Our life group from Central hosted our 4th annual pumpkin carving party to connect with new people. We invite our neighbors, friends, and coworkers, with the entire goal to hang out so we can create and build new friendships. It was great to see a bunch of new people and some repeaters from the last few years as well!
Here are some of the photos of the night:
Gavin was interested in carving his own pumpkin--for about 5 minutes.
Pumpkins make people do crazy things...
Recently I saw a handful of stunning photographs from this article about a variety of people who have made their own levees to protect themselves from the overflow of the Mississippi river. It is crazy to see how their makeshift walls have allowed them to protect their households from the onslaught of water. But it also strikes me as incredibly lonely.
I’m a visual learner, and staring at these pictures reminded me that often times we need to build walls like this in our lives to protect ourselves. It may be a person who has let us down continually or betrayed our confidence. I’d bet we all know the feeling of being burned by another person. Sometimes this type of defense keeps us alive and going.
But it is easy to keep the walls up long after we need them. As an introvert, I struggle with vulnerability and letting others in. Yet true and biblical community demands it of me. I’m reminded of the great community imagery of Ecclesiastes:
“Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” 4:9-12
We had another amazing year with our Fire in the Sky event at Central’s Gilbert campus. This year we partnered with the Town of Gilbert and it was bigger and better than last year. It was awesome to give a gift like this to the community.
Earlier in the day, Gavin fell into the waterfall in the courtyard as he was throwing coins and making wishes. It was a blast for sure. Here is a pic of the boys doing surprisingly well at “posing” for a pic (they were even holding hands!).
The fireworks were amazing. It was a thirty minute show and I filmed the last five and a half minutes of it on my phone that you can watch below. The last 45 seconds or so are the actual finale. We had a great vantage point that made for a great show.
But make sure you watch carefully around 4:55 when part of a firework actually falls on us! That’s what I call experiencing the show!
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