Blogs

For those hearty souls who braved the freezing cold to come out for Mt. Zion’s Family TV Game Show Night on Saturday, January 21, the laughter and good times were well worth the trip.  Read more »

Front row (left to right): Kathy, Jon, Allison, Jenny, Daniel, Rachel, Jill
Back Row: (left or right) Kevin, DJ, Patrick, Elisabeth, Brittany, Jeff and Steven

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I was a little taken aback by the blogger‘s semi-sarcastic manner as I read:
If you haven't made that connection yet, let me be the first to inform you: Christmas Day is on a Sunday! While we all probably wish that everyone so valued the true meaning of the holiday that such a collision of the calendar was a moot point, the truth is that Christmas Day falling on a Sunday presents several complications for churches:
- low attendance as many people are traveling or simply prefer to stay home with their families Read more »

Dear Friends,

In their book "Built to Last" James Collins and Jerry Porras coined the term BHAG (pronounced "bee-hag’) which stands for "Big Hairy Audacious Goal." A BHAG describes a bold, well-nigh-impossible vision. Common sense would tell you that a BHAG would intimidate people and discourage them from trying, but BHAGs are paradoxical.

The idea of attempting the impossible is so exciting and energizing, that organizations usually experience an upsurge of motivation when a leader presents a BHAG to his/her people. Read more »

The following is the text copy of Jenny Burtzlaff's (Lay Leader) sermon from October 16th, 2011:

So, here we are. Who’s we? The Laity.  It’s Laity Sunday, so instead of Malcolm preaching, you have ME – the person in this congregation designated as the “Lay Leader.” Read more »

Today was the final work day.  Each site finished up their jobs and had a final visit with their homeowners.  The homeowners are left a Bible and t-shirt signed by their work team.  The day was capped off by the traditional visit to The Shed for BBQ, live music and dancing.  Tomorrow we fly home.

There were two special events at Camp Hope today.  After an early dinner the teams drove to First UMC Pascagoula, Dee and Jack's home church, to see their Maundy Thursday production of "Is It I".  (Some people may remember Mount Zion's productions of this short play.)  When we returned to the camp we had a celebration of Brandon Norwood's 15th birthday.

Most of the same work went on today as previously at all of the sites.  The evening was livened by two special visits.  First Miss Vicki, whose house was repaired by Rod, Rick, et. al., during MZUMC's first visit to Mississippi in 2008, came to Vancleave UMC to say hello.  She shared how that particular work team was particularly special as much for the relationships built as the repairs to her house. Read more »

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The Camp Hope teams had their first work day today.  Two of the teams spent the entire day sanding drywall mud and went straight to the showers on returning.

One other team spent time placing insulation underneath their house, and then putting up plywood over it by holding it up with their feet. The remaining team painted and cleaned at their house.