I am preaching at Grace Baptist Church in Bethlehem, NC this week. The Pastor is Brother Marcus Benfield. We have been having a good week thus far. The people are receptive and friendly. The services have been free and I have had good liberty to preach. The folks have been very responsive in the invitation. Please pray for this meeting. We have two more evenings this week and I am looking, and longing, for the Lord to do some great things for us.

Our family is just about 8 days away from the birth of Johanna Carswell. In case you may not remember, Johanna is the daughter of my daughter Nikki and her husband Chad. Johanna was diagnosed with Full Trisomy 18, or Full Edwards Syndrome in April. As I mentioned, on this blog in April, Full Trisomy 18 is a terrible genetic disorder with a 100% mortality rate. This simply means that we may not have Johanna for very long in this world. So, pray for her Mom and her Dad. They are hurting and and they are looking to the Lord for grace to help in this time of need. They are finding that He is a very present help in trouble. Praise Him for that! Anyway, Johanna will be born on Friday October 23rd early in the morning. Our family would appreciate your prayers on that day and for the days following.

As we have walked this road as a family, several passages of Scripture have given me hope and comfort. The one that I have leaned on the hardest is Psalm 115:3, which says, “But our God is in the heavens: He hath cone whatsoever He hath pleased.” At the end of the day, whatever happens with Johanna, was the Lord’s will for her life and for our family, and that is good enough for me. I will discover, as I heard someone say a while back, “Whatever God does is just what I wanted.” Thanks and God bless!

Alan

Of being sick and tired. For the last few weeks I have been fighting a wicked cold in my chest and head. I think I either had bronchitis or pneumonia, or both. Wither way, I heven’t felt like doing much. Of course, even with the sickness, I had to do some preaching, so that just prolonged my recovery. Anyway, enough whining, right? I am feeling some better. Still coughing, still hoarse, still stuffy headed, but well on the road to recovery. God is good!

The last week has been a tough week for other reasons, but through all the issues of life, God has demonstrated His grace and presence in a great way. My wife Joan and I have been spending a considerable amount of time in prayer together and the Lord is blessing that. I love my wife! She is an inspiration to me. I have been watching her grow in the Lord. She is a praying woman and she has been actively seeking the Lord. He has been blessing her in return. He is honoring His promise to draw near to those who draw near to Him, James 4:8. I appreciate the ministry she has had in my life.

Today, I would like for you to help me pray for a preacher named Milton Martin. Brother Milton is the Pastor of Pleasant Hill Baptist Church in Vanntown, TN. Brother Milton is going to have to have heart valve replacement surgery within the next few weeks. Please remember him, his wife Barbara, their daughters Carrie and Lois, their grandchildren and the church he pastors. Brother Milton is a humble, faithful man of God and I am asking the Lord to give him complete healing for His glory. I know Brother Milton would appreciate your prayers.

I have spent the past two mornings at the Taylorsville Baptist Camp Meeting. The preaching was great and the presence of the Lord was so very real and powerful. I got some help for my soul yesterday and I am thankful for that. Pray for that meeting as it continues through Friday.

Looking ahead, it is just a month until our Bible conference at Calvary. The dates are August 2-6. The preachers include Tom Hayes, Scott Moneyham, Rick Safriet, Steve Dagenhart, and Eric Snider. Please pray for the meeting and make your plans to join us then. The service times on Sunday are 11:00 AM and 6:00 PM. Monday through Thursday the service times are 9:30 AM and 7:00 PM. We hope to see you then!

I am sitting on the deck of the chalet this morning. It is a pleasant 65 degrees here in Beech Mountain. Joan and I have enjoyed our time together. It is always good to get away with just her. Due to my preaching obligations and church duties, we don’t get very many days to spend together. So, it’s been nice to get away for a couple of days. Anyway, yesterday we went to West Jefferson, NC. They have a cheese factory there. You can go into the viewing room and watch them make cheese, but that’s kind of lame. They have a cheese store across the street and sell many, many different varieties of cheese there. We bought some and it is good. I especially like the super sharp cheddar. Next, we went to see the CHurches of the Frescoes. There are two old Episcopalian churches in the West Jefferson area that have large fresco style paintings by a fellow named Ben Long. Apparently, they are quiet a tourist attraction. Joan has wanted to go see them for some time. Well, we saw them! The paintings are good, but the churches are in deplorable shape. I was amazed by their condition, especially the one in Glendale Springs. We have been there, if I never go back it will be too soon for me. Then, we went to Valle Crucis, NC to Mast General Store. They have a candy shop and Joan has a massive sweet tooth.  She bought her a poke full of sweet treats. After that, we went to a steak house called Stonewalls in Banner Elk, NC. It’s overpriced and overrated. The steak was good, but I was underwhelmed by the whole experience. After that, it was back to the house and into the hot tub for a while. All in all, it was a great day! Today, we have done nothing! And this after noon, I plan to do a whole lot more of that. It’s a tough life, but someone has to live it!

