Christmas Greetings 2007

Merry Christmas from Our Home to Yours!

We hope all of you had a wonderful year and that this time of year when we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ finds you and your family doing well. If we have not heard from you please drop us a quick note, we’d love to hear from you. The last year has held many changes for us and we’re excited about sharing them with you.

Last December our ministry at Cicero Christian Church came to an end and, through what was clearly a move of God, we were offered a pastoral position at Webb Chapel United Methodist Church. For almost a year now we have been serving the wonderful people of this church in rural Indiana. What’s rather amazing is that it is Linda’s home church! We won’t elaborate on the details, but if you are interested please call and we’d be glad to share the story with you. Bill has had a busy year serving and working with the people of Webb Chapel.

Linda concluded her position with the Central Indiana Crisis Pregnancy Center in February. Her three years there were a blessing to her and the staff, volunteers and clients of the center. After moving Linda took two part time nursing positions. She serves a few hours a week with a home health agency and works twenty hours a week as a school nurse at the local high school. This position gives her the wonderful opportunity to enjoy and minister to the many students who come in to see her each day. Being back home also gives her time to see her family more often and help her parents with any medical concerns.

One big piece of news in our family is the birth of our new grandson Nathanael Harrison. Nathanael was born July 24th and is a wonderful little guy. As you can see from the picture he is undoubtedly the best looking baby around! How does he manage to stand up with dad when he is only four months old! He is Jeremy and Jackie’s first child and we hope not the last! If you want to see more pictures of Nathanael check out Jeremy and Jackie's blog. Here's Nathanael opening his first Christmas present.

After spending a wonderful year and a half in Oregon and California working at national parks, Sarah is now working full time at a pharmaceuticals company near Indianapolis. She is enjoying her challenging job as an Accu-check Customer Support Specialist and is doing a great job. She has a nice apartment and is attending a church she truly enjoys. One of her favorite pastimes is cheering for the Indianapolis Colts which has obviously paid off. Could there be another Super Bowl for them this year? Sarah also has a great blog which you are welcome to visit.

Other than the birth of our grandson and a wonderful week spent at a pastor/spouse retreat center in Wisconsin, a big event in our lives this past year was time spent in Israel. Last December we truly enjoyed ten wonderful days traveling the land of Israel. It was exciting to be in the land of our Savior’s birth and see the places where He lived, ministered and gave His life for us. The picture on the right was taken in Linda’s favorite place; the Sea of Galilee. To be where our Savior walked on water, calmed the storm, and did much of his ministry was beyond description. Bill’s favorite places were the tomb where Christ rose on that first Easter, and the Garden of Gethsemane. Nothing can compare with seeing Scripture come to life! Have a Wonderful Christmas Celebration! Bill & Linda

Baby Nathaneal is Here!

Our first grandchild, Nathanael Harrison Bergstrom, has arrived! He is a beautiful baby and we can't wait to get to New York to see and hold him! What a joy to see the miracle of this new baby. Below are a few pictures of this beautiful little guy. For more detail and pictures go to Jeremy & Jackies blog.

A Sleepy Boy

A Proud Dad!
A Proud and Tired Mom

Our Grandson Nathanael Will be Here Soon!!

On July 12 our first grandchild is scheduled to enter the world. We're very excited for Jeremy and Jackie, the soon to be Aunt Sarah and of course ourselves. As soon as possible we will post a few pictures of Nathanael. Below are the excited soon to be parents during our visit to New York last year.

A Wonderful Retreat in Wisconsin

In May Linda and I went on a wonderful pastor/spouse retreat at Cedarly in Wisconsin. Cedarly is one of three locations operated by Pastors Retreat Network designed especially for pastoral couples. It was a wonderful week of relaxing, eating fantastic meals, taking canoe rides, riding bikes and just being lazy. We did a some exercises for spiritual renewal but mostly just enjoyed ourselves. If you're interested their web sit is pastorsretreatnetwork.org.

Less than a mile from Cedarly is an Episcopal seminary our son Jeremy told us about. The grounds were great and you could sense that it was a wonderful place to train for ministry and simply enjoy the pastoral setting. Below are a few pictures of Cedarly and the seminary.

Cedarly Pastors Retreat Center

Nashotah House Episcopal Seminary

A Little Less Than One Month After Our Move

Linda and I (mostly Linda) worked hard to settle into our new home. With just a few days to go before the one month mark all but two boxes are unpacked. Quite an accomplishment I'd say! Below are a few pictures of the inside after settling in and a picture of our country church.

We are enjoying the people of the church and our ministry here. They are good people who have received us well and made us feel at home. I'll say more latter but for now here are the pictures.

As you walk in the front door you see a favorite picture that was given to us by our church in Roanoke when we left.

The entry way

The next two are of the living room.

Our bedroom Our Family Room

And last of all the kitchen which we have yet to paint.

This is a picture of Webb Chapel United Methodist Church where we are serving.

Our Move To Logansport

This is our first attempt at posting to a blog so we'll see what happens! For our first post I thought I'd update everyone on our move by using my article for our church's newsletter. It's an update on our move and beginning our ministry at Webb Chapel. So, with a few modifications here it is:

It’s hard to believe that we've already been a part of Webb Chapel for seven weeks! So much has happened during that time. As all of you know we chose the day with the worst weather we’ve had in a few years to move! The moving van arrived on Monday the 12th to load up and after cleaning our home Linda and I left for Logansport. After a great meal with Roger and Margaret (Linda's parents) we spent the night at the parsonage. Needless to say the moving van didn’t bring our belongings on Tuesday and we spent the day looking at the snow storm and shoveling the drive. On Wednesday the movers arrived at noon and by about 3:30 were unloaded. Now we faced the daunting task of sorting through and unpacking all our stuff. Linda has done a great job of organizing and as of today (the 21st) most of the unpacking is finished. In a few days I’ll try to organize the garage and we will have settled into our new home.

One little adventure we had during our move was the cat that had decided to live in our crawl space. After crawling under the house to be sure a cat was there we looked for a way to evict him from his new home. After hearing about the cat in the children’s message Roger Ide loaned me a live trap. I set the trap out on Sunday afternoon along with some tuna fish to tempt the cat. After a few hours I looked out the window and in the growing darkness saw that we had trapped a cat! I told Linda about it and she looked out and when the ‘cat’ turned around she said, “That’s not a cat it’s a raccoon!” We are assuming that the raccoon had evicted the cat for us and decided that he was going to make our crawl space his home. I had other ideas. I covered the hole and turned the cage toward the woods assuming the raccoon would head for the woods; not so! As soon as the trap opened he made an about face and headed right for the hole leading under our house. I guess he liked his new home! I held a stick against the plywood I had put against the hole and told him he couldn’t live here anymore. He was not a happy raccoon! After doing all he could to pull the wood away from the hole he just sat there in the window cell and stared at me. It was a standoff! While Linda held the stick against the plywood I got a shovel to chase away the raccoon and a hammer and nails to nail the plywood against the hole. While we worked the raccoon climbed our fence and watched from a distance as we made his eviction permanent. I don’t think we are well liked by the raccoon population right now! I guess the raccoon and the storm are our little moving adventures!
Well enough on our moving adventure. Linda and I truly appreciate the wonderful welcome we have received at Webb Chapel. All the great food has been truly appreciated; now I know it’s true: there are a lot of great cooks at Webb Chapel!

As we begin our ministry at Webb Chapel I have two objectives. Preach and teach God’s Word and get to know all of you. It’s so important that we get to know and enjoy each other as brothers and sisters in Christ. I truly believe that God deeply desires us to grow close to each other so that we can encourage one another as we grow closer to Christ and serve Him. To begin getting to know each other I hope that many of you will host a Meet Pastor Bill and Linda meeting and that everyone will attend. Look for the details of the meetings in this issue of the Chapel Chatter.

Here are a few pictures from our move.

The next few pictures of our home aare on the day the moving van was supposed to arrive. The storm, an Alberta Clipper, dumped over a foot of snow on us. Needless to say we didn't get much moving done but we were able to rest from the busyness of packing and moving.















A view accross the street where it's pretty hard to see the corn field.














The day after the storm and before the moving van arived.














This is a great picture of a large pine tree in our front yard.




















Just to the left of the pine tree the early morning sun shines through the trees creating long shadows on the new snow.




















And finally, the famous racoon you read about in the above post!















If you need our new address, phone numbers, or email addresses post a comment and we will send them to you.