November 7 – “General George wins again”

We had supper last night with Nathan and April and Cailyn.  We tried to do that last week but couldn’t coordinate a time between Cailyn’s softball and Mommy and Daddy’s work schedule.  Nathan called us this time, though.  He is finally starting on his regular shift work at the plant, so he actually had a day off. 

Before the chili was served (Good stuff, by the way.  Nathan put in three different kinds of meat.  He has always been the creative cook in the family), Cailyn practiced her presentation for history class.  They are studying the Revolutionary War and some of its unlikely heroes.  Cailyn chose someone I had never heard of, for sure.  Can’t even remember her name.  I think she married a guy named Reed.  Anyway, she organized some of the hoity-toity ladies (that’s Nathan’s translation) to collect money for the army.  The intent was to simply distribute the money to the soldiers, but a certain General named George Washington had some reservations about that.  He was fairly certain the men would simply spend the extra money on booze.  They compromised.  The ladies collected the money, and used it to purchase linen.  Then they made clothing for the troops.  It was certainly a worthy endeavor, but our lady hero still wasn’t completely convinced.  She even wrote General George a letter expressing her ambivalence.  She felt like the soldiers would consider the clothes more something they earned – something the army should have provided them anyway - a payment for services rendered, rather than the surprise bonus the ladies intended.  General George won.  So did the soldiers.  So today we drink coffee instead of tea …

1 John 1:7 says, “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.”

Father, please be with Cailyn in her presentation today.  Help her to have fun with it.  Amen.

November 6 – “Rescue the bees”

We did it again.  Two days in a row.  Three mile walk.  I know.  So what?  Hey, it feels good … when we finish. 

Guess what?  The bees are back at the church.  This has become a yearly thing.  They really like one particular spot under our retreat center building.  Return just about every year.  I hadn’t noticed them yet, but our motorcycle friends pointed them out to us.  The bees were there last year when they were in the center, so it was a bit of a reunion for them as well.  Fortunately, I was able to connect with our regular bee guy already.  He is coming out next Wednesday to rescue the bees.

Last night we went into Texas to watch Jachin’s baseball game.  We left a little early so we could stop by their house in LaMarque and let their dog out.  They spent the day at the Renaissance Festival.  I heard a little about that trip.  Josiah was anxious to tell me about the museum of torture methods.  His favorite was when they would strap you down and attach a cage of rats to your bare stomach.  Oh, and the cage had no bottom.  Then the rats would eat their way out of the cage through your stomach.  Gross stuff.  Just the thing to entertain an up and coming young man.

From their house we stopped by the Whataburger near their house.  We had a coupon.  Buy a what-a-meal and get one free.  Good deal, except we usually just get a Whataburger Jr.  It was a lot of food.  Chris especially liked the fact that both buns were warm.  At our Whataburger in Galveston one or both buns are usually still a bit chilled.

So on to the game.  Traffic was tough in a few places, but Chris plowed through on her usual Houston traffic, slow and steady pace.  We arrived just in time to see Jachin’s team score six runs in the bottom of the first inning.  Jachin hit a nice line drive single to left field in his time at bat.  He even had a chance to pitch an inning.  He hit a batter and walked one, but eventually struck out the side.  Nice outing.  Traffic home was almost non-existent.  Guess everybody was busy at 7:30 on a Tuesday evening …

Isaiah 40:29 says, “He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.”

Father, thank you for yet another safe outing into Texas.  And would you take care of those bees until they can get relocated?  Amen.

November 5 – “The Saga of the Painted Truck”

She’s home.  Finally.  The Saga of the Painted Truck has officially come to a close. 

OK, I know that sounds like it was taken out back and shot in the head, but it really is home.  We got the call that it would be ready to pick at 2:30.  I think that’s his go-to pick up time for everybody.  We pulled up and there was the old 1992 GMC Sierra parked on the street.  But we almost didn’t recognize it.  The paint looks pretty incredible.  The two logos on the tailgate were reversed, and the little word “Truck” that used to be attached to the “GMC” crumbled in his hands when they removed it for the painting, but other than that, all was well. 

As we got closer we noticed the extra addition.  He had talked to me about adding a stripe around each side.  I pictured something a few inches wide or even wider.  You know, a sporty, jazzy look.  Couldn’t figure out why he would recommend something glitzy like that on an old pickup.  As it turned out I was quite pleasantly surprised.  A very small, very subtle stripe had been added on both sides.  Just enough to break up all the blue.  The stripe is black with a second strip of lighter gray or silver in the center.  The gray almost glistens in the sun.  Interesting effect.  Not sure how long that shimmer will last, though. 