I would like you to pray for a couple of friends of mine, Pastor Chris Benfield and Brother James Smith. These men need the help and encouragement of the Lord in their lives right now. Please say a prayer for them, asking the Lord to give them direction for their lives. They would appreciate it, and so would I.

Last night was the first of five nights under the “canvas cathedral” in Vials, NC. Willowdale Baptist Church and their Pastor, Brother Eugene Braswell, are hosting the meeting. This is the first meeting of its kind to be held in this community. The Lord blessed us last night with beautiful weather and a good attendance. I would guess there were around 75-80 people under the tent. I had great liberty to preach and the Lord blessed at the end of the meeting. Please remember us this week as I travel back and forth and preach each night. God sure has been good to me, opening doors and giving me opportunities to preach, but I have some decisions to make in that arena and I would appreciate your prayers that God would give me wisdom to know His will for my life. Better yet, pray that I will simply walk with Him. If I will do that, I will always go where He intends me to go. That, and nothing more, is what I want for my life. 

Also, yesterday, I attended the funeral for Brother Jimmy Lambert. He is the 99 year old preacher I mentioned in the post yesterday. His funeral service was superb! Each preacher did a great job opening the Word of God and magnifying Jesus. The choir sang “Shouting Time In Heaven”, which was apparently Brother Lambert’s favorite choir song. After the song played, they played a recording of Brother Jimmy talking about his conversion and about that song. It was a blessing to hear his voice and to know that :he being dead still speaks.” Brother Jimmy lived a clean life and left an untarnished testimony. Let us all pray that we will be found faithful to the Lord for as long as we live. I surely don’t want to bring reproach upon the One Who gave Himself for me!

Pray for the meeting this week!

Our meeting at Mount Hebron Baptist Church got under way last night. The service was well attended and I enjoyed great freedom to preach the Lord. I appreciate the Lord blessing like He does. I am on my way out the door, so I do not have time for a long, detailed post today. I would just ask you to pray for the meeting this week. We need His help. Well, at least I do!

The Lord met with us yesterday in power and glory. Both services yesterday were blessed with God’s presence and power. In the morning service, the Lord blessed our choir graetly and allowed us to enter into His presence in woprship as the songs of Zion were sung and the name of the Lord magnified. Then, the best part, the man of God opened the Word of God and preached it in simplicity and in the power of the Holy Ghost. Evangelist Tom Gilliam is with us for our Spring meeting, He is preaching this week from 2 Corinthians on “The Wisdom Of Weakness”. The text for his series is 2 Cor. 12:10b, “…when I am weak, then am I strong.” Yesterday morning Brother Tom preached about “The Foe Of Weakness”. He talked about how Satan will fight our efforts to surrender fully to the Lordship of Christ in our lives. He will fight our efforts to be weak, because he knows that our weakness will allow the power of God to be strong in our lives. Last night Brother Tom preached about “The Facts Of Weakness”. This message was designed to teach us how suffering is used of God to educate us, to identify us with Jesus, to liberate us and to glorify Him. It was a profound message that God used to bring help to many of His people. I am looking forward to the rest of the series. I will be posting the sermons in the next few days. When I do, I will post a link to them here on this web page.

Please pray for our meeting. The Lord has truly blessed our church, but we need a great move of God. He has done so much for us, but He desires to do so much more. Pray that we will be in a position to receive it!

More later!

Alan Carr

I am preaching this week at Gilead Baptist Church in Nebo, NC. Thus far, the meeting has been good. There has been great liberty to preach the Word of God and I am always grateful for that. What makes this meeting different for me is the fact that I was Pastor of this same church for nearly 16 years. Those were good years, filled with many manifestations of God’s grace and glory. He truly blessed our ministry there. It is good to be able to go back and to see old friends and new faces. I appreciate what the Lord is doing for Gilead Baptist Church. Pray for the rest of the meeting.

My daughter Nikki and her husband Chad are in Charlotte for more tests on baby Johanna even as I type this post. They are there for more testing on the baby and for a consultation with a geneticist. We hope to have a little more information about Johanna and her condition and prognosis. As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, Johanna has been diagnosed with Trisomy 18, or Edward’s Syndrome. Please pray for Nikki, Chad and Johanna as they wait for the Lord’s will for be revealed in their lives.

Thank you to all you who have E-mailed me that you are praying about our situation. I truly appreciate that. God bless you all!

Alan

I am sorry that I haven’t been by in a while. Things have been different in out part of the world, to say the least. Last week I was in Carrollton, GA for the annual campmeeting at Central Baptist Church. On Tuesday, after the morning session, we received a call from our daughter. She is expecting a baby, and during the course of a routine exam, a problem was discovered. Joan and I started for home immediately. After all, while I am a preacher, I am a Daddy first. Anyway, her OB/GYN made Nikki and appointment with some other doctors in Charlotte. After testing the genetic material in the baby’s placenta, they discovered that the baby has Trisomy 18, or Edward’s Syndrome. Nikki and Chad found out this morning.

Essentially, the baby, now named Johanna Raye Carswell (Yes, she is a girl) has three 18th chromosomes instead of the normal two. This is a devastating prognosis for Johanna. Around 95% of babies diagnosed with Trisomy 18 never live to be born. Of those that are, about 90% die within the first year. Those who are born usually have severe physical problems, and sometimes physical deformities. Most also suffer severe mental issues as well.

So, as you can imagine, this has been a tough day for our family. I would ask that each of you pray for the Lord’s will to be done in this matter. Regardless of what we want, we know that He is absolutely sovereign and that He is in control of this situation. He can heal Johanna, and let her be born into this world, or He can allow her to be born into Heaven. All we ask is that He be glorified by whatever happens and He give grace to Nikki, Chad and the rest of the family. On that note, let me say that I am proud of Nikki and Chad. They received, what can only be described as, the most terrible news imaginable. Yet, they handled that news with grace and faith. I am amazed at how the Lord works in their lives. We would appreciate your prayers.

In spite of the problems, I stand amazed by our sovereign, awesome, almighty, glorious God!

Alan

A lot has happened since I last took the time to sit here and blog. Week before last, the family took a much needed vacation and spent some time together at a cabin in the mountains above Pigeon Forge, TN. We had a very relaxing week together. For many years we were not able to take vacations because we could not afford to. Now we can, so we do.

This week has been very unusual. I preached Monday evening at Piney Grove Baptist Church here in our county. We had a great service. The Lord moved and several decisions were made. Tuesday morning I received a call from a brokenhearted mother that her 24-year-old son had been killed in a car wreck late Monday night. His name was Mark Garnhum and he was saved and called to preach under our ministry at Gilead Baptist Church in Burke County. Mark was like a son to Joan and me when he was growing up. He was in our home on mnay occasions because he and our son Jesse were best friends. At any rate, we had his funeral Wednesday night in Morganton, NC and the burial was Thursday afternoon in Burnsville, NC. Mark will be missed by his family. Please pray for his widow Kayla, their two children Kassie and Kayden, his mother, his father Frank and his sister Virginia. There are some great spiritual needs in the family so please pray that God will be glorified through the death of this fine young man.

One of our men, Brother Norman Tester, has been in intensive care since Wednesday evening. Brother Norman is a walking miracle. A few years ago he had throat cancer. Docotrs removed his tongue, larynx and interior throat muscles. Norman can’tr swallow, so he has to be fed through a feeding tube. Even without a tongue and a larynx, Norman can still speak and often stands to thank the Lord for saving his soul. Last year Norman had lung cancer and lost his riht lung. Now, he is having siezures. He had been in the hospital for three weeks due to these seizures. Wednesday afternoon Norman had a seizure and aspirated a bunch of the liquid food they feed him. His left lung is full of that material and he is now on a ventilator, with pneumonia and other problems. Please pray for Norman, his wife Earlene, and his daughters Renee and Sherry. They would appreciate it.

I am schedules to be with Pastor Ken Frady and the folks at Mt. Calvary Baptist Church in Connelly Springs, NC. Please remember the meeting and come if you can.

God bless!

Alan

Yesterday was a great day for me. We had a good time at Calvary in the AM service. The attendance was excellent and the Lord met with us in a powerful way. I praise His name for His faithfulness!

Last evening we went to Trinity Baptist Church in Valdese, NC. Brother Scott Moneyham is the Pastor and my daughter Nikki, her husband Chad and their son (my GRANDSON Clayton) all attend church there. Anyway, they had a baby dedication for Clayton there last night and they invited us to attend. I did the preaching and we had a great service. All of our family was there as well as Chad’s family, so Mister Clayton was well represented with aunts, uncles, grandparents and great-grandparents. In case you missed it, that little boy is really something else!

So, I am scheduled to begin meeting at Grandview Park Baptist Church this evening. Please pray for these services and come if you can. The church is here in Lenoir.

Last week I asked you to pray for a baby in our church, Abigail Gibson. She is about two months old and she was born two months premature. She has had a lot of health problems and is in the process of dying now. The doctors estimate that 85% of her brain is already gone. At any rate, she and her family stand in great need of prayer today. Please remember them and ask the Lord to dispense grace in an abundant measure. Thank you!

Alan Carr