This past weekend the Ola Community Church held a revival featuring Dr. Ron Kratzer, Associate Pastor at Valley Shepherd Church of the Nazarene.

Being a person that is always up to seeing what God is doing, I wondered up there (Ola is 12 miles deeper into the Idaho mountains than Sweet) Saturday evening. Arriving a few minutes late, I entered the 107-yr old one-room church building – slipping into the back pew as the echoes of the hymns drifted through the open door.

Alas, it was not to be as some friends motioned me forward a few rows further in… yet thankfully no one commented on my late arrival – instead, they broke out into another hymn, signing with their whole being as an acoustic guitar kept pace with an upright piano.

O’ the memories that came pouring in!!

Memories of my childhood sitting in the small Jay Bird church tucked away in the foot hills of the Ozark Mountains.

Memories of worship services long ago….of sitting next to my grandma as she delicately held an old hymnal and sang with a voice that dripped years of toils and pain – a voice of one who held the Master’s hand and walked through the garden side-by-side with the Lord.

Memories of saddling our horses and riding through the back lanes too church….memories of still older days when grandpa would hitch up the wagon and drive us all to that small while chapel at the crossroads.

Memories of sermons long ago… memories of seeing God’s spirit move through the harden farmers and workers of a hard land.

Yet while those memories where strong, time had passed and I was now a thousand miles away sitting in a different chapel in a different mountain range.

But, it was the same God.

The same familiar Father who lovingly embraced His kids regardless of time and location.