Good morning on this hot and steamy July 2nd morning. I'm at the church because I have office hours this morning. Our secretary is off for a week of vacation so I'm holding down an empty office and a non-ringing telephone on the off chance someone does come by. Actually, our Financial Secretary was here to get the deposit from yesterday's offering ready and take that to the bank. It takes him about an hour to get all of the paperwork done that he needs to do. So, he and I chatted for awhile. But other than that it has been as quiet as the proverbial "church mouse".

I was glad to see that we had a good attendance at church yesterday. I didn't know how it would turn out with this being the "4th of July holiday weekend and many people being on vacation. But once again we had several visitors that made up for the absent members. That is always good to see. And, we have some new people showing up on a repeated basis. It is time to sit and talk with them as to their interest in joining the church. I've said before, that is an area where Pastor Art really shines. He comes from an Evangelistic background as a Baptist pastor and they do a lot of that. I do pretty well with home communion and visitations of nursing home and hospital patients. We all have our strengths and this way it works out well for both of us and for the church. We are still averaging twenty five or so more in church every Sunday compared to a year ago.

I did have a chance to sit in the sun porch for awhile this Monsignor and watch my Backyard Buffet guests. I lost part of a feeder yesterday because "Toothless" the neighbors black cat was stalking in my flowerbed again. He jumped up at a bird that was on a feeder and knocked the feeder down. He broke the tray base and the dome lid that was on it. It was a feeder that I had gotten from Wild Bird's and Things maybe four years ago. Were they still in business, I could have taken it back to the store and they would have given me a new one. But --- they aren't and I can't. I guess though that I can't get too mad at Toothless, he was just doing what cats do. It could have been a squirrel or a raccoon that knocked it down too. But Ms. Kate was sitting there when he pounced from out of the flowerbed. That happens more frequently than I like. I'll just buy another one somewhere that isn't made of plastic.

I finished my sermon for this coming Sunday last evening. I need to now go back and read it and make sure I'm saying what I wanted to say. It might be a bit long too so I'll need to time it. Our service is supposed to be an outdoor service this coming Sunday. I hope it isn't going to be a scorcher for weather. If it is much above eighty degrees, we may want to hold it inside. We don't need people having heat strokes out there. But eighty with a nice breeze would be perfect  because the whole area is shaded.

Time to wrap things up here and get ready to close up the office. This evening we have a memorial service to attend for a class mate of mine. I'm getting to that age where that is going to become a more common occurrence, and someday, the ones that are left will be attending mine. Such is life.

Have an enjoyable day. Pray hard and love your fellowman fiercely. Peace.