Arrived in Chicago!

After 2 days of driving we have arrived on the outskirts of Chicago. Nate did better than I did, he only needed one stop per day, those of us drinking coffee needed a couple more...Now that we're here, I'm looking forward to getting the 'study' part of my sabbatical under way, after 4 weeks of house renos, packing and planning, I'm ready to put this into motion. Tomorrow we go to Willow Creek Community Church, you can check out their website at: http://www.willowcreek.org; seems they knew we were coming so they invited Michael W. Smith to lead worship. We'll probably put Nate in their toddler activities--its pretty cool, if you check out their website and follow the links you can find out the exact curriculum he'll be learning--even the songs are listed. I've been to Willow a few times now and each time I'm left with a sense of awe--they have a food court in their building and a waterfall! Part of this journey is to discover what the church is about and what is she doing around America--I'm not sure if churches need a waterfall, but they do need good preaching and I still remember the sermon Bill Hybels preached one year ago last time I was in Chicago. After Willow Creek we'll drive into downtown Chicago and get ready for the CCDA conference. For those of you following me to these destinations, check out the CCDA website as well and you can see the workshops I'll try to get to. We'll try to rest abit tomorrow and Monday (its Labor Day here as well) and Tuesday the conference begins. Its good to be back in Chicago, I like this city.