The Way

This has been a great year for us as a family. Morgan and Wilson are still living in Jackson, Tennessee. Wilson just graduated with his BS in Nursing and starts a new job at Jackson General in January. He just finished his job at Starbucks so no more discounted coffee for us. Morgan is still working in enrollment at Union University and travels some which brings her our way at times. They are very active in their church and small group. They have proven this past year that anything is possible. We are incredibly proud of them. Shelbi and Mark are still living in Rome, Georgia. Shelbi is a nurse educator and Mark is still running WinShape Camp for boys. (He actually is the operations guy, but believe me, organizations do not run smoothly without a good operations guy. Thus, he runs it.) They recently bought a new house, moved in during a snow storm and are enjoying all the joys and challenges of home ownership. They also are co-owners of a new escape room in Rome set to open Dec....

First, let me thank each and every one of you who prayed for and gave money for our missions experience in Guatemala. Your sacrifice of time and money contributed to a great work that God is already doing in the area we were privileged to serve. Sondra and I are both grateful and humble that you would invest through us in the work that God is doing in the area of Las Conchas (The Shells) on the outskirts of Guatemala City. Those of you who gave financially, be watching your mailbox soon. We departed from Nashville on July 4th and took Sondra's mother with us. Sondra's aunt and uncle have been missionaries in Guatemala for nearly 49 years and we went a couple of days early to spend time with them. Sondra's mother traveled well and we arrived rather late on the 4th and got settled in for the night. The next day, we met up with with Sondra's cousin Harvey, and his wife Sharon and the whole lot (notice the NZ way of saying all of us) of us headed to a house down on the c...

This week, Sondra and I have been blessed to host her cousins and their friends at our home. Noel and Janet are successful "farmers" (livestock and Christmas trees) and their friends, Julian and Nikki (whom we have not met before) are self-employed remodelers (that is my term for what Julian explained) who are all from New Zealand. They are traveling the States visiting Janet and Noel's daughter and son-in-law in NYC and then making their way back to Houston via train and rental car. They were gracious enough to add us into their itinerary and stayed with us two nights. AND IT WAS A BLAST! On the way back from dinner on Monday evening, the boys and I were driving down a country road close to our house when all of sudden, Julian says, "What is that?" I asked for some clarity as to what "that" meant and he said those little shining lights that keep going on and off.  I looked up and said, "Oh, those are lightning bugs or fireflies." They w...

Sondra and I are going on a mission trip to Guatemala in July. Here is a letter that we are sending out asking you to pray for our team and to consider supporting us financially. Thanks for praying and considering a financial gift as well. Dear friends and family, Paul and I have the opportunity to be a part of a mission trip to Guatemala.   We will be going July 8-15, 2017 with a group from Hermitage Hills Baptist Church.   This is Sondra’s fourth trip to Guatemala and Paul’s first.   Our focus this year is discipleship and training through vacation bible school for children and discipleship and bible study for youth and adults.   In previous years part of our time has been spent on construction, but that is not our focus this time.   The church project in Las Conchas is almost complete, and we actually hope to hold the first service in that location while we are there!   What a celebration this will be! We are asking that you would consider su...

So many of you have been incredibly faithful to pray for Sondra and me over these past few months. We are humbled and grateful for your prayers on our behalf regarding our next position in ministry. If you have kept up with social media at all then you already know that I accepted a position at Friendship Community Church in Mt. Juliet, TN as Director of Groups and Discipleship. If you are interested in the back story then read on. Friendship is a church that I have had a relationship with for the past close to 3 years now I guess. Our relationship began when I guest preached at the recommendation of Teresa Snyder who is the children's minister here. I have known Teresa for many years and she was very influential in our daughters' lives as the children's minister at New Hope. Teresa has more energy than the Energizer Bunny has ever thought about for sure. I preached a few other times over the next couple years as they were without a pastor and then last Fall the church ...

These past few weeks have been different to say the least but they have been refreshing in so many ways. After the first couple of weeks of being unemployed, I was ready to get back to being focused on something. And Mondays seemed to be harder than the other days. Not sure why other than I was beginning another week of saying, "Okay God, what's next?" I attended a couple of men's Bible studies and the encouragement and accountability was most helpful. I asked a couple of guys, who are friends and righteous people, to pray a couple of things specifically for me. I am grateful that I asked them and am even more grateful that they have been faithful to pray for me. I do not want my attitude to become one of bitterness or entitlement and I know that their prayer on my behalf has been honored. I have talked to many people about potential ministry roles and am grateful for their interest in me. It looks as though God may have revealed our next ministry/job role and I ...

These past few weeks have been different in many ways. Recently I blogged about Take Me to the Edge and how our church is going through a campaign to challenge us to Take Us to the Edge. I shared an illustration about bungee jumping (stepping) and trust, faith and obedience. On Thursday, Feb. 2, I walked into a meeting knowing that it was a big step in some things that God has been stirring in Sondra and me. Since last summer, we have known that God was doing some things to prepare us for something different than what I was currently doing in ministry. I have talked to a couple of churches over that time and have known that while they were good ministry positions, they were not positions that I was to step into. I also knew that the current position that I was in at LifeWay was probably one that I would not remain in for an extended period of time. I had hoped to be able to make many more phone calls; have more personal conversations; share a coffee or a workout and be able to te...

This phrase, "Take Me to the Edge" is a theme for a new campaign at our church, Hermitage Hills. I know that it is a phrase in a worship song sung by some group that our pastor heard a few months ago but I don't know the full story behind it but Poly gave us a short explanation in his message on 2/5. This phrase, "Take Me to the Edge" is an interesting one to me. Aristotle says, "the mind never thinks without a picture", so the picture I get in my head is an experience that happened almost a year ago when I bungee jumped in New Zealand. It was a cool morning but sunny and beautiful and I was nervous on the ride over to Kawarau Bridge , the home of the original bungee jump. I was trying to play it cool in the van, but I was shaking and not because it was all that cold in the van. I was nervous and even somewhat afraid. (If you know me well, you know that heights are not my forte.) Shelbi, Mark, Wilson and I had already paid for the bungee jump ahead ...

I have the privilege of knowing Jimmy Bradford, who is a friend of mine from the Downtown YMCA. I have known Jimmy Bradford for about 15 years and was reminded again this morning of what it looks like when people genuinely care for one another. This story is about 17 minutes long but actually the story is much longer than that. I will tell you that you will want a Kleenex close by as well. It will be time well spent and is a great example of people loving and caring for one another.

Here it is January 13th (Friday the 13th for all of you superstitious folk) and I am finally getting around to another blog entry. It was a great holiday break and I really have no excuse for not blogging, I just didn't. Sometimes I feel like writing and at other times, I don't. It was a season of good times but no writing. This past year, for those of you who have kept up, has been a good year for the Turners. We enjoyed a family trip to New Zealand with our kids in March (we shared a bunch of pics of that trip). Shelbi and Mark are still in Rome, GA and are doing great. Shelbi took on a new assignment at work as a trainer for new nurses; continuing education for nurses; and got her Masters. Mark still runs WinShape ;-), well at least the operations part of the boys' camp. Morgan and Wil made a move to Jackson, TN where Wil is pursuing a nursing degree via fast track and Morgan is an enrollment counselor for Union University. They are doing great and we are blessed to...