They had just completed the bed liner, so the smell was still extremely strong.  He said not to put anything in there for a day or two, to give it plenty of time to completely harden.  His final two recommendations were to replace the outside mirrors and to get an after-market grill for the front.  The chrome is peeling off badly.  Oh, and maybe sometime in the future get some new wheels (Not tires.  Those are pretty new already.  Just new rims).  Apparently he scrubbed them down as much as he could, but they were just stubbornly showing their age.  This whole restoration of a classic vehicle is like buying a fixer-upper house.  But she looks really good. 

1 Chronicles 16:11 says, “Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always.”

Father, thank you for fun projects like the truck.  And bless John, the guy who did the painting.  His love for you and for his family is really evident.  Amen.

November 4 – “So … no Astros …”

Another great day at Seaside yesterday.  We had quite a few guests from the big motorcycle rally going on.  There were thousands of motorcycles all over the Island, and one of the groups that ministers to them stayed in our retreat center.  A handful of them stayed over for church.  We also had several others who were staying in beach houses nearby who came as well.  That group in the retreat center was very excited because they had seen a highly uncharacteristic tendency for ministry groups to cooperate this year that they have never seen before.  They were amazed at how the expression of unity made it possible to do so much more for the bikers.  Yep.  God does love that unity …

Sunday afternoon was interesting for us.  No Astros game.  Not even a Texans football game (They played at 8:30 in the morning in England).  The Cowboys don’t play until tonight.  We did watch a taste of the Ravens vs. Patriots game.  That was more to root against the Patriots than anything.  Worked.  Patriots lost (OK.  I had to check the score in the paper this morning.  I went to bed in the third quarter). 

So, no Astros.  No football.  What then could we possibly have done all afternoon?  Here’s a hint.  Not counting the tiny little bit of a nap that I took, it did involve binge-watching.  Guessed it yet?  Well, there you have it.  Hallmark and Lifetime movies.  The season is here.  New movies are being cranked out by both channels.  Join us this season as we chuckle at the horrible acting, sniffle just a bit at the oh-so cute children, and see who can be the first to guess the plot climax …

Isaiah 25:1 says, “Lord, you are my God; I will exalt you and praise your name, for in perfect faithfulness you have done wonderful things, things planned long ago.”

Father, thank you for our biker friends.  Watch over them all as they travel back to their respective homes.  Amen.

November 3 – “It’s gone …”

I ran into another one of those crises of epic proportions trying to upload the Saturday final review sermon update changes to the cloud so I can access it from my iPad.  Problem?  The iPad couldn’t find the file.  It was lost somewhere up there in the clouds.

I played with it for a long time trying to find the missing link.  Too long, I guess.  Suddenly the entire folder full of sermons, home group Bible studies, special event teaching notes … the entire file of everything I had ever backed up to the cloud … it was gone.  In an instant.  Deleted.  And the worst part is, I have no idea what I did to cause it to happen.  What button was it that caused such a catastrophe?

Fortunately the files were all still on my computer hard drive.  Thank goodness for old school.  I went back in and did the whole drag and drop routine.  It seemed to be going fine, so I left it to its own devices and went to watch some college football.  Go Underdogs. 

When I returned a few hours later I assumed everything was fine.  The folder icons were all present.  Everything looked ready to go.  So I went.  I tried again to pull the particular sermon file I wanted onto the iPad.  Same notice.  Couldn’t find it.  But this time the reason was a little different.  This time it was in use somewhere else.  I thought I had somehow made the whole situation worse.  It was operator error, but not a full blown, toss the computer out the window error.  It had simply not had enough time to finish downloading all the files.  A closer look revealed that several of the folders, including the one containing the file I wanted, were there but empty.  OK.  Finally a problem I knew how to deal with.  I spent the next thirty minutes or so loading up each folder individually from my hard drive. 

Aaaaaaannnd … it worked.  Best I can tell, the iPad knows where everything is now.  I should be able to access it, come time for today’s teaching.  But … I ran a hard copy backup just in case.  That’s what I get for trying to transition into the 20^th century.  Oh, wait.  That should be the 21^st century, shouldn’t it?  I’m still behind.  Sigh …

Matthew 5:10 says, “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Father, I do appreciate the genius you granted to those who figured out how do get these computers to work.  It really has made work easier.  Please grant me the patience to learn how to interact with the results of that genius.  Amen.

November 2 – “Return of the … oops, not yet”

What a calming All Saints’ Day.  Especially after all the hoopla of All Saints’ Eve.  We could use some down time.  So recuperation was on tap for our day after Halloween.  We finished the cleanup of all the extraneous candy wrappers and left-behind Halloween buckets.  We even retired good ol’ skeleton George (named for George Springer several years ago) and crammed him back into his hibernation spot in a closet where he will rest until next year. 

