Good morning! Do we actually say; “Happy Good Friday”  or is it more appropriate to simply give a blessing greeting? I’m not sure —- the events we recall that bring us Good Friday are horrendous at best. However, without those events, the event s of Easter Sunday could not have occurred. So, it’s dealer’s choice I guess. 

Good Friday is the day that we Christians commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Tradition tells us that he was nailed to the cross at around 9:00 am and hung there suffering until approximately 3:00 pm. Most crucified prisoners would linger there sometimes for days but they had not been beaten to within an inch of their lives prior to the crucifixion. Jesus listed for six hours before declaring “It is Finished” and brewing his last breath. Due to the rapidly approaching Sabbath his mourners had to take him down quickly from the cross if he were not to hang there for another 24 plus hours. Unfortunately they had no where to place his body, but as always, God intervened and a friendly Pharisee named Joseph of the town of Arimathea spoke up and obtained permission from Pilate to assume responsibility for the body and they placed Jesus temporarily in a grave belonging to Joseph. None of them knew just how temporary his stay would actually be. But —- that is another sermon for another day.

We had a wonderful Maundy Thursday service last evening. It was a combined parish event and was really well attended. We celebrated Holy Communion and also did a Tenebrae reading. All of the readers did a great job. It was also first communion for our two confirmation graduates and marks their first event as full members of the church. 

Now I look forward to Sunday. We’ll start the day with a “Sunrise service” and our parish choir doing an Easter Cantata. The choir has worked really hard and they are well prepared. The cantata is entitled “The Cross”. 

I did get much of my outside work done yesterday and today I really need to sty inside and finish up that sermon. 

If I don’t write tomorrow, I wish you a very blessed Easter. If you are a member of the Christian Faith —— this is the day that defines our very reason for our belief. I urge you to attend your house of worship and give God praise. Peace. 

 It may or may not surprise you that I like to listen to a little lite opera once in awhile. Well, I guess I you can’ call this opera, although this particular trust is doing part of the album in Italian. I pulled up one of my two Katherine Jenkins albums this morning to listen to. She was all the rage maybe five or six years ago. She has a beautiful operatic voice, she is a beautiful woman and not a bad dancer either. She was on Dancing With The Stars and although she didn’t win, she did very well. She also appears to be a very proud and good mom. She is worth listening to. You can pull her up on You Tube.

April 6th, it is Maundy Thursday. I don’t know if your particular church celebrates Maundy Thursday or not. We will have a Parish wide service this evening and include a Tenebrae service and Holy Communion.  We end the service in silence and begin an all night prayer vigil to honor the words of Jesus when he said “Can you not watch with me, even for one hour?” Our service commemorates the “Last Supper” and the betrayal of Jesus by Judas Iscariot. It is also the “first communion” for our confirmation graduates. It is an important service for us. We don’t do a Good Friday Service like a lot of churches do. I think there will be a Good Friday service somewhere but have not heard of one. Often the Protestant churches will join with their Catholic brothers and sisters in recognition of Good Friday. 

Sunday, I will have three services; 0700, 0900, and 1030. Then, I think I will take a long nap in the afternoon. Well, actually I take a nap every Sunday afternoon. So, there is that!

Ms. Kate had a bad day yesterday. Her two surgery incisions were bothering her and she had an upset stomach. That may have been because she got back on some of the medications that she had been required to stop taking before surgery. She got up in the middle of the night last night and moved to her recliner in order to get comfortable. But, she is feeling a little better this morning. 

I have bird feeders to fill, stick to pick up in the yard, and a lot of weed eating to do today. Jim hasn’t been over to put the mower deck on and the yard is getting tall. But, I really need to take some of it down with the weed eater. Oh, and I still have a sermon to finish. 

I guess that means I better get off of my chair and on to me feet getting busy. Have a very blessed day. Peace. 

 Good morning and happy April 5th. Once again we are under a tornado watch. Like most people, I tired of the weekly tornado/severe storm watch routine. We have been very lucky at least in our neighborhood that there has not been any significant damage because of storms etc. Just about seventy miles up the road there was a very destructive tornado that wiped out the southern half of the town. I pray for those folks and for the people that lost family members. I think there was another tornado over in Missouri last night and one or more lives were lost. 

I’m glad to say that Ms. Kate is doing very well, all things considered. She only has to take Tylenol tablets a couple of times a day. Last night I noticed that she even was able to sleep on her left side which is a big improvement. That is the side they did the surgery on. The incision on the breast doesn’t bother her near as much as the incision to remove a lymph node under her arm. That’s where her bra rubs and she has to continue to wear one for support. But she says it is a small price to pay to get rid of the cancer. 

I got a good start on my sermon for the 16th last night and I have learned a lot in the process of writing the sermon. It’s always amazing to me when I find new things from scripture that I have read before many times. Last night I had the opportunity to do a good comparison of the four gospels on a certain subject and it was very interesting to see the similarities and the differences. It becomes obvious what each gospel writer considered important and what their slant or view was on their writing of their particular gospel. Mark, was the first gospel written and Matthew copied so much of his gospel as did Luke. Luke did more research on Jesus and reports in a different style that Matthew or Mark. John is a different type of gospel altogether. He approaches the story of Christ from a divinity approach, meaning that he looks at everything through the thought of Christ being the Son of God and being a part of God. The other three work through the human issues associated  with Jesus. 

Okay, our cleaning lady is here and is ready to move in to the kitchen so I got to get out of the way. I hope you have a wonderful day. Peace. 

 Good morning, I hope your day is going great. I don’t have a lot to say today but I did want to update you on Ms. Kate. 

As I told you yesterday as an add-on, The surgery went well and the doctor was pleased. We got her home and she rested pretty well for the remainder of the day. Last night she kept like a log, as did we all. She said that she woke up a couple of time but went right back to sleep. She got up this morning around 0830 well rested but needing to take a Tylenol. It is a little after noon and she is napping again. Julie has gone home about 40 minutes ago. I went to the grocery store and picked up some items for supper. Later on I plan to put some chicken thighs on the grill. 

Wee are all so pleased that she is dog so well. We are even more pleased that it pears that the doctor was able to get all of the cancer out through a lumpectomy. She goes back to see her surgeon o the 20th and then her oncologist on the 24th to determine how much radiation she will have to have or whether or not chemo will be warranted. At this point, I can’t see that she will need chemo, but what ever the oncologist says is what we will do. 

So that’s it for today. My lady is doing well and that just makes it an extra Holy Week blessing.After all, no healing happens with out divine intervention. Have a blessed week. 

 Good Monday morning to you. It’s April 3rd and Holy Week began yesterday with the celebration of Palm Sunday. We had good attendance at both churches which is par for the course for the Christmas and Easter seasons. But with a confirmation ceremony as part of the service, we had a bigger than normal attendance.  Unfortunately the person that was running the video/audio stuff didn’t get it done right so we didn’t live stream or record the ceremony. 

We had a night of thunderstorms last night. I don’t know how much rain we got because I haven’t had time to check it out. But the thunder was loud and long and we had a pretty good light show gong on too. 

The big story of today of course is Ms. Kate’s breast lumpectomy surgery. We are at the hospital right now. They just took her back for surgery. The surgery should take about 45 minutes and then she will be in recovery for another 45 minutes. It is almost 1100 now. We had to be here at 0615 for some reason. They had to take her for another mammogram for any last minute checks on the size and placement of the cancer. So that is part of the reason for the early arrival.. But, if all goes well, we should be able to take her her home by around 1330. I imagine she will be sleeping most of the afternoon, which is fine. Julie and I are ready for a nap too. LOL We have had several texts this morning from well wishers and if you are one of them, we thank you. Kate and I re not worried about tis and anticipate that everything is going to be fine.  That’s what you do when you decide to turn your worries over to God. 

So, I’ll let y’all know to morrow how things went. Until then, this is Holy Week. Stay close to Christ this week. Peace. 

 Good morning! I hope you are keeping your head down; there’s a bunch of storms coming today. We’ve had rain already , on and off, since about 0400. Right now we are in the a lull and waiting for more to start. It’s not like we need any rain. But, God gives what God gives. Tomorrow is supposed to be a better day. 

We went out and bought a new mattress and box springs yesterday. It is supposed to be delivered tomorrow. Kate has her surgery on Monday and our current bed is just too high. She has to use a stool to get into it. With her surgery, it might be really hard for her to maneuver into, so I said we need to fix that situation. It was fine when we were younger but now we are 75 and 78 yo and we don’t need to be taking chances on something as simple as getting into bed. 

Today we are waiting on a document to be delivered via “over night” mail. My granddaughter said that we had all neglected to sign one of the places on her marriage license. So, —- she is overnighting it to me to sign, ten Jim and I will meet half way between our house and theirs, and then I’ll overnight it to Heather i CA. She will sign it and she will overnight it to Bryan’s mom. What a mess. 

Yesterday afternoon I put my Epson Salt on the flower beds and garden. It sweetens the soil and helps stuff grow. It was a good day to do it since the rain has now come and dissolved it into the dirt. I also put out several peony cages around plants that were big enough. I have maybe another couple of dozen that I’m waiting on to pop out a bit more. I may need to go ahead and buy some new cages as mine are getting pretty rugged looking. I also need to get my mower deck put on the JD because the yard is going to need mowing soon. I generally wait until after Easter. It’s silly I know, but I always wait until after Easter if I can so the “Easter Bunny” has a place to lay the eggs. Yeh, that family tradition does go back forty years or so with my girls. 

Well, I think I’ll fix some oatmeal for breakfast. You have a great day. Peace. 

 Good morning and happy Wednesday. It’s a bit chillier than what I have had the past week in the morning. But, it’s sunny and will warm up time some point today. 

Ms. Kate and I got home from vacation yesterday afternoon. We were tired; tired from driving, tired from a week of visiting, tired from hearing all of the wonderful and beautiful noise and chit chat of a family that loves one another. All three of our daughter were there. We were however missing Steph, our “fourth daughter” who we always have join us for family vacations. But, she was home taking care of her mother who just had cancer surgery for esophageal cancer. And that’s exactly where she should have been.

The weather was perfect for our entire vacation which was a blessing. We did have major storm Sunday night into Monday morning but it was passed over by the time Ms. Kate and I left. And we had good traveling weather again on the way home. We put in 535 miles Monday, driving from Wilmington, NC to Cordin, KY. That’s a long day for folks our age; or maybe it’s just a long day for us, I don’t know. Then yesterday morning we headed out for home. We stopped at a place called Buckee’s, which apparently is the new rage and standard for a gas station. You probably know it. They advertise their bathrooms, because of how many “stalls” they have and how clean they are. And they live up to their own hype. Thee place is also famous for their brisket as well as a lot of other food. Kate and I picked up a couple of sweet rolls for our breakfast. I finished one this morning. It’s good stuff, and a fun stop along the road. The company originate in Texas and the one that we stopped at is their furtherest northern store. A clerk told me that they are going to build another one in Sevierville, TN. That will be a people zoo what with all of the visitors and tourists going to Dollywood and Gatlinburg. But, if you haven’t been to one, and you come across one in your travels —- be sure and stop. 

Lots of stuff coming up for Ms. Kate and I. Today, she has to have a blood test and this evening is choir practice. Sunday is Palm Sunday and I have two young men being confirmed. Monday morning  Kate has her cancer surgery. It is supposed to be a same day surgery, pray it goes well. She acts like she is not nervous but I know the difference. Too many unknowns at the moment. Next Thursday is Maundy Thursday with an extra worship service thrown in. The following Sunday is Easter, with a sunrise service and two regular worship services.

So, keep us in your prayers please. It will all be what God intends it to be and we’re good with that. Have a blessed day. Peace.