The People

Janie and I went, on our own accompanied only by 8 year old Lilia, to the grocery store. It was interesting to be almost illiterate when shopping. We found the items for which we were looking and went to the check out. The cashier was in training and Lilia had to go back for something we thought of after arriving at the check out line. The two ladies who were there, the cashier and her trainer, did not speak English. They knew only a few words and I only knew a few words of French. I struck up a conversation with them and they smiled while trying to speak what few English words they knew and at my poor attempt to speak French. I have found that the French people are very friendly. I have felt very safe here. The people seem to mind their own business and are very quite. I notice also that the dress in dark colors. I have a light tan colored hat that you have seen in some of the pictures I have posted here. I felt like I was wearing loud clothing. After the grocery store we stopped at a bakery shop and bought some baguettes. The lady behind the counter seemed to be amused that we were relying on an 8 year old to place our order. We are going to watch a movie with our grand kids now before they go to bed. They are eating their Halloween candy right now. All has gone well with our visit here so far and we are having a great time. God bless you.

Hiking in Paris

Jason and I went on a hike today. We walked about 12 miles in all. The trail itself was about 12 kilometers in length. I have placed here some pictures that we took along the trail. The weather was perfect for hiking. It was in the 40's and cloudy. We enjoyed good conversation on a number of different topics ranging from the Bible to hiking. We caught the train back to the apartment. I was impressed when Jason stopped a lady on the trail and said something to her in French and she said something back to him and the only word I caught was "wee." Jason seems to have a good grip on the language and the train system. He navigated the maze of tunnels in the subway without any problem. We saw a sign for a McDonald's but never saw the actual place. It rained on us from the train station to the apartment. When we got home we ate liver sandwiches, mmm mmm good. We have had tuna pizza, crepes stuffed with ham and cheese, and monkey bread and boiled eggs for breakfast. We had a good visit with Jason and Angie after the kids went to bed. Jason showed us a YouTube video of a comedian who was very funny. They had to pause it at one point so I could catch my breath I was laughing so hard. We are planning to have another busy day tomorrow. Enjoy the pictures of our hike. God bless you.

Really Good Music

We went into the city of Paris today and I was amazed by the train system. It is very efficient and not much waiting. We saw 2 really big church buildings and a really tall tower. The last sentence was composed in honor of my grandson, Micah and here's why. We watched 2 acrobats performing for the crowd and they were really good. They had a CD player playing in the back ground and as we walked away, amazed by their act, Micah said "That was a good song." If my summary of our trip into Paris still has you wondering here is what we saw. We went first to the Eiffel Tower and it was amazing. We did not wait in the 1 kilometer long line to take a ride to the top. I had no desire to go to the top and so it suited me to move on. We went to a vantage point where we could see the tower from afar and passed by several statues of dead guys. We went to a church building on a tall hill. I can not spell nor pronounce its name. We climbed over 300 stair steps to reach it. It was a great view of the city and it was here we saw the acrobats. There was a Carousel there and we let the kids ride it twice. While they were on the ride Jason began to feed the birds. A whole host of pigeons gathered and one landed on my head and sat there for a while which amused the kids. We went next to Notre Dame and it too was amazing especially for a building that was started back in 1623 and took 170 years to complete.

Jason and I will hike on a walking trail from Massy to Paris tomorrow and I am looking forward to that. We had a good visit this evening after the kids went to bed. I am going to head for bed now and get rested for tomorrows long hike. The pictures should be self explanatory. God bless you.

"Its good to have you back"

We made it to Paris, France without any problems. We slept a little on the plane and were hit by a tidal wave of grand children's affection. Caleb kept saying over and over again, as we walked from place to place, "Its good to have you back." We have been busy since we arrived. The train ride from the airport to Massy was about an hour long. We ate a sandwich for lunch and then took a good walk to see the language school where Jason and Angie attend. We saw their kid's schools and then Jason and I, with the kids, walked back to the apartment while Janie and Angie went shopping. We have already celebrated Christmas and Birthday's with opening of presents before supper. I have included some of the pictures we have taken so far. The first is of us on the plane waiting to depart from Chicago. The second is of Jason and I carrying the baggage from the train to the apartment. The third is of the Clarks in front of Lilia's school. The fourth picture is of the kids opening their Christmas presents and the other goodies we brought from the States. We are going to head for bed early tonight and try to get over this jet lag. God bless you.

