The Orchard Blog

Wow, what a weekend!  We LITERALLY rolled out the red carpet for all the moms who showed up Saturday and Sunday at The Orchard.  We also had a live video feed from the red carpet where our friend, Jason Hartong, was interviewing moms and warming up the crowd before each service.  It was a blast!

My FAVORITE part of the weekend was the exciting opportunity that I had to interview four amazing mothers who shared tons of insight, wisdom and some of the real life challenges that they have faced through their journeys of motherhood.

This was all a part of our “That’s What She Said” series.  And I just have to say…….these moms did an AWESOME job of communicating from their hearts in an authentic, yet impacting way!  There’s NO DOUBT in my mind that God used each of them to speak to the hearts of EVERY person there.  Great job Kristen, Connie, Jenny and………MY MOM, Loudene!  I’m so proud of each of you!

Here are some sights…  (Click for larger images)

Missionary evangelist Stanley Jones writes

The Christian position is “Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy mind” – the intellectual nature; “with all thy heart” – the emotional nature; “with all thy soul” – the willing nature; and “with all thy strength” – the physical nature. The total person is to love him – mind, emotion, will, strength. But the “strength” might mean the strength of all three. Some love him with the strength of the mind and the weakness of the emotion – the intellectualist in religion; some love him with the strength of emotion and the weakness of mind – the sentimentalist in religion; some love him with the strength of the will and the weakness of emotion – the man of iron who is not very approachable. But loving God with the strength of the mind, the strength of the emotion, and the strength of the will – that makes the truly Christian and the truly balanced and the truly strong character.

From Ordering your private world by Gordon MacDonald

Posted by Kathryn Egly

I’m really excited about this weekend as we celebrate Mother’s Day at The Orchard! We have some great things planned that you won’t want to miss. Hopefully you’ll be bringing your mother or A MOM with you. I promise that you’ll be glad you did!

Speaking of mom’s… Here’s a photo of me and my sister (Kellie) with our mom, Loudene Hodge. We love you mom!

Posted by Scott Hodge

Wow…I just finished listening to the podcast “Smudged: My Children” from April 19/20th. Scott did a tremendous job communicating words of encouragement and direction to help us navigate the parenting journey! I would encourage EVERY PARENT to click here and listen to it!!!!!

Also – if you are parent who wants to pray for your children but aren’t sure how, a book I love is called Power of a Praying Parent. (Click here to purchase a copy) This book gives you specific prayers for your children.

I hope that you will use the podcast and book as tools to help you on your parenting journey!

Posted by Kathryn Egly

We began a new series this week called That’s What She Said. We will be taking the next three weeks to celebrate women by looking at things said by great women in the bible.

This week we focused primarily on Esther. She has a great story! Here’s this woman who had nothing going for her yet God uses her to save an entire nation of people. Ordinary people can do extraordinary things when they recognize God’s call and respond with courage. The courage to follow through with what God has called you to is not something you wait for – it’s what God gives you in the moment. Courage is not waiting until you are no longer afraid of whatever it is your afraid of… it’s action in spite of that fear.

Here’s the music setlist from the weekend (with links to iTunes to purchase the original recordings):

• Happy Day – Fee
• Kingdom Come – Hillsong United
• Another Hallelujah – Lincoln Brewster
• Let The Praises Ring – Lincoln Brewster
  
• Suddenly I See – KT Tunstall *****

Posted by Mike Jones

*****(Please use discretion when previewing or purchasing other songs by this artist as other songs on this album may contain inappropriate lyrical content.)