The Weekend Dispatch 3/20/23

Wow! What an amazing weekend! Stay tuned until the end for some good news!

Our weekend began at lunch with Pastor Jon Isaacs and his family including meeting Emerson for the first time.😍 Hello, beautiful!

There she is again!

One more time!

The last night of revival was also youth rally with some local churches. We loved being part of the rally.

Some of the men helped get the equipment into the bus after church and we sure appreciate it.

We hoped to leave after church Friday night, but I realized pretty quickly that I was not up to driving without sleep. Instead, we went to bed as quickly as possible and rose up early to get ready to hit the road.

6:38 AM Central and rolling.

We emptied the holding tanks at Flying J in Dothan, Alabama after 53 miles and then turned on I-10 after two hours and twenty minutes. Our first 220 miles took us almost 4.5 hours. I thought the slow driving was over, but the rain and traffic brought reality for sure.

In one stretch it took us 4 full hours to drive 100 interstate miles and it took us over 11 hours to drive the whole 451 miles.

7:45 PM Eastern

I had let this pastor know that I would not be here until Sunday afternoon, but we kept pressing on and finally made it Saturday evening. We did not even set up our sound until Sunday afternoon and I think all of us slept pretty good Saturday night.

This is our first visit to Bethesda Church in Plant City, Florida although we have preached for Pastor Tim Baggett years ago. He planted this church less than four years ago and we are happy to be here this week.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, dear friends, for praying faithfully for us. I still have a long ways to go, but I am incredibly better than I was eight weeks ago or even three weeks ago. Praise God for His help!

After a week full of revival and a horrendous travel day Saturday, I honestly felt like a truck or two had run over me when I got up Sunday morning. I hobbled to church holding to God by faith but felt pretty low down in my body.

The Sunday service encouraged me and besides my Psychotic (sciatic) nerve, I felt really good physically. I sang and preached Sunday morning without using supplemental Oxygen for the first time since January.

After church, we visited with our new friends and then set up our sound system and began soundcheck. I was walking around while singing and adjusting settings when I realized that I felt much better than what has become my normal.

As I write this, I feel the effects of a hard weekend, but I am not going to allow that to prevent me from praising God for the great morning and afternoon. Hallelujah!

We are expecting great services all week in this revival. It feels great to be here and we are waiting on God to do His work. Thank you for stopping by for The Weekend Dispatch.

Davy

The Weekend Dispatch 3/13/23

Another weekend has come and gone and we have stories to tell and pictures to show you. Are you ready for The Weekend Dispatch? Here we go!

First, we survived time leaping forward again this year. We are traveling into Eastern Time Zone next Saturday so we will leap forward again. In the past, we have traveled into Eastern Time on the same day the time was set to change. That means we lost two hours on Sunday morning. That is Bad scheduling.

The fun began bright and early Friday morning in Semmes, Alabama on the grounds of the Allentown Fellowship Meeting. The meeting was still going on, but we were leaving in order to give us a little extra time to travel and be prepared for revival in Elba.

It took us about 90 minutes to disconnect from utilities, crank the bus, put up all the leveling boards, empty the holding tanks, hook up the Jeep and hit the road. Honestly, by the time we pulled out of the parking lot, I was wanting/needing a nap.

Our first several miles went slowly as we worked our way around from the west side of Mobile to the north side and I-65. After a shade over 90 miles and an hour and forty-five minutes, I pulled the bus into the northbound rest area near Evergreen, Alabama.

I stretched out for nearly and hour before easing into the driver's seat once again. I have been struggling with sciatica pain for the last few weeks and laying down on my left side is the only surefire way to get the pain to ease. Bro. (Uncle) Larry Smith from Ellisville called it the Psychotic nerve and that is pretty accurate because it has been driving me crazy.

Soon after our stop at the rest area, we exited the interstate onto Hwy 84. We carefully followed 84 to Elba and then took Hwy 87 north a few miles to Grace Fellowship Holiness Church.

About 10 miles short of Elba, we heard a loud noise that sounded like an Air Conditioner Shroud coming loose. I was able to pull over and investigate and confirm our suspicion. The #1 (Front) AC cover was hanging on by one screw. It looked like it might be salvageable, but it was too dangerous to get on the roof with the BoggsMobile right on the edge of the lane.

We decided to drive slowly to a safe place to pull over and that ended up taking 30 minutes. We pulled into a gas station and KJo scrambled up top and put the cover in place and taped the corners.

New readers may wonder why Kelly is on the roof instead of me. The reasoning is completely scientific. I can lift KJo up through the escape hatch, she can not lift me. I am sure Einstein had a theory for that.

A few minutes later we were pulling into the church and getting parked.

Saturday afternoon, we loaded in sound equipment, set up and did a sound check. We moved slowly and deliberately with lots of sit down breaks, but we finished the job.

We are so glad to be back with Pastor Jon Isaacs, Sis. Heidi and their wonderful people in Elba. We have had some great services in the past and we know the Lord is helping them and us this week. The revival began with two great services yesterday and we are anticipating even better things this week.

Odie captured some great pictures Sunday.

Thank you for stopping in today.

Davy