Sowing

I am allergic to corn. If I eat corn in any form other than cornstarch, corn syrup, or corn oil I break out in hives. I miss popcorn the most. When I sow a garden I never sow corn. Today we were at a district ladies auxiliary meeting and they had some home made soup that contained corn. I passed on the soup but I did not miss it for the salads and the desserts were excellent! The church we were at is out in the country and country ladies sure can cook! My wife did not get much sleep last night so she is napping right now. I went for a three mile walk and meditated on my sermon for Sunday. I thought I would blog a little before waking her up to head to the store to pick up a few things we will need for our trip.

We are going to cook a pot roast and some veggies for our pot luck lunch at the church tomorrow. Janie wants to shop for a pair of shoes to wear on the trip and while we are out we will run by the grocery store to pick up a few things. It is a beautiful day outside, sunny and cool.

I am looking forward to our trip and am anxious to see Jason, Angie and the grand kids. It will be a joy to just sit and listen to the stories they have to tell. I expect I will say very little except for the myriad of questions I will have for each of them. I hope to spend some one on one conversation time with each of the six of them and in so doing sow seeds of encouragement.

I do not expect to sleep on the plane going over to France and if I were bringing my laptop I would work on my doctoral prospectus. Bringing the laptop is more trouble than it is worth. The battery will only last for 3 hours and I would have to run off battery on the plane. So for six hours of work it is just not worth bringing it along. I will take my Bible along and catch up on my reading. I may have a chance to sow the seed of truth with others on the plane.

Brother Harold Davis taught me how to sow God's word. My Father-in-law taught me how to sow a garden. My wife taught me how to sew a tent. The picture is of my wife back in 1977 making a dress while our oldest daughter looks on. God bless you.

Successful Run

We had a good day today. Got some packing done for our France trip. We have purchased a lot of the items that Jason and Angie requested using the offerings which were given for that purpose. We still need to get some of the children's clothing they requested and will need to go to a bigger store than the one here in Hillsboro. We will check Henderson and Corsicana when we go over to help Janie's parents get to their doctor's appointments. The picture is of Janie's dad at Waldrop Cemetery where Janie's mother's people are buried.

We had a really good supper tonight. I cooked some fresh turnip greens and baked some sweet potatoes and some, what I refer to as fake, cornbread. I can not eat real cornbread because I am allergic to corn so we make cornbread using cream of wheat. I fried some spam to go with it and what a meal.

The kids on the bus were well behaved tonight. Last time one of the men of our church road the bus and was fairly tough on the kids to get them to behave. He did not ride with us tonight but Janie told them if the did not behave he would be back. They behaved exceptionally well. We will not run the bus again until December which is a long time to the kids. They all seem to enjoy coming to our mid-week Bible School and hated to hear that we would not have it again until December.

Tomorrow I will spend my morning at the hospital with the family of one of our church members while she is having surgery. We will head for Henderson tomorrow afternoon and will return on Friday after spending the day with Janie's Parents. Saturday will be spent in Purdon at the district ladies auxiliary meeting. Saturday night and Sunday morning we will fix our covered dishes for the fellowship lunch at the church. I will be preaching on the subject "Where is the God of Elijah."

We plan to drive our truck to the airport Monday and park in the south parking lot at the airport. It will cost $56 but we thought it would be worth that not to have to bother someone to take us there and then come back and get us. If our returning flight was delayed for some reason it might cause a problem for the person picking us up so we will spend the money and have our truck waiting for us when we return. We will be very tired upon our return but it is only a 1 hour and 15 minute drive home from the airport and that is not too bad. We will be able to handle that OK. When I returned from a trip to Belgium 15 years ago I had to drive over 3 hours to get home and that was not easy at all.

Well once again a day has ended and it has been a productive day. I have read the Bible, prayed repeatedly, preached God's Word, and walked about 1/2 a mile (not near as much as I should have walked). Thank you Lord for this good day. God bless you.

Nap on the Bus

I took a nap today on the church bus. I had taken a pill for my allergies and it made me sleepy. I had taken one seat out of the bus and was working on the second when I ran into a problem which required another set of hands. I called Janie and asked her to come to the church and help me when her ladies Bible study was over. It was going to be about 15 to 20 minutes before she arrived and there was nothing I could do until she got there so I laid down on the seat of the bus and fell asleep. I was awakened twice by a loud snoring sound. There was no one else on the bus so I must conclude that it was me. My cell phone woke me up and shortly Janie arrived and with the help of the helper which God made to be "meet" for me the job was done. She held the wrench inside the bus while I worked with the other one under the bus. The bus seat has now been delivered and is on its way to having a new cover.

