as the crowds gather

Another full day here at ANBC... if you're not with us, you're missing out on some great fellowship and ministry together.

We were joined by our friends Rob & Irene VanAsperen from Jacksontown Baptist Church; Kyle Hughes from Providence Christian Church and the first wave of volunteers from Peterborough Free Methodist Church arrived by plane (the remainder of the team will arrive by van tomorrow morning).

The Speakers Cabin renovation is taking shape with lots of exciting changes, the Waban-Aki Book & Soda Shop is all ready for the Peterborough team to tackle and the yard clean-up has begun!

Speakers Cabin Renovation: Paul and John framing out the new bathroom door.

Zach built a new coat rack for the apartment.

Todd has been working on the bell for the "coupla"!

Speakers Cabin Renovation: Dave and Brian got quite a bit of the drywall up today.

Speakers Cabin Renovation: Cindy, Dave and Brian getting the new insulation underway.

Kevin & Zach took advantage of the rainy day and burned the burn pile.

Speakers Cabin Renovation: Todd Hill helped out with some wiring issues in this cabin.

The mobile office...

Thumbs up Paul!

Brooke & Justus (and Zach) have been our dish crew for this week! We certainly appreciate their help!

Barb Heal and Lorrayne Breen helping to prepare to feed all the hard working folks.

 Rob is going to build us some new games for the summer and repair some of our old games.

Work Week 2013... demo day!

Today was another fantastic day at ANBC. Our friends from Victory Baptist church were joined by a new friend from Devon Park Baptist Church here in Fredericton; Brian has been helping with the Speakers Cabin renovation.

Todd Hill joined us today to wire the tuck shop for that renovation and Todd Nielsen began work on the "coupla", a belfry to house our big brass camp bell!

We were joined tonight by NCEM General Director Albert Heal and his wife Barb as well as Len & Lorrayne Breen our Eastern Field Directors! The lodge is beginning to fill up! It's always exciting at ANBC during work week!

Cindy & Julie getting ready to tackle the speakers cabin!

Todd Nielsen is building us a belfry for our big brass camp bell!

The "coupla" is going to be pretty snazzy!

Our speakers cabin will be a housekeeping unit, Paul and Dave were busy with demo today.

Inside, outside!

 After beginning to work in the speakers cabin it became evident that there had been rodents living in the wall at some point in the past. So the renovation became much more comprehensive... but it's going to look amazing when they're all done.

Resident electrical wizard... Todd Hill!

Zack working on getting the big brass bell all shined up!

 Eve & Liz making the magic happen in the kitchen... keeping everyone all fed up!

So happy to have Brian join us from Devon Park Baptist.

We're certainly putting the ANBC truck through it's paces this week!

Live in Concert

 

This past Saturday we were blessed and encouraged to be at Cumberland Bay Baptist for the Nielsen Family 5 Live Concert. They shared an update about their candidacy with NCEM and ministered in song. It was wonderful to share in their enthusiasm as they prepare to go to mission training next fall.

This family is an IMMENSE talent, and they use their talent to glorify God! Maybe you'll have an opportunity to invite them to your church for an evening of ministry! This is a video Todd put together to share this opportunity for ministry.

2013 Work Week

Last week preparations began for our annual Spring Work Week! We are anticipating a complete overhaul and reinvention of our Tuck Shop building, and to begin I gutted the building as much as I was able and cleared it all out.

 This building will look much differently by next Saturday.

As part of our re-imagining of the ANBC Tuck Shop we took advantage of the going out of business sale at Zellers and availed ourselves of some of the fixtures and furniture during their clearance sale.

These stools will sit in front of the counter in the new tuck shop.

I made a trip to Cocagne on Friday and picked up this load of lumber for us to use for re-siding the outside of the tuck shop. A major issue that we have had in the past is bats living behind the siding of this building. So, we are going to replace and bat proof the East wall and hopefully be bat free ongoing.

 

This wonderful rack was built several years ago by Jamie Weber, a friend and volunteer from Gorrie, Ontairo. We are so thankful for gifts like this that enable us to do all of the things we need to do at ANBC.

Today marked the first day of our 2013 work week, we were joined by the Nielsen family 5 as well as the Strouts. It was great to work together as local missionaries. The ladies took care of some of the Spring cleaning, while Todd & Kevin tackled a rather serious moisture problem around a window and air conditioner in the kitchen. I dealt with some water woes; I had a professional in today to look at our water system as it had ceased making water. He has taken some water samples, but he is suspicious that we have high levels of Manganese in our water, and this has ruined the pump on our reverse osmosis unit. We should know in the next couple of days just what the verdict will be, but Lord willing we should be able to start making water again in the near future. In the interim we have brought in bottled water for cooking and drinking. The water system is still working for our showers, toilets and dishes, so we are not out of commission, but we are prayerful that the expense of dealing with Manganese in the water will not be overwhelming.

Tonight we are excited to welcome a ministry team from Victory Baptist Church near Newmarket, Ontario. They are tackling the renovation project in the speakers cabin. It is our hope to have this building be a self sufficient housekeeping unit. It will serve for volunteers in the summer and be available as a getaway rental throughout the year. We are so blessed and excited to have this team with us, for the first time, this year.

 Todd & Kevin beginning to work on the water damaged wall around the air conditioner.

All completed, with a casement window filling the space. A job well done and serious damage prevented. Thanks to Don & Sue Currie for the donated window.

The ladies got busy with the Spring cleaning, Eve (above) Liz & Marcia got right to business scrubbing and tidying!

Stay tuned for updates and pictures throughout this week!

The Spring Wind-Up

The Spring Wind-Up has begun! Every year at about this time we crest the hill and begin the downward roll to summer! The past couple of weeks have certainly propelled us forward.

Last Monday I made an early trip in to Fredericton to have a new windshield put in the camp truck so that it will meet MVI conditions. I took the opportunity to pick up some new windows some hardware items for the impending tuck shop renovation.

The following day Liz, Ivy and I made our way to Victoria Corner, to N.B.B.I. for an opportunity to speak to the students and faculty in chapel. As always, it was great to visit the school and reconnect with friends and connect with new students. This year we are hopeful to recruit a student from either Bible School or a senior in High School to serve at our summer camps in the role of Program Co-Ordinator. Following our visit to the school we made a quick detour to Houlton, ME to pick up Tuck items and prizes for the upcoming ANBC Men's Retreat.

As we prepare for the arrival of our work teams next week, we have been collecting all of the materials and equipment that the teams will need for the projects! Stay tuned to the blog next week for updates on our renovations!

On Sunday, we had the privilege of visiting Forest Hills Baptist Church in Saint John. I was asked to present the ministries of NCEM and ANBC and to preach in the morning services. I was also given the opportunity to give a seminar on evangelism during a luncheon meeting for their summer ministry teams. It was encouraging to be able to be with the folks at Forest Hills and a great opportunity to be able to share with their fellowship and ministry teams. Forest Hills will be sending a team to one of our summer camps and the Korean Global Mission church will be sending a team to another of our weeks. We look forward to a wonderful summer of ministry together.

It is year end and audit time at NCEM, so this week I have been working on my year end checklist for the ANBC books as well as providing information at the auditors request. It is perhaps not the most exciting part of ministry to worry about the finances and books, but it is comforting and encouraging to know that we have an executive team and CFO who are committed to ensuring the details are being cared for.

Tomorrow Todd & Zach Nielsen and I will visit Devon Park Christian School to share during their chapels. Perhaps the Lord will impress upon some of the senior high students to serve with us this coming summer.

As our schedule continues to fill and we move ever closer to summer, please keep the ministries of ANBC in prayer. That we would be diligent to our roles here and that the ministries might be fruitful and full and bring Glory to God!

The Adopt a Cabin Project

 
At Arrowhead it can be a challenge to stay ahead of all the maintenance and repair work that we need to do. We are working diligently to bring all of our buildings up to a consistent level of repair. The next piece of this process is for us to upgrade and improve our summer camp cabins.

We have six cabins that we use as accommodation for our campers during summer camp. These buildings are winterized, each has a baseboard heater and built in bunks; they each have a shingle roof and a small porch.

At Arrowhead we have some beautiful big pines, cedars and fir trees, these leave a lovely coat of needles on the floor of the forest. Unfortunately they also leave a lovely coat of needles on each roof, which then promotes the growth of moss. One of the upgrades that we are excited to include in this project is a brand new shiny red steel roof for each cabin. This will help us promote the longevity of our buildings. We are also planning to include some brown aluminum fascia for each building as well.

Each of the buildings is finished inside with chip board. This unfortunately leaves us with some odour issue in the heat of summer. The adopt a cabin renovations will see this removed and replaced with tongue & grooved pine boards. We will also be installing a larger window and pot lights into each building.

Each building has a solid wood door, this unfortunately has not served sufficiently to use these buildings in the winter. That coupled with a need to insulate the floor, it is our hope to install insulated doors for winter use and screen doors for summer use; we will also be insulating the floors.

This may all seem like a daunting task that is prohibitively expensive. Working with our local supplier we have determined that each cabin will cost between $4,000 and $4,500 dollars. The way that translates to our "Adopt a Cabin Project" will be determined by those church groups that feel led to join with us.

By committing to take part in this project a group commits to raise funds and work through all of the renovations over the course of five years to completion. If a group would like to partner with us in this program, but does not feel that they will be able to come here and complete the work, we can arrange to have the work done on your behalf.

We currently have two churches that have expressed interest in partnering with us in this program. It's always exciting to see people come and serve and minister along side us in this way. If you think this might be something your church or group would be interested in, don't hesitate to drop me a line.



This video was created by a friend of ours, Micheal Parrington, for use in making known the opportunity to minister at ANBC in very practical physical ways. It will perhaps give you a bit of an idea what it is like to serve here during one of our semiannual work weeks.