Summer Time!

Its been a while since the last post! I apologize for not being better at this!! I am making a commitment to be better at keeping you all informed.
That being said, we have so much to share with you. First of all, its camp season. John and I spent the week at teen camp last week. It was an amazing week of camp. We had about 45 high school students attend this year. This was the first year that we split the middle school and high school groups because of how big it was last year. We had 2 students trust Christ! We are so thankful to Frontier's counseling team, Nathan Reichert, and all of the staff for contributing.  Please be in prayer for middle school camp starting tomorrow. Jr Camp is the week after.

Grace has also been experiencing a lot of growth the past few months. We are running almost at full capacity- and its the summer time. Usually the summers are lighter in church attendance- but we are still growing. We have plans to begin a building project on a balcony that will seat an additional 40 people. We  have already began raising funds for it. Please pray for us to be able to raise the funds to complete the balcony.

We have experienced growth from believers as well as people accepting Christ for the first time at Grace. We have a family that has been attending Grace for a few months. It started with one family member coming and inviting her family to church. One by one, her family and some extended family began coming to grace and 5 people have gotten saved. God has been doing so many amazing things in this valley! Its been so encouraging and exciting to be a part of the ministry here. Please continue to pray that God would continue to work in the hearts of the people in our valley, and that we would continue to see people getting saved and growing in their relationship with the Lord.

The Warner family has also been attending Grace. Paul Warner was the planter and pastor of Faith Community Church in Eagle Mountain. He and his wife have followed God's call to leave FCC in the hands of Larry and Naomi Fox and plant again in Provo. They are taking the next year to gear up and raise funds for their next church plant. They will be attending Grace during that time and will be serving Grace with us. We are so excited and thankful to have Paul and Bren. Please pray for their family as they will be raising support for their church plant.

John and I also have a prayer request for our daughter, Taylor. We have recently learned that she has a gluten intolerance. Its not as severe as Ciliac, which we are very thankful for. She is not able to eat anything made with wheat. I am very thankful that we were able to find out so we could make her feel better. Please pray for her as it will be difficult as she gets older when she can't have the same food or snacks as others. Please pray that she would adjust well to her new diet.

We have also been suspecting that she may have Aspergers. We had noticed that she was developing a little slower than the other kids in her speech and communication. A few weeks ago, a relative of ours who is a child and family counselor mentioned that he had noticed some things about Taylor. He thinks she has a very high-functioning form of this disorder. Aspergers is in the same family of Autism. To find out more about Aspergers, you can click here. In Taylor's case, she has no trouble showing affection and making eye contact- which is a huge blessing. She does struggle with over-stimulation and meltdowns, communication, speech, some motor skills, playing and socializing with other children her age, and obsessing over things. She is very advanced with numbers, letters, shapes, and her memory is incredible. She has a great sense of humor and loves to sing. I believe that she will be musically talented as well.


For me, it wasn't a shock because I knew that something was different with Taylor. It doesn't make it easier, though. Its hard to imagine that your child will be a little different from all the other kids... I worry about her struggling to make friends or feel different if she has to go to special classes. But I know that the Lord has a special plan for her and made her this way for a reason.  Taylor has not been officially diagnosed, but we have been working with her as if she has it. We don't currently have health insurance and most cases are not diagnosed until age 4. So we are waiting and watching. We have started educating ourselves and have started working with her as if she has it. We have already noticed much in improvement in 1 month and we are very optimistic that if we continue to work with her, you wouldn't even be able to tell she has it by the time she is in school. Please pray for us- its been a lot all at once with Taylor. It means so much to us to know that you will be praying for our precious little girl. 

Thanks again for reading and for all your prayers and support! God Bless! Love, The Miles

Taylor Age 3 (at the end of August)

Avery 8 months

February 25, 2012

Hello from Springville! Its been a little while since our last post- so lets catch up!

Grace Bible Church has been filled with blessings. We have grown so much and have so many new faces. And youth group is no exception- we have about 35 kids now! (And they are GREAT kids) We have an intern from Frontier School of the Bible, Barry Duerksen, who will be with us through September. Please pray for him to be able to connect with the kids, learn about being a youth pastor, and continue to grow in his walk with the Lord. We also have a couple that is coming out to work with our youth in the fall- which is one of our biggest needs right now. They are getting married soon and will be moving to Utah. Please pray for them over the next few months as they will be adjusting to married life and moving from California to Utah- two big adjustments!

On Sunday mornings, we have been running from 160 - 180 people and our maximum capacity is 185. We have 2 options- two services or expand somehow. We really would like to stay away from two services because it makes fellowship difficult since people don't get to always see each other on Sunday mornings if they attend different services. We have been praying about the possibilities we have with increasing our seating. Since we are in an older storefront building and share walls with business on either side, we are limited on what we can do. There is a possibility to add in a balcony that would seat an additional 40 people. We will be getting a quote and an inspection from the city to see if we can pursue that. Please pray for God's will and His provision to meet this need for our growing church!

Our church also has so many new babies! We have had a baby dedication just about every other week. We are so thankful for these new little ones- and that their parents choose to dedicate them to the Lord. One couple in particular - Justin and Danielle - have been trying to get pregnant for over 6 years. They had a few miscarriages and almost gave up and were ready to pursue adoption. Danielle became pregnant again last year and gave birth to a beautiful baby boy last week. Its so amazing to see God answer prayer! - Here's baby Roman~

And this is baby Lydia, another family in our church dedicating their first child

Thank you so much for your prayers for our growing family as well! We love being the parents of these two beautiful girls. I love that we get to use words like "girls" and "kids". Avery is such a blessing to our family, and Taylor has been such a great big sister. Avery is 3 1/2 months now- it goes by so fast!

Thanks again for your prayers and support!

Love, The Miles :)