I am going to work on packing my suitcase tomorrow after I finish up my lessons for Wednesday night. I was just checking the weather and there seems to be a good chance of rain tomorrow night but I hope it does not so we can run the bus. I just don't like to run the bus in the rain so we don't. I am going to be nostalgic Sunday and preach a sermon from the past. I will reflect on the past six years that I have spent at Walnut Street Missionary Baptist Church. God has been so good to us and the people so kind. Souls have been saved and lives changed and it has been a joy to have had a small part in God's great Kingdom business.

I am headed for bed now and plan to rise early to get as much work done as I can. The picture is one of me and my oldest sister taken by Janie at our family reunion a couple of weaks ago. God bless you.

Voted Today

Janie and I voted today. I will not say for whom we cast our vote but we examined the candidates carefully and voted for the ones we thought would do the best job and with whom God would be pleased for us to vote. I taught a class today on operating the equipment in the churches sound room. There is a lot of equipment with a lot of knobs and it can be a daunting task. The two that I trained had little or no experience with computers and so it took a little longer than usual. They did a great job learning and they passed their test with flying colors.

The ladies auxilary meeting went very well and while they met at the parsonage I did some visiting. I visited a man who is gravely ill with cancer, a woman who is having surgery Thursday, and our France mission secretary/treasurer. Afterward I returned home just in time to eat with the ladies at the parsonage. It has been a good day and I plan to go to the church in the morning to remove one of the seats in the bus so I can take it down to Hewitt tomorrow night. We are going to, a few at a time, get the bus seats recovered. There is a lady in the church there who has offered to do this at cost for us and we surely do thank her for her hard work and generosity. We will go shopping to get our son, Jason, and his family some of the things that they cannot get over in Paris. We plan to take a couple of suitcases of goodies over there for them next week. Most of this is has been made possible due to generous contributions by our church members.

Well, it has been a good day and it is time to head for bed. The picture is of my son and I at the ABA messenger meeting last year. God bless you.

France and Farming

We are getting close to being ready to head for France a week from tomorrow. Janie wrote a check out today that paid off our airline tickets. We have our passports and my suit case is 90% packed. We spoke to Jason and Angie today and they seem very excited and anxious to see us. We will hit the ground running for Jason wants to show us the kid's school and the language school right off. Their children will hit us like a tidal wave when we arrive and I am sure the first few hours will be spent embracing and listening to their stories. We plan to take a lot of pictures and will try to blog every day we are there to keep you posted.

We had lunch today with three other couples from our church. We had a really good time. I have always enjoyed learning and the three men are each full time professional farmers. I have asked them, over the past six years, a million questions about farming. Each answer that they give seems to invoke another question from me. I learned today that there are two kinds of cultivators. One is a row cultivator and the other is a field cultivator. They are very patient with me and very willing to answer my questions.

Tonight is business meeting time and I expect that all will go well. The sermon is from the Life of Christ series and it will be rather short tonight. The picture is of Janie climbing into a combine on the Roger's farm in Hill county. God bless you.

1016

I have written 1016 words in my doctoral prospectus. Just another 4000 words to go. I have actually written about twice that many words its just that I threw half of them away. I throw my thoughts down as quickly as I can and then spend a great deal of time cleaning up the messy sentences. Some words are thrown out because they were not the right words. I frequently visit the dictionary to make sure the word I use means what I think it means. In the old days my office trash can would have been over flowing with waded up pieces of paper but now the discarded words and mistakes disapear without a trace.

We got a lot of work done on the house in Henderson. We had several to drop by and offer to help and at present there is not much they can do. In a few weeks there will be painting and such that they can handle so I will look them up then.

I have been thinking about my relatives in the New England area a lot lately. I would dearly love to see them and spend some quality time with them. The events of my life took me away from New England and I believe that my life here in Texas was the one God intended for me to live.

We are back in Hillsboro getting ready for Sunday. I like to spend Saturdays reviewing the Sunday School lesson and the Sunday Sermons. I will rise at 6:00 in the morning and spend some quiet time alone with God in prayer and meditation. It is a great way to start the week. Next week I will be preaching at the nursing home on Monday, Janie will be entertaining the ladies auxilary at our house Monday night, we will meet Tuesday night with the church in Hewitt pictured above at their organizational service, Wednesday we will run the bus and pick up some 50 kids for the Mid-week Bible School, Thursday we will be at the hospital while one of our church members has surgery, Friday we will be in Henderson to take Janie's parents to their doctor's appointments, Saturday we will attend the district ladies auxilary meeting in Corsicana. It is going to be an wonderful busy week. God bless you.

