So pics of where we've been....

These are just some pictures from the last 6 months....hope you enjoy.

When God pulls the rug out from under us

Recently Ryan wrote this letter explaining where we've been & what's going on in our lives. I hope you can find time to read it & understand where in the world the Fasts are now :-)

Dear Friends and Family,

Greetings from Hayfork, California! For some of you this may come as a surprise to find that we are no longer in Mariposa… and trust me when Erin and I say we are just as surprised as many of you. But God has been doing some pretty interesting things in our lives as of late and we wanted to update you and ask you to join with us in prayer. So here is the story.

Everything was going smoothly in the Fast household. As of the middle of April, we had just gotten back from a lovely vacation with the elder Fasts to Hawaii, some major contractual issues pertaining to the project that I was administering had been overcome, our involvement at our church continued to progress in new and exciting ways, and we found out that Erin was pregnant with a due date in November. Life in the “Fast Lane” was on cruise control and we were enjoying it. Then I received a call from my boss informing me that the decision had been made to remove me from my project in Yosemite with very little to no explanation given as to why. Furthermore, I was given one day to turn the job over to another project engineer and in less than a week to pack up my family and move to another job in Arizona. For all intents and purposes I was being kicked to the curb with very little consideration given to my career and my family situation.

As Erin and I reeled from this unexpected turn of events we found ourselves driven to the Lord in prayer. We loved where we were and believed we were serving Him unconditionally, so why was this taking place? As we prayed for wisdom in what to do God led me to James 4:13-17. This familiar passage brought great conviction to us as we realized in typical human fashion we had failed to consult God concerning the direction in life in which we were headed and God upset the apple cart so that we would put aside our ambitions and replace them with His will. As we prayed and opened ourselves up to His will we both came to the conviction that my secular career as an engineer would soon be coming to an end.

The next realization that God brought to us was related to our position in the community in which we lived. As many of you know we have been very involved in our church. I was the worship leader and in charge of the small group ministry, Erin was in charge the women’s ministries, and we both were actively involved in the youth ministry. To us the Mariposa community was very much like the town of Antioch when Barnabas brought Paul to it in Acts 11:25-26. Our church was growing in numbers, in maturity and in so many ways this community was moving away from being the mission field God had called us to and into a ministry. In short Mariposa had moved from being our mission to our home.

This left us in a very unique position having to make a decision concerning our future that we did not expect to be making at this point in time. Was God calling us into vocational ministry or was He calling us into service on the mission field? It is very difficult to describe what then took place other than to say that when the Holy Spirit speaks into the life of a Christian it always come with clarity and conviction. But in one single moment the frustration and confusion surrounding the turmoil of life seemed to be put aside and Erin and I responded to God’s call on our lives to full time missionary service. When we responded to God’s will and told Him that we would gladly serve Him as full time missionaries everything changed and we were filled with the peace that Jesus talked about when He said “I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33). How then did we end up in Hayfork, CA?

This processes as described above took place primarily over a span of 4-days. Within an hour of committing our lives to the mission field I received another phone call from my boss. While I still did not fully understand why I was removed from the project in Yosemite it began to become apparent to most of those involved that the way I was being treated was not right. During this phone conversation my boss complimented me on the maturity that I demonstrated throughout this process and that he would like to try and make good by at least transferring me to a region that I preferred to be in. I requested either Hawaii or Northern California and he was able to get me in on a roadway reconstruction job in Northern California in the Shasta-Trinity National Forest between the towns of Hyampom and Hayfork on Hwy 3 (you’ll have to mapquest this one to figure out where it is J).

The final decision in this process, from an emotional standpoint, was the hardest. Because we believe that God is calling us into missions we need to continue down the path to financial freedom and clearing all of our debt. The clearest path to this point appears to be continuing to work in the secular work environment until Erin’s school loan is paid off and to leave our home church, our Antioch, behind for a season. So with tearful goodbyes and many hugs and kisses we handed our leadership positions within our church over to those whom God had brought up underneath us and headed north to a new job in Hayfork.

So many other events and confirmations took place though out this process that it would take up too much paper to describe them with the measure that they deserve. Suffice it to say, that God brought confirmation through many of you and used our Pastor, our parents, and our closest friends to give us counsel as we walked through these turbulent waters. Consequently, we write in part to thank each of you for your prayers of wisdom and Godly counsel throughout this season. Finally, we write to ask you to pray for us as we head into what we believe will be a life long commitment to the mission field. We have been approved by the mission board of Teen Missions to join staff with them and if the Lord wills we will do so in the not too distant future. We covet your prayers, thoughts, and counsel as we enter this stage of actively pursuing the mission field.

In Christ alone,



Ryan, Erin, Micah, and “Papoose” (a.k.a. the bun in the oven)

We're back...kind of

Well, we're back on solid ground & have met back up with the "World of Technology." Two weeks ago we purchased a wireless modem that is MUCH faster than our old dial-up modem, so again I can post our latest updates (and there has been a lot) and pictures. So stay tuned & I'll get this thing up and going again soon. My first major project is to update you on what's been going on in the last month, which I hope to get done tonight....so we'll see what happens.

Where have you been??

As you can tell, this blog has been quite for quite a while. That is because, as many of you know, we recently took the big step out of our 5th wheel and into a rental home. The only problem with this move is that we had to down-grade to dial-up internet. Which makes uploading photos really difficult. I hope to update this blog once we have DSL again, which the phone company says could be coming in the next few months. In the meantime, check back on occation & maybe I'll let you know what's happening.

Sharing is fun!!

So on many of my friend's blogs they like to share youtube videos that strike their fancy. I have found my new favorite site for Christian satire... God Tube I know it may sound a little cheesy, but it can be very funny. I have two which have been personal favorites latetly....

The First: is for those of us who grew up going on youth retreats with our youth group. If you ever had a crazy youth pastor you would appreciate this...and maybe if you're like me, you are saying "deep down inside I wish I could try it too..."



The Second: can be most appreciated by those of us who are children of the early 90's. I hated this song when it came out....but now I have a renewed appreication for it. You have to listen closely to the lyrics & hopefully you will find this as amusing as I did.

Halloween in a small mountian town

We enjoy living in a small mountian town. Every year for Halloween the entire county, all 18,000 of them, seem to come into town to go trick or treating. It's great, they close off the city streets & the kids wander about trying to get the biggest stashes of candy in town. This year Micah decided to try his hand a trick or treating. The problem is, my son really doesn't like candy too much (I think I know where he gets it). But he does like suckers!! We walked through town with some friends & their kids. At every house Micah would stop, check out the candy & only take it if they had a sucker. At one stop they offered him a small piece of candy & a sucker, he politely returned the piece of candy & kept the sucker :-)


Micah prepares to go out & hit the town


You will notice that the sucker in his hand here is a different color from the one above. Every time he got a new sucker he put his half sucked one in his bucket & requested for the new one to be opened. I don't even want to know what the bottom of his bucket looks like :-)


My favorite stop through town is a local resturant which gives out deep fried bananas covered in carmel sauce!! Ryan tried to look real goofy for the camera.


Our church had a GREAT harvest party! After getting our fill of suckers we headed over there. They had a chili cook-off & a variety of games. Here Ryan tries to go "bobbing for apples" (without water).


Micah really enoyed the make-shift hay slide.


I think I'm going to be pulling hay out of his costume for a while :-)


Micah's favorite game was our version of a dunk tank. Micah loved throwing the balls at the target (and he got pretty close!!).


The pastor after he gets soaked by Micah's throw (with a little bit of help from the adults)

Fall in Yosemite

Well one of my favorite seasons up here is fall. It reminds me so much of living back east. The trees are full of color & create a canopy over the roadway. I was a little disappointed this year because some of my favorite places to drive were closed due to Ryan's consturction job (I'm trying not to hold it against him :-) But Micah and I headed up there last week to catch the tail end of the color. It was beautiful. It was about 75 degrees outside & the leaves were falling like snow. Micah loved kicking the large piles of dry leaves & picking up sticks. It was wonderful & relaxing.



kicking the large piles of leaves


Playing in the "Indian Villiage" at the visitor's center


preparing for a "giant" leap off this "giant" rock