Blog Posts

Taylor and I are excited to announce that we have accepted a ministry opportunity with Converge Missions to be missionaries in Togo, West Africa. We have been praying about this for some time and we have felt God telling us to take this next step.

A little fact about where we will be going and what we will be doing:

“We will be serving in an area whose primary religion is Voodoo. We will be partnering with a team focused on planting churches and sports camp ministry. Our vision is to plant reproducing churches in cultural centers so that they can then plant in more rural areas and to continue building and growing the sports camp ministry for youth, “Togo Palms”.  Togo Palms has been an effective base of ministry for the past 7 years to plant churches and minister to the Togolese population that finds half of its population under the age of 18.”

We ask you to join with us as a partner with prayer and financial support during the time that we will be serving in Togo. We are seeking monthly financial support partners during this time. Together we can effectively take the Gospel to the unreached people of Togo.

Click link here to Partner with us

We are so happy that God has opened up a door for both of us to go to South Africa this fall. Our church is planning a trip this November (over Thanksgiving) to travel to Botswana/Lesotho in Africa to work with (re)claimed Project. You can check out their website below for more details on the organization.

While we are there we will be involved in three different area:

1. Orphan Care Center
2. Job Creation
   • Reclaimed Project’s job creation initiative derived from the desire to truly “equip change makers to be the change”. In order to equip change makers, Reclaimed team members travel to Africa to teach the locals how to turn their everyday skills into a gateway for financial independence.
3. Evangelism
   • Reclaimed Project seeks to advance the Gospel among the communities where they work. There are communities in Lesotho that have never heard the Gospel.
   • We may have the opportunity to go up in the mountains of Lesotho on horseback and preach the Gospel to the villages that haven’t hear the word of God. This is an amazing opportunity for us since we both love to ride horses and spread the gospel.

Since we are both going we are coming up with different ways to raise funds for the trip. We would be grateful if you could help us out. I (Marci) would love to book some photo shoots; Easter is right around the corner 🙂 I added a few samples of some family, kids, and senior photos I’ve done.

Just to say a little about me, so you know you are getting someone that actually knows a little about photos, I have a minor in Digital Media and have been taking family photos since I was in high school. You can email me at: marci.danielle88@gmail.com or message me on facebook. Click on the photos to enlarge and scroll through

We are also having a Yankee Candle fundraiser, if you wish to buy some candles (who doesnt love candles!)  or gifts you can click on the link and type in our group number. By buying online 40% of purchase will automatically go to supporting our trip. Our Group Number is: 990077655

We will keep the blog updated on information and preparation for our trip. We are both excited about this trip and appreciate your prayers for our trip to Africa.

Sometimes it feels like we are going 100 miles an hour through our lives, and just looking forward to the next day so we can get through today. We tend to look forward to things to come rather than the things that are happing now in our lives. I know this is how I feel many times, and right now in our lives I keep thinking of things that are coming in the future for us.  But I don’t look at what I have right now and things that are happing in our lives today! Many times I know we look for a house and want to find a house, but right now in our lives we are not ready to buy a house. This is mainly because we do not know where God is going to lead us after Taylor graduates, and he must find a job so we know where to find a home. We of course have a wants and wishes list but like we have learned in just a year and half of marriage, God‘s will is not always our will.

Like I told my girls in Sunday school, we can pray to God all we want but we must also listen and do His will that He has showed us.

With all of that I know that summer is always one of the busiest times of the year, and this summer was no different for us. We did have time to see family and have great times throughout summer. One thing that we did together as a couple was taking “The Art of Marriage” bible study at our church. This was a very good bible study, and we were told going into it that we may not have encountered the topics we were discussing in our marriage right now, but we would come across them at some point. The tools that it equipped us with during it we hope we can handle them in the correct way. I would recommend that class to anyone that is married, and it doesn’t matter how long you have been married it is still great.

This coming fall will be very busy as well for us. I know Taylor is looking forward to December the most! I am extremely proud of all that he has accomplished this past year. This summer was very busy for him I know because he took several courses but also started his internship. We were very blessed for the school to allow him to start his internship in the summer and continue through the fall rather than doing it all in the fall. He will start his last graduate school class on Wednesday the 21!  Which I think is kind of cool because that is the same day Tucker will be starting at BAMA. One brother will be finishing up his college experience while the other starts on his journey through college.

The last thing that is coming up this fall is my baby brother is getting married! Wow that is very hard to believe. In October we will add a new family member to our family. Another busy time but not too busy to see His blessings.

Love,

Taylor & Marci James

PROVERBS 16:3

3 Commit your work to the Lord,

and your plans will be established.(ESV)

This year is going to be a huge year for us and there will be many changes in our future that will be coming and we can’t wait to share them with you all! We started this blog back before we were married to keep everyone updated and in case we moved away about how we were doing in our new area of our lives J  we love to keep everyone up to date on how we are doing with any new changes in our lives!

As of this month we do not have any new changes in our lives, but I say that now and watch next month I’ll be writing about something amazing God has done in our lives. The saying I love is, “If you like to hear God laugh, tell him your plans.” Which is very true because we never know what we are going to be truly doing, but we think we know what we are going to be doing. I know this first hand and I remember it daily and thank God my plan didn’t work out and His did because I married my amazing husband when I followed His plan and moved to Huntsville. I had not planned on going to UAH or really even wanted to move to Alabama but I felt it was what was in God’s plan and I followed. I am blessed every day of my life and I am so glad for that! I also grew to love Alabama and have very dear friends and family there today!

With that I can say we are coming up on our first year anniversary and I can’t believe it! One year ago I married my very best friend in the world and I would not have change one moment of that day! It was the best day of my lifeJ I was the happiest girl in the whole wide world! I am smiling the biggest smile right now as I write this now just thinking about it and I know we couldn’t have pulled it off like that without our parents there to help.

We have begun to adapt to Petal and we have already grown to love this town and made some great friends. Petal is a great little town that is growing fast. It’s really perfect for both Taylor and I because we can live in the country and still only be 10 minutes from town or 20 minutes from Hattiesburg. Taylor really loves the job outlook that Hattiesburg offers and is hopeful for a good internship in the fall that could lead to a good job. The next big change for us in the year end that will be that Taylor will be looking for a job as he graduates from Graduate School! I am beyond proud of him for this. He is working so hard on his degree and he is truly enjoying what he is working on. He has made great contacts here and may have some leads so we are going to be praying for a job here.  But again we are praying for God’s will to be done and will follow Him wherever He leads us. We ask for your prayers as we go through this next year as these changes come along in our small familyJ and we love you all!! 

Love,

Taylor & Marci James

PROVERBS 16:3

³ Commit your work to the Lord,

    and your plans will be established.(ESV)

We have finally unpacked all the boxes and “put them away” and let me say that I do not believe we had all this stuff in a one bedroom apartment! All of us are loving our bigger rental house here in Petal, Mississippi, and one of the greatest things about living here is that we are close to family. Family dinners at both grandparents’ house and then followed by games, are a must at least one night a week if Taylor doesn’t have a heavy load at school. The weather was getting cooler here but then it went back up and will be in the high 80’s close to 90’s for a little while, but fingers crossed it will go back down! 🙂 I need some cold weather again! I am going to post some pictures of our house all decorated. I was waiting till we got curtains because it would help it feel homier, and it made it look so much better!! 

Since we have been here, we have also been to a USM game and cheered on some Golden Eagles…Yes we know they are 5-0, but its okay everyone has an off season. We are going to their last game in November and we are hoping for a win. Taylor is excited to be able to get involved in things on campus as well. He even signed us up for a intramural corn hole tournament. We will play every Tuesday till like the middle of November. I think that is all the updates I have today and I have to get back to work, but I’ll update again soon!! 

Love,

Taylor & Marci James

PROVERBS 16:3

³ Commit your work to the Lord,

    and your plans will be established.(ESV)

It was a happy time and a sad time when we were moving all of our things out of the first place Taylor and I lived together. When I saw the empty walls I remembered the memories we had there, even if they were just for 6 months. They were 6 months I would never ask to trade in. Sure we had our problems, like when we had mice in our apartment. Anyone that knows me well knows I do not handle mice at all!!! That was not a very enjoyable time, but we got through it together which is most important. Another issue we had to endure was living with our grill in our living room for 2 months due to the city saying we couldn’t have it anymore. That cut down on square footage in a one bedroom apartment for sureJ but again it was one of those things that we got through and it didn’t kill us. I can’t say thank you enough to everyone that helped pack us last night!! It was a huge, huge, huge help and there is no way we can ever say thank you enough. We are blessed with many people in our lives and as I type this it bring tears to my eyes how blessed we are to have the people we have to care for us. Many people out there don’t have the support and the guidance we have from our family and friends and most of all from our parents and Taylor and I can’t thank you all enough for your support and guidance.  Well to end on another adventure, as we were leaving the apartment last night we had to lock it up, so I went to find my keys and couldn’t seem to find them anywhere. We looked and looked and looked but we still could not find them, until we came to the realization that my keys had gotten packed away in the 16ft moving truck. So my tip to you for moving is put all your keys and phones in one area together AWAY from the boxes. 

Thanks again.

Love,

Taylor and Marci James

More Pictures to come of our new place:)

Taylor and I got to go on our dream honeymoon!! We are both very excited to be here in Aviemore, Scotland. This town really does fit us nice because there are a lot of outdoor things and it is not a big city. The first day we traveled all day starting from Manchester, England we took a train up to the highlands of Scotland!

     The second day we woke up and went walking around in Aviemore and Inverndruie. We are in the national forest of Cairngorm which is where we went walking and it is very beautiful! Afterwards, we went down to the river for a little while and saw kids jumping off the bridge into what felt like 50 degree water! They said the water was warm to them because it was such a hot day of 78 degrees. We did not go swimming in the river, all though I tried to get Taylor to go out and swim with them. Later today we went on a horseback tour of the Rothiemurchus Estate here and we got to ride Highland Ponies. The lady that took us on the trail ride was funny because she was talking about how hot it was out and that the horses did not like it at all. We both thought that it was a really nice day out with a light breeze. We are going to rent a car and go on a road trip tomorrow to see Loch Ness and some castles around the area.

Taylor and Marci James