Saturday, July 07, 2007

Abundant Blessings

I think sometimes I can get so caught up in the busyness of the day that I forget to see the blessings. I have decided to make the effort to appreciate the blessings today that I have. Being in this appointment has made me miss the corps people from our first appointment. Many of those saints from our first corps are with the Lord now and I have found myself missing them dearly. I didn't appreciate them or that corps nearly as much as I should have, that is until I left it. I am not going to make that mistake here. I count my blessings from God and appreciate each one.

The photo above is of our men in one of our Sunday School classes. This is just a few of the men that come to Sunday School. As I think about the number of men in our corps I am astounded. It can be hard to get men into church (traditionally), but God has blessed us with men of God that are seeking Him in ways like never before. Praise God!

We also do a Salvation Meeting. It happens at 6:00pm. We just started this particular meeting last September. Though some believe an evening service will just not work in this day and age, it works for us. On this evening we had an outdoor meeting. There were 88 people there. Several of the neighbors came. Several of the homeless that reside in the neighborhoods surrounding the corps showed up too. One man was in a wheelchair and he frequents our daily soup kitchen. He introduced himself as "Wheelchair". His real name is Clarence but his friends call him Wheelchair. So "Wheelchair" it is because we at the Army are considered his friends.

It should be noted too that the folks we get on Sunday morning are not all the same folks we get on a Sunday evening. It appears that the "unsaved" and "non-church going" folks prefer the evening service. Go figure!

Wednesday, July 04, 2007

This has been an exciting summer at our corps so far. Below are just a few pictures that I hold dear. The first is a picture of our Jr. Band. All but my own are beginners this year. We are missing about five of them too. This has been a wonderful year with them. These are our kids heading off to Music and Arts Camp. Again, most are beginners. And again, they are mostly brass players with a few timbrelists.