Garden Gate Rabbit Park - Oh, The Blessings of Visitation!

Jan. 24, 2007

Oh, The Blessings of Visitation!

The Lord instructs us to “compel” people to come to the House of the Lord.– “The lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.” Luke 14:23 We have the Great commission to obey and a testimony to unashamedly proclaim “Look-what the Lord has done for me!” We have a light to hold out in this sin darkened world!
So in obedience to the Lord's commands we go on visitation every week.
For many years we have set weekly appointed times to visit new neighbors, hospital patients, shut ins and countless visits have been made to meet folks in our neighborhood and community. We have had to face the rude, vulgar, hurtful individuals- with shock (and a broken heart) and also the timid housewives and kindly couples with relief and thanksgiving! Our family has had amazing stories unfold over the years. (we took our children through their toddler years, the teen-ages and now young adults) One story I must tell- happened here in our neighborhood when we visited a retired nurse with health problems. She was truly a kindred spirit when we discovered our mutual love for the Lord and music! We shared the word together and then songs of praise! Before we left we had prayer together! (Our busy lives are still no excuse for neglecting to visit people in our community-people always make time for what they really want to do!!) A few weeks passed and Mrs Redd called me on the phone to chat about our church. (Victory Baptist was only a couple years old-started by a few of our families here in the “back woods” !) Well-they were moving to the next county and wanted to give their organ to our church! WOW-just what we needed! Oakwood Baptist Church had given us hymn books (so that we could all sing on the same page) We had a pulpit etc. and so many needs provided! But this was a thrill for our church family that had grown to 28. After the organ was moved and I wrote Mr & Mrs Redd a special letter from our church, I realized this is the first time that I have written a “thank you” note to an “organ donor!” Isn’t the Lord wonderful! Mighty are His works!

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Comments

Jan. 25, 2007 - Hi

Posted by PlainJane

Thanks for stopping to visit my blog - Tamara of Training Hearts just beautified it and put it up yesterday. I still have some clean-up to do on it and change the sledding photo from my spring-y theme - lol. What a beautiful blog YOU have! I can see I will have to spend some time here when I have time.

Ahhh, visitation - it is so nice to here from others that still visit. I was very active in visitation in my college days and when I lived down south, but sadly I don't even know of a church in our area that does visitation anymore. Hearing your story brings fond memories. God blesses those that honor Him.

We use to have 3 bunnies - 1 naughty rex that I sold (for practically nothing) and 2 lopearred siblings (the boy die last year and we still have his sister). I love your bunny graphics & photos - very cute site.

I see we have some things in common -- our daughers play violin too; Baptist; and we use some BJU curriculum. I hope you don't mind, but I simply must add you to my friends list.

Hugs - Your new friend, Jane

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Jan. 25, 2007 - Thanks for visiting :)

Posted by MiikoGibson

What a testimony! I love it! And what a wonderful ministry. I love to be hospitable and having folks over...and feeding them, LOL, but I really need to pray over this aspect of ministry. I would love to read how you actually do it. Is it something you do as a church or family? Do you just drop by? Do you bring a gift? A tract? Or just a smile and friendship? Invite them to your church? We used to do "visitations" when we were in another church but I was thinking it's nice to reach out to neigbors as a family too, and show love in practical ways as well. I remember how a stranger once dropped by with gifts of diapers and babywipes after seeing a "welcome baby" sign outside our yard. That was so cool we began looking out for such signs around our neighborhood and did the same thing for another family. They were so surprised, a bit wary at first, but then I think they were happy too. We need to do that again when the opportunity presents itself. It's fun too to see their jaws drop initially at unexpected gifts, LOL.

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Jan. 25, 2007 - What a wonderful post!

Posted by picketfencemom

This was a wonderful post...thanks for sharing! And I think your idea of having a give-away is great! It was SO much fun...I think I was the most excited of all! LOL I just put it on my blog, but several of my friends mentioned it on their blogs as well...so word of mouth works! LOL!

You'll have to keep me posted!
Have a blessed afternoon!
Amy

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... The Gardener ...

Whether we eat, drink, study, or do our chores, we desire to glorify God! Our family of five is striving to be examples of true Bible believers "in word and in deed"-with the help of our dear Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! My two eldest children are sons that are homeschool graduates attending a christian university taking courses in engineering, computer science etc. (fun classes like Calculus 3-who would have thought!) My daughter is now a high school senior! We all love her violin music! When my husband is not working on gas turbines for GE, he is busy with all of us maintaining our country home and rabbitry. We have been raising purebred rabbits for 14 yrs. and are members of the American Rabbit Breeders Assoc. with 120 bunnies (that number varies day to day!) I hope we can get acquainted real soon !

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