A few days ago we purchased two vacuum cleaners for the church retreat center.  Not too difficult to put together.  Just two screws involved that needed a tool, actually.  I tested them out on our rug here at the house.  Very nice.  Ours has not one, but both broken wheels.  It still works, though, if you can get it to stay on track.  Driving that new one, though, made us realize that it was not really worth the effort involved.  So we went back to WalMart and found us one as well.  It’s not exactly the same as the others.  The church ones are heftier than ours.  Wider vacuum base (or whatever that is called).  They both have the same last name, though … Bissell.  Guess that makes the church ones like a big brother or maybe a show-off uncle. 

Oh, and we got some exciting news.  The truck was ready for us to pick up at the paint shop.  I anxiously awaited the agreed-upon time, and when it finally arrived we headed on over there.  Sure enough, there it was.  Repainted the same color blue.  All the black accessory areas had been retouched as well.  The chrome had been shined up.  But … they had forgotten to spray in the bed liner.  The company owner met us outside to tell us he had just seen the order sheet, and he had just forgotten.  He said we could take it and bring it back in Monday morning.  I told him to just keep it and let us know when it was ready.  He also recommended replacing the two side mirrors.  Apparently a cover plate was missing from them that exposed the internal mechanisms to the weather.  We’ll see about getting those in the future.  He also recommended having a stripe of some kind, whether black or silver, down the sides to break up the blue.  I’m not sure about that option.  My first impulse was that I kind of liked the simple look, but I have been reconsidering.  After we left I also remembered that he was going to reinstall the GMC and Sierra logos on the back of the tailgate.  I can live without those, I suppose.  But then, again, I may just give him a call …

1 Peter 4:16 says, “However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name.”

Father, please watch over all the motorcyclists covering the Island this weekend.  Amen.

November 1 – “Ho. Ho. Ho …”

Our annual Halloween Party is in the books once again.  This year we ended up hosting at least 33 people at one time or another for pizza, hot chocolate, cider (thanks to Kathy), chips and dips (thanks to Sam), and of course, plenty of candy.  The 200 plus New Testaments we had went really fast.  Thank you to the Heaven’s Saints Biker Gang that provided them.  We also had 300 DVD’s of several of the Jesus movies.  We have a few of those left over because we were making a concerted effort to just give one per family.  The DVD’s were a big hit with the teenagers who came by.  The little guys were especially happy to get the “little books.”  Parents were appreciative on both counts. We had one little bitty guy dressed as a fire fighter. He got my yearly grand prize: a plastic fire hat filled to the gills with a New Testament, a DVD, and lots and lots of candy.

Costumes abounded this year.  The Collins family was decked out in make-up, and Josh even had a dragon on his shoulder with a long tail that was deadly when it smacked you in the face (Not that I am speaking by personal experience or anything).  Sam was dressed head to toe in a cow costume (By “toe” I mean she had on some very loud toe socks with her regulation flip flops).  John and Taylor and Little Gus were all one big happy scarecrow family.  There were several students of Hogwarts School of Magic (Brennan and Alexis).  I remember a brightly colored (with actual lights) butterfly (Lexie).  We were visited by superheroes and movie bad guys.  There were some (more than I care to mention) that I had no idea what their costume was supposed to be, but they were certainly impressive (Cailyn’s fell into this category.  Harley Quinn?  The Queen of Spades from Alice in Wonderland?  An evil clown from a black and white universe?).

We met some more of our neighbors.  One young couple lives just around the corner.  Mom had a little one named Titus all bundled up under her coat.  Great to see more and more young families returning to take over for all of us old coots.  Hope they keep the neighborhood’s reputation going as the best place to live in Galveston. 

We also had a FaceTime call from the Halloweeners in Waco.  AnnaGrace was sporting her princess costume (of course).  Luke was decked out in some kind of Lego knight-looking garb.  Zak was dressed as an aspiring young basketball superstar.  Caleb looked like Fonzie (Don’t know who that is?  Ask your mother). 

There was one other special appearance, though.  Santa Claus showed up to greet the kids and introduce them to his special friends who were giving away candy.  It was a lot of fun watching the youngest ones’ faces light up.  One in particular was The Flash.  He was streaking ahead of his parents, racing toward our house.  He looked up and saw Santa and stopped dead in his tracks.  He looked at Santa.  He turned back to his parents.  He looked at Santa again.  It was as if his feet were suddenly stuck, sunk into the concrete of the sidewalk.  His parents caught up with him, and ushered him gently past good ol’ Santa, the youngster staring in awe at the unexpected spectacle before him.  Many of the kids wanted to know if that was the real Santa.  Several of the older kids and teenagers wanted to make sure they put in a good word for themselves for the upcoming season.  Santa just assured them all that, “Your parents weren’t kidding.  Santa sees all.  Even at Halloween.”  Ho.  Ho.  Ho …

Matthew 12:18 says, “Here is my servant whom I have chosen, the one I love, in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him, and he will proclaim justice to the nations.”

Father, thank you for all the little guys who came by last night.  Please use the Bibles and DVD’s to touch some hearts.  Amen.