Working Day Off

This picture is one I took with my cell phone on Interstate 45 north of Houston, Texas. It is a picture of the statue of Sam Houston. It is quite an impressive sight. Notice the bugs on the windshield. It was mating season for love bugs and we must have killed thousands of them with our truck.

I worked on my day off which is what I have always done. When I was not at Lebus Mfg. Co. I use to work at home on my day off. I worked on our house in Henderson and got a lot done today. Tomorrow I plan to work on it a little more before returning to Hillsboro. I am going to also try to get a lot more work on my thesis tomorrow and Saturday. I am excited about the sermon for Sunday and it is going to be one of those times when I wish I could preach first and let the song service come second. You can listen to our services online by going to http://www.khbrhillsboro.com/ and click on "listen live". Our services come on at 11:00 AM central time.

I ate lunch with my mother today and enjoyed visiting with her. She came over in the afternoon to help me with the work there and she was a big help. One thing about her generation they sure know how to work. We went to a family visitation at a funeral home this evening and my wife saw a lot of people she had not seen in a while. A lady who was her friend back when they were kids was there and she had not seen her in over 25 years. I have longed to return to Massachusetts and see my cousins which I have not seen in over 35 years. I do plan to travel there in 2010 and hope I can see at least some of them then. God bless you.

MBA of Texas

We recently hosted the pre-association meeting of the Missionary Baptist Association of Texas (pictured here). There was over 50 in attendance and the meeting lasted 2 hours. It was a good meeting and I hope it accomplished its purpose. The purpose of this meeting was to have questions answered about the state missions and missionaries. This way the main association meeting would not lose time with a lot of questions and discussions over each recommended missionary or mission project.

My brother in California is moving to Texas. He will be moving in December and will, at least for a time, be living in the house next to my mother. She is real excited about this prospect and it will be good for her and for him. I will have a lot of work to do to help get the house ready for them and hope to get a days work done on that on Thursday this week. Janie will be taking her dad to the doctor and her mother to the beauty shop on Thursday and I will use my day off working on the house. Friday I will work on my thesis again and then spend the afternoon working on the house some more before returning to Hillsboro on Saturday. I have a lot of work to do so better get to it. God bless you.

Family Reunion

We attended my mother's family reunion last Saturday. This picture was taken by my oldest sister of my mother on the phone at her home there in Henderson. Her brother and sisters were there except the oldest sister. A lot of my cousins were there and the food and visiting was great. My mother stayed much longer this year than in years past. I think she enjoyed this years reunion more than any of the others. I will post a few of the pictures here on this blog post they will be fairly self explanitory they are in order according to generations. Tomorrow Janie I will make our usual visit to the nursing home and other shut-ins of our congregation. I will get "From the Pastor" composed tomorrow and get a start on Wednesday's lessons tomorrow afternoon. Tuesday I meet with my finanial advisor and see how bad my 401k has been hit by the stock market crash. I am not concerned in the least about it for life does not consist of the things we possess. Tuesday night I think is time for us to meet with the church in Hewitt and if it is, we will enjoy our time with them. The first picture is of my mother and her siblings and then the generations to follow are next. Enjoy the pictures. God bless you.

Pouring Water

"...Here is Elisha the son of Shaphat, which poured water on the hands of Elijah." (1 Kings 3:11) Elisha was a great prophet of God in the Old Testament. He truly had a double portion of Elijah's spirit. I love this verse of scripture for Elisha served Elijah and waited upon him. What a humble spirit Elisha had, for God had sent Elijah to anoint Elisha as his replacement but Elisha did not for a moment act as though he was equal to Elijah. He humbly served Elijah and quietly learned at his feet. Today I spent the day pouring water on the hands of Bro. Davis. I went over to Bro. Davis' house and and helped him move a pile of firewood. It was good exercise and we had a good visit. I think from a spiritual point of view it is time well spent. I believe Elisha learned much as he helped Elijah with the chores of daily life. Bro. Davis was a great pastor and I believe I will do well to spend what time I can serving him.

I preached in chapel at TBI today and really had a good time. I forgot our suitcase when we left the house yesterday to come to Henderson and today I forgot to get my computer when I left my in-laws house and had to go back for it. I forgot my computer again when I left TBI and one of the staff there brought it to me in Tyler. My forgeter works real well.

Tomorrow we will attend our family reunion and it will be good to see again those who we see only once a year. My sister arrived from Colorado safely to attend the reunion. We will head back to Hillsboro tomorrow afternoon. We leave for France soon and I am anxious to see my son and his family. I dread the flight over and the flight back but it is worth every bit of lost sleep to see the grandkids again. The picture is of me and Bro. Davis at church camp many years ago. God bless you.

Chance

Take a Chance (risk or hazard). Now is your chance (opportunity). Opportunities often involve risk or hazards. Missed opportunities often occur because we are not willing to take a chance. The old school bus that I drive for the church on Wednesday nights is a good example of taking a chance. It might break down in the dark with forty kids still needing to be delivered home. Kids have been known to get hurt on buses so you're taking a chance. I have driven over 30,000 miles this year which increases my chances of being involved in an accident. The Bible says that "time and chance happens to them all." Chance primarily means "the unpredictable and uncontrollable element of an event or occurrence." There are things which we can neither predict nor control in just about everything we do so we just have to take a chance. God wants us to take chances. It is the way we prove our faith in Him. Is it taking a chance when we step out in faith and do those things which God wants us to do? With God there are no chances. There are no unpredictable and uncontrollable events or occurrences. He is in control and knows all things.

I walked about four miles today and will try to do this every day until we go to France. We will be sitting for about 10 hours on that journey and that is a lot of sitting for me. I do not know how much they will allow you to walk on the plane but I will try to do as much as I can without taking chances. I will try to walk some on the way back but I don't think that they will let me say that I walked all the way across the Atlantic.

We went to see the movie "Fireproof" with our daughter and her husband. It was the second time we had seen it and their first. It is a really good movie and I would recommend that everyone go and see it. At $5 a ticket we took a chance that it would be as good as "Facing the Giants" and it was even better.

We will head over to Henderson tomorrow afternoon to attend a wedding there and on Friday my wife will take her dad for his Chemo therapy treatment. I plan to spend a few hours with Bro. Harold Davis my good friend and father in the ministry. I plan also to get some more work done on my doctoral thesis. The picture is of my son and son-in-law helping with the remodeling of our house in Henderson, talk about taking chances. God bless you.

Minutes

I am the secretary/treasurer of our local church association. We had our meeting today and it went very well. The moderator of the meeting had very poor eye sight and I was amazed at how smoothly he was able to execute his job. As the secretary I record the minutes of the meeting and publish them. I have them all typed up and ready to go to press. As usual my wife was a big help to me. She took notes and pictures for me which allowed me the freedom to focus on getting the minutes recorded correctly. A good friend and fellow church member went with us to the meeting. He gave a challenging speech somewhat like a loosing team's coach at half time. It was a joy to hear. He and I are pictured out in front of the church where the meeting was held in Corsicana. He came to my father's funeral and though he drove 300 miles and got lost, never finding the cemetery, He gets full credit as if he were there. The minutes I spend with such friends are a delight.

I am going to head for bed now and get some minutes of shut eye. The sermon for tomorrow is ready to go and is titled "Why are you here?" We shall learn from Elijah why and why not we should be were we are. God bless you.

Piety

There has been a lot of concern about the economy this week. I personally was glad that the House did not pass the "Bailout" bill. I think that things need to be shaken every now and then. Prosperity breeds impiety whereas poverty tends to breed piety. Of course that is not always the case but prosperity has not caused our nation to be more pious. Our Nation's motto still stands as its motto and I thank God for that.

I had a good day today. I worked on the sermon for Wednesday night but did not finish it. I worked on Sunday's sermon a little but have not gotten it ready yet. I will complete both of these in the morning and get a start on the Sunday School Lesson. I am the secretary/treasurer for our local Baptist Association and it meets this Saturday. I hope to have it ready to go to press before we leave for Paris, France. A week from Saturday is the Nutt family reunion and we are looking forward to that. My sister Jean will be driving in from Colorado and it will be good to see her.

I had a dream last night that my mother traded her car off for a pink limousine, It was quite disturbing. We took a nap this afternoon which we almost never do. We have been burning the candle at both ends lately and it caught up to us. I am paying for it now though for it is way past my bedtime and I am still awake.

We went down to Waco tonight and the car averaged 52 miles per gallon. I just love it. I am glad that I got the diesel Jetta it has saved me over $300/month in fuel thus far.

I like my new laptop. Vista seems to work just fine. There are still a few things on my old laptop that I need so will not forsake it as yet. I need to get back to work on http://www.baptistville.org/ . I have several things to add to it but just have not had time to get to it.

The picture was taken at the Nutt reunion last year. It is of my mother, father, aunts, and uncles. God bless you.