Small Beginnings

Delta changed our flights so that we did NOT leave the airport at 3:30 PM, we had to LEAVE the Valley at 3:15 AM to catch the flight they gave us ... hmmmm ... well, we made it to the airport, and the fog didn't keep us from taking off!  I'm headed to Denver, Colorado with two of our awesome staff from the Valley Care Pregnancy Center.  We are attending the Care Net Conference, an equipping and inspirational gathering of Pregnancy Center leaders from across North America and around the world. 

The young man next to me (14 yrs.) was an amazing young man ... having traveled around the world, into competitive boxing, etc.  In our conversation, he commented that he was an atheist.  I asked him what he meant by that ... and his answer showed that he was not saying that God did not exist, but that he didn't know if God existed ... so I explained that that was called being an "agnostic."  We talked about all sorts of things from chemistry to his cousins and his family history; how he stuck up for his friends when they got picked on at school, etc.  Later in our conversation, he commented about how beautiful the clouds were.  God opened up a great opportunity for me to share with him about the time when I came to think God didn't exist either ... until I really considered the amazing creation all around us - and how totally impossible I thought for all this to just come from nothing ... by chance ... and how amazing a creation we were ... which displays God as a personal being to whom we must be accountable.  I told him how I looked at all the other world religions and how they all said I had to live up to impossible standards ... but how Jesus was the only One who ever was said to love me ... to come down to me, pay the penalty for my sin and rise again from the dead inviting me to accept His sacrifice on my behalf and receive forgiveness of sins ... I got to tell this young man that this was the most beautiful love story I've ever heard ... and I had chosen to cling to that until I found something better ... and that in the 30 years since then, nothing has ever held a candle to His amazing Grace.

Toronto was a blur because we had to go through customs ... and we Jody and I had to eat Second Breakfast ... but when we got to Detroit, the underground people mover had music playing and the color on the walls danced and changed color according to the mood and rhythm of the music.  We couldn't get Jody to stop dancing!!!

Colleen kept dancing so much, she hurt her foot on the smaller moving sidewalks.

Detroit's airport had two sky trains INSIDE that ran the length of the terminal.  Jody INSISTED we go for a ride ... no, wait, that was me who insisted :)

Fianally, we arrive in Denver

In the train under Denver's airport going from Concourse C to B to A to the Terminal.

Just down the street from the Sheraton Downtown Denver Hotel, is the Paramount Cafe ... the food is addictive.  Jody made me eat too much.  The whole street is actually a mile long mall called, "16th Street Mall" and has buses that buzz by every few minutes on either side offering free transportation up and down the mall (see below)

Who knew that this weekend, Denver has a city wide party downtown with free food and rides, shutting down roads, and drawing huge crowds all weekend!  It's nice that they went to such an extent to greet us!  Such friendly people!!!

Colleen had to taste the bottom layer just to make sure it was cake ... oops!

Jody's was almost as big as the table!  We all promised we wouldn't eat again until next week.

All along the middle of 16th Street Mall were people busker kinds of things.  A piano was across from where we ate and people were just walking by and would start playing ...