After being told it was virtually impossible a few weeks ago, yesterday we were offered the back page of next week’s Patchogue edition of The Pennysaver.

The salesperson said she reckoned someone was looking out for us, but we knew that already.

That’s the ad.

Had an interesting jaunt out and about in the rain on Tuesday evening while Gill was meeting with the South Africa missions team.

First stop was a haircut at the end of the block, where the girl did a great job in three minutes straight without interrupting a text-message conversation with a guy she is very interested in. I know that because she provided a running commentary for the other associate in the salon.

While wandering around Target looking for a big enough clock for us all to see when we’re on the stage on Sundays, I got the inevitable phone call from home – bring milk.

That was easy enough. It was on special too, so I was particularly happy, until I got to the checkout that is. While loading my few bits and pieces onto the belt, I noticed that the young woman on the till was engrossed in conversation on her cell phone. It continued while she scanned my purchases, grunted at me twice and handed me my change.

So here’s my point. Will employers please rip those things out of the hands of their staff, tell them they’re there to work and suggest they should give some attention to the customer, because the customer is actually important.

Then I got to thinking, as I do from time to time and I concluded that both the ladies I encountered that evening were doing nothing worse than many churches do most Sundays. They carry on doing their own sweet thing, oblivious to those who may be visiting and almost treating them as intruders.

I’ve heard the whole lot over the past few years, mainly from people who have now moved on -
I want more worship!
The teaching isn’t deep enough!
Why do we need props on the stage?
Etc, etc, etc

Several people have asked me how many guests we have there on an average Sunday, I suppose the point was to suggest that the already Christian majority wins the right to indulge themselves on Sunday morning.

I explain with what degree of patience I can muster that whether there is one unchurched guest or a dozen who do not yet know Jesus, they are not incidental, unimportant, or to be ignored. Their spiritual journey should be our #1 priority – and it is!

The customer matters at CATMO!

I’m going out for a while this evening, despite the pouring rain and the fact this is the last free night I’ll have for almost two weeks. The house is being invaded.

To explain – without question, the best support I have had in thirty six years of ministry has been my wife of almost thirty seven years. She has been an amazing, friend, partner, encourager and occasionally the voice of reason!

Gill doesn’t look for prominence. She’s a good preacher but says that is not her thing, so in church life she does what she does the same as she does at home and is a friend and encourager to so many.

We met in Bible School and started married life with God’s kingdom as our priority and reaching people with God’s love as our life purpose. Little wonder then that she loves missions and has developed a real passion for underpriveleged children in South Africa.

Tonight a group of ten people will gather here and make final preparations for a missions trip over in Africa in October. She’ll be off there then and the next month I’ll be returning to India.

We may go in different directions, but we’re on the same page.

Chez nous missions is a family affair.

This coming Sunday is it – the last hoorah before the big day, the start of a week of prayer and the launch of 40 days of fasting (partial that is!).

I made up my mind several weeks ago what I wanted to teach on this important morning and then paused to pass it by the pastoral team to see if they thought it was a good idea or I was going crazy – but they agreed (that it was a good idea, I mean!).

So here’s what I’m going to do, I’m taking my personal favorite message of the past couple of years The Table,updating it a little and using it to cast vision for the fall.

I’ve used that message in a number of churches and a couple of other countries – it excites me and motivates me like nothing else I’ve put together on the subject of what we’re about and where we’re going.

On September 10th we’ll be launching our major fall series – DISCOVER RECOVERY: Life Hurts-God Heals but before all that we need to revisit The Table.

Having a relatively quiet day, which in theory is what Mondays are for in my routine. After getting four hours sleep Saturday night and navigating a busy Sunday, I would have overslept this morning were it not for a gentle voice beside me uttering the fateful words – Are you going to the gym today?

So I’ve been doing a bit of thinking – after I watched the Mets beat the Phillies of course – and here’s what I realized.

The amazing momentum we have going now in the lead-up to September 10th’s launch of our new-look Sundays is probably the result of what we’ve done the last two falls.

‘04 was the 40 Days of Purpose campaign, which was a strengthening and growing experience for us as individuals and as a church.

‘05 we went through 40 Days Of Community, which among other things established our small groups stronger than we have seen them at any time over the past eight years.

So where we are now is not somewhere we arrived at by chance, it’s the result of a progressive building, layer upon layer. And of course where we are now is not where we will stay, because this next step is not our destination, it’s simply the next stage towards the eventual goal.

This morning was different – in a good way. To conclude our worship series we gave most of the time to praise and worship and while I didn’t preach as such, I did take around 25 minutes to share some aspects of the vision for our new-look church following the September 10th relaunch.

I spoke about two areas of involvement. One is to invite, using the great materials we have at hand and the other is to pray. I talked about the week of prayer that starts next Sunday and also kicks off a 40 Days “Daniel Fast” (more on that later).

On Labor Day we have a major connection event in the community, our End Of Summer Festival at Shore Front Park. Do you know that every last invitation card we had printed for that afternoon was picked up today. We were cleaned out. They are gone, vanished, disparue (bit of Frnech there!), nixed, anihilated – there are none left at all.

I love that. You know why? I can talk about what we’re looking to do until I’m blue in the face without knowing whether I’m really getting through, but that empty table screams that a ton of our people have got it!

We are on the same page, moving forward together. This will be a great fall. Not a good one, an average one or just another one – a great fall!

Chicago Midway is one of the nation’s better airports. It’s bright, airy, easy to navigate and even has some half-decent restaurants. Taking a flight with a change of planes here is far better than getting a direct flight out of Laguardia to DFW – it’s always good to fly back into security-ridden McArthur.

So sitting here in Chicago, I have to admit this is a good place be – unless your plans for the day have you already approaching Islip at this time and you’re stuck in the windy city because your flight was almost two hours late leaving Dallas, so you missed your connection!

And that is how our day is going. It will be a long wait here, following three and a half hours sitting doing nothing earlier today at DFW. Arriving at McArthur around 9.45pm will bring Sunday morning around really early!!!

So, what do you do? We’ve seen the screamers, shouters and complainers in plentiful supplies today. Their elevated blood pressure has threatened to raise that of airline employees at times, but has achieved no change in the situation. If planes are late, they’re late. If yours left, it left. No amoung of ranting will change that. So what to do?

Enjoy the journey. I just enjoyed a great freshly made Italian sandwich (on wheat!), made a couple of phone calls and will now catch up with a few things courtesy of the internet.

It’s the old thing about – when life throws you lemons, make lemonade.

If you’re not enjoying the journey, you may well need to evaluate your approach to life. Jesus didn’t come to make life hard, boring or miserable, he came to give us life that is the best it could ever be.

The world is full of miserable Christians, which could well be why so many churches are closing in the USA every year. Hurting people don’t want to share people’s misery, they want a bit of the abundant life Jesus was talking about in John’s Gospel (forgive the King James English!).

So maybe Chicago Midway really is a good place to be!

No, I didn’t get lost deep in the heart of Texas, just busy. And this morning we start the trip back home, ready for tomorrow’s Imagine Worship series finale when we’ll be spending quite a bit of the morning in praise and worship. We’re going to celebrate communion together too and then it’s down to explaining the nitty gritty for our September 10th relaunch.

The countdown begins around 24 hours from now!

I seem to travel quite a lot in the course of a year, though when I get back to Long Island again on Saturday I don’t anticipate leaving any more this year, except for a ten days trip to India right after Thanksgiving.

Like millions of other Americans I’ve lived with the security changes the past few years have bought, but I have to admit that Monday capped all I have ever seen.

At Islip McArthur Airport, hardly likely to be a major terrorist target in the grand scheme of things, they have gone from the sublime to the ridiculous. Now unless the Department of Homeland Security and Southwest Airlines have some information that I am not privy to, I would have to conclude that they have lost their marbles at McArthur.

Here’s the deal, they ask you about liquids, make-up, shampoos, toothpaste, etc at check-in. Then they x-ray you and whatever you’re carrying on to make sure you didn’t lie. You are then free to go up to the concourse and hang out at the gate area for ever because they told you to be there at least 37 hours before take-off for domestic flights (I think it’s three weeks for international).

But God forbid you get thirsty. If you do, you must go and sