon and that we would be able to get moved in over the next week. I long to be in our own place, but we are prepared to share a house or house sit for the next four months, or whatever might open up. We trust the LORD will provide for us and show His great faithfulness, as He always has! Thank you for praying with us!
We have a staff prayer and planning and student leadership retreat this weekend. After that we will fill you in on more ministry things for the semester – so be sure to check the blog again next week. For now, we just wanted to give you an update of our personal lives and thank you for journeying this road with us. We pray you are all well, let us hear from you soon! May the LORD richly bless you and your family, friends, work, homes and every part of your world in 2009!!!
Personally speaking...
Here we are at a wonderful little creek in Lake City, CO where we spent several hours during our first year anniversary trip! It is hard to believe we are in our second year of marriage now! It has been such a WONDERFUL journey together. Please pray for us as we continue to learn to balance ministry and marriage!
We have have some news to share that we could really use prayer for right now! We found out a little over a week ago that we are going to have to move out of our house before the Christmas break! We have been so blessed the past year and a half to basically be house-sitting for a man that lives in Texas, but seeing as his situation has changed and he has someone else that will be needing to live here, he has asked us to leave. We are not at all upset with him, however this did come as a big shock to us! Please pray for us as we try to pack up our house, finish the semester well with our students, and look for a new place to live in the next couple of weeks – whew it sounds like a lot just writing it, but we are trusting the Lord for big things! A very wonderful promise has come to us by way of the verse Haggai 2:8-9 which says “The gold is mine and the silver is mine declares the Lord Almighty. The glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house, says the Lord Almighty. And in this place I will grant peace, declares the Lord Almighty. Wonderful huh?
