First Baptist Church

On a recent Saturday, I was watching my grandson. I had a wedding to do that evening, so I was in the bathroom shaving, while Andrew drew pictures in the dining room. Then I heard: knock-knock-knock-knock!

I said: “Andrew, was that you making that noise?” He said, “No!” Then I heard him run for the front door. I ran after him, wiping shaving cream and water from my face. He was already at the door. “Don’t open that door!”, I said. He looked back at me and said, “I’m trying to help you!”

At our house, most people we know come to our back door. When someone knocks on the front door, it’s usually salesmen, politicians, or the occasional non-Christian cult member. So I really didn’t want my grandson to open the door before I got there.

Wiping my face and hands one last time, I squeezed between my grandson and the door, and opened it to see a young man in a t-shirt, shorts and a ball cap, standing on my porch. I opened the storm door a little—with Andrew trying to push past me to see who it was – and I said, “Can I help you?”Read More

I know you all groaned inwardly when I told you I took over 1500 pictures while I was in the Holy Land. I promised not to make you look at all of them, but to my surprise, you willingly looked at a great many. When I showed some of the pictures in the evening service that first time, I honestly thought you would quickly get bored with them. I remember my grandparents coming home from vacation and showing us an interminable number of slides from their trip. It was all quite boring to me as a kid, and I had no desire to bore any of you in the same way.

But you weren’t bored. The Holy Land is different, isn’t it?

For my part, I’m glad I took all those pictures. I knew this would happen, but I’m still not happy about it: we went so many places, and saw so many different things, some of the details have started to blend together in my mind. I sat and talked with my son Josh the other day, and he reminded me of some things I’d forgotten about our trip. At least, I forgot them until he spoke of them. So I went back through my pictures (and even through some of the 2000 pictures Josh took), and it helped to refresh my memory.Read More

So many people have come up to me and said, “I am so glad you got back safe from Israel! I was praying that you would be safe!” Both members of our church, and people outside of our congregation have expressed this to me.

I am grateful for each of you. I am surprised at how many people outside of our church knew about my trip. And I am humbled by the concern of so many. My response was and is always the same: “Thank you for praying. I’m glad we got back safe and sound, too.”

Many of you know that tensions were on the rise while our study group was in Israel, particularly after the kidnapping of those three Jewish teenage boys. While we were there, the Israeli Defense Force was conducting a massive nation-wide, house-to-house search for them. It was not learned until after we got back that those boys had been murdered almost right away. Our hearts were broken along with the Israeli people.Read More