“8 Days with the Preacher” : Day 8, Sunday February 26

Our final day in this series did not begin well, though it is the Lord’s Day. I usually wake up at 6AM, but this morning I was up around 4:15 with…let’s just say…pain inside. I felt awful. However, I got ready and we headed to worship. Once there, I still didn’t feel well, but the sweet fellowship of our wonderful church family surely helped!

I preached a sermon from 2 Timothy 4 called “Keep the Faith.” This was one of those lessons that meant so much to me in preparation, and thankfully I had several tell me that it meant a lot to them as well. We were blessed with 307 in worship, despite having around 35 of our folks away at CYC in Gatlinburg for the weekend. Our services ended, and I taught my Bible class, continuing our lessons on Jude. At the end of class, we discussed what might study next (we have just two weeks left in Jude), and we decided to study “end time” matters. I am looking forward to that study already.

Following classes, we came home, and had one of our special young adult ladies over for lunch. Leah made a wonderful meal (as always), and we enjoyed both the food and the conversation. By this time, I was feeling quite a bit better. We visited with our friend until it was time for me to head out again.

This time, I went to another assisted living home, Sycamores Terrace. We hold services at this home twice each month. On the way there, I listened to the Ashville Road church of Christ podcast with my friend Drew Kizer. I try to attend the services at Sycamores as often as I can, and today, it was my honor to serve the Lord’s Supper to these sweet residents. One of our deacons preached a sermon about the cross of Christ that was truly a blessing to my life. Following the service, we had to stay a few minutes because one of the residents had gotten outside and we were pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to be out in the parking lot. After about 10 minutes or so, we learned that we were right. But, it was hard to blame him for getting outside. It was a sunny, 70-degree day with a gentle breeze. I told a few folks today that this was a “Chamber of Commerce Day.”

Following the service at Sycamores, I drove home while listening to the Spring Meadows church of Christ podcast with Dale Jenkins. Upon coming home, I did some reading and listening to podcasts. As I said during the week, I am not preaching tonight, so I am trying to take advantage of this extra time to rest just a bit. Thankfully, by this time I was feeling all the way better, and I pray that continues.

After a little rest, and listening to the Old Time Rock and Roll podcast on our porch, we got ready and headed to evening services. On the way, we stopped by Wal-Mart, though. Leah put together a care package for Blake Rader, and the kids used some of their spending money to buy something for the package.

At services, I led singing, and our outreach minister, Harry Middleton, presented a lesson “Self-Evaluation.” On the way out, we picked up some assignments for our visitation team and look forward to making these visits this week. We stopped and got some fast food on the way home (since we had some money left in our “eating out” envelope!), and enjoyed supper. As this day ends, I plan to read and relax. It has been a very good Lord’s Day.

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NOTE: This brings the 8 days to and end, but I will be posting a quick wrap-up post tomorrow around noon. I hope these 8 days of posts have been encouraging to you, and have shown you just a little of what preachers do. As always, thank you for reading.