Fun In The Son--Jekyll 2008

It was great to be back at Jekyll Island last week for Fun In The Son. FITS is the youth conference Tanna and I attended back in the day--and by "back in the day," I mean "the late '80s." I think I attended in 1990, too. Anyway, we both went to FITS at Jekyll (I was there in '88), but we actually met at FITS in Panama City, Florida, 19 years ago. Man, that was a while back!

Here we are with Dr. Chuck Neder--the man who started it all. Chuck Neder is the founder of Fun In The Son. You can read about the history here.

So yeah ... the kind folks at Youth Conference Ministries invited us back to FITS as their guests. Wasn't that nice? We thought so, too. We decided to take them up on their offer for a few days. (We had planned not to stay for the whole conference because we thought it might be too much for the babe.) We got there Sunday night just in time for the first session.

Talk about the memories! It made me miss all my youth-group friends and family (hey, there were four kids in our family, so we made up a good portion of the youth group in our small church--LOL!). Plus, after a while, your youth group becomes part of your family anyway. This is such an important age to have a strong group of believing friends and leaders to help strengthen you in your walk with Christ. And conferences like FITS are awesome--they are soooooo fun and also thought-provoking and encouraging.

This year's theme was "collide"--how God chose to collide with us through Christ ... how we are to collide with the world, etc. It was explained a lot better than that, but you get the idea.

I felt pretty old being there and seeing all the high-school kids. (A lot of them were taller than me, though. haha) Tanna actually said that we met at FITS before this year's attendees were even born--wow, if that doesn't make ya feel like an old lady, I don't know what will.

Did you see Kate's shirt? It reads "Fun in the" and then has a sun! I just had to get it--I bought if off of a lady online. It's a Gymboree shirt from a year or two ago, I think. It was perfect for FITS--especially because the word "Son" isn't spelled out (because it would have been spelled "Sun" on the shirt, right? I actually bought her another shirt like that.) And because her middle name (Suna) is after Tanna's mom, Sun. So suns and sunshine things ... we like them.

FITS has changed in some ways and has stayed the same in some ways, too. Still the same great format--sessions in the mornings and evenings with free time and recreation in the afternoons. Great speakers and musicians. One of my favorite speakers from FITS back in the day was Ken Davis. I still remember his series of messages on "Super Sheep" and "Nothing to Hide ... Nothing to Prove ... Nothing to Lose" ... or something like that. He is so funny, too! This year's speaker at Jekyll was Chap Clark. He was great--well, what I heard, anyway. ;o) Tanna and I took turns watching and walking with Kate out in the convention center lobby/hallways during the "serious" sessions.

This ain't your mama's church camp.

Todd Fields holding Kate

Kate loved the worship music! We weren't sure how she would like the loud music--but she seemed to really enjoy it. Todd Fields from North Point Community Church was the worship leader. (Tanna and I used to attend North Point a few years back--it's a great church up in Alpharetta. Check it out if you get a chance.) Of course, we loved the old Freddie Langston days of FITS--anyone remember him? Todd Fields does an excellent job and was very friendly--the FITS kids loved the worship time and many actually rushed the stage kind of like they were at a concert. LOL!

One night, all of the conference peeps got to go to the water park on Jekyll--Summer Waves. Everyone ate dinner there, and the FITS folks had the park all to themselves. It looked like sooooo much fun. We left after dinner, though, because it was mostly for older kids and we had decided to hit the beach that evening (it was our last night there). The evening session didn't start that night until after Kate's bedtime, so we didn't attend that one.

Tanna and Kate backstage

Wednesday morning, the FITS crew had us up on stage to share just a little bit of our story--how we met at one of the conferences, kept in touch, and eventually married, etc. Of course, we didn't want it to come across as FITS being another match.com or anything--haha! We probably sounded like a bunch of old fogies. But I still think it is incredible to think about how God brought us together so randomly (but not) at a youth conference in high school ... then had us keeping in touch (sporadically) throughout the rest of high school, college and beyond ... and then eventually brought us back together when the timing was right. God's timing is perfect. Tanna is an awesome husband, and I am so thankful that God provided such a loving, intelligent and hilarious guy for me to grow old with. And I'm thankful for FITS for being a part of our story.

Yes, I am wearing a sweatshirt. You know me--always freezing. Of course, I remember freezing at FITS meetings years ago. LOL!

A lineup of church vans--this is just a few of them. Ahhhhh ... I remember the good old days of youth-group road trips! Ha! So fun!

Speaking of vans, I thought this was hilarious--had to take a pic!

I'll have to post beach photos and such another time. :o) Stay tuned!