HE did it again!

  Yesterday as I was praying for the services today I wondered who the Lord could bring in as visitors.  When I saw how few came for Sunday School I wondered how many would come for main service.  Today was also potluck.  We thought that it would be a farewell for the Goffs(heading to Arizona for the winter), but it turned out that they had to be in Saskatoon today.  Lorraine was flying to see her daughter and grandkids. She will be gone a week, home 2 days and then they leave.  It doesn't seem like we'll get much of a chance to say goodbye, but that happens sometimes. When the main service started there were only 18.  About 5 minutes after services they all started walking in. 12 more people, 2 of whom were first time visitors!  They came to visit their daughter from Korea.  A long way for visitors to come, but we're certainly thankful that  they did.  They even said they'd come back for the services tonight.   
 Potluck was a blessing, although our food didn't end up on the table.  We figure that our crockpot has stopped working properly, resulting in the potatoes and meat not ending up cooked after almost 5 hours.  Thankfully there was plenty of food, as usual.  Most people stayed and it was a good time of fellowship.
  It also looks like we'll be having another lady join us for the next Ladies Bible study.  That's a huge blessing, considering that there are only two ladies absent from our regular services. It's a reminder not to take God's power to move in the hearts of our community for granted. I think that we have about 5 more lessons in this series before finding a new area to study.  If any of you have been particularly blessed by a certain topic, I'd definitely be interested in hearing about it. 
  Something I didn't mention was the business meeting on Friday night.  It's been something that I never really felt comfortable attending, although the women are welcome.  Our church in Trail required us to all be there because there just weren't enough men in the church and a certain number of members had to be present to vote.  I went to the first couple because I thought Scott might need me there, but the last two I've abstained from.  I find that I get too emotionally involved with some of the things that the people say and I don't want to cause offense if I can avoid it.  Some of you know the history of the meetings from Oak Harbor, but for those that don't I'll share a brief synopsis.  Originally men and women were welcome to attend the meetings and they all had a vote.  However, after several heated meetings, where the women were upset over carpet colors, paint colors, etc, it was brought up that it might be better to have it be a men's business meeting.  The wives were in agreement and it went really well over the years, with only a few women being offended by the fact that they weren't welcome at the meeting.  They were allowed to know what went on and if they had issues they could bring them to their husbands or the pastor, but it just worked better and faster without them in attendance.  Some may think this is old-fashioned, but I'm really starting to see the wisdom in it.  In order to avoid conflict and further frustration I've opted out of going.  It's much more fun to stay at home with the kids anyway;). One of the big decisions I was really happy about is the decision to purchase a sound system.  When I have to be downstairs with the kids or making sure someone's casserole doesn't burn on potluck day, I really miss hearing the sermon.  Sometimes it's my sympathy for visitors or those hard of hearing to have to try to hear over child noises.  All in all, I think it's going to be a really good thing.  The second decision was to help our missionaries to the Philippines with their plane tickets.  Very thankful for that!
  Well, I'd better sign off for now.  We have a missionary preaching tonight.  He's headed to the Philippines and we're looking forward to seeing him present his ministry. Praying that the kids will continue their well behaved phase:).  J.K. I know that it's the Lord keeping them quiet, thus the comment that I'm "praying".  It's the best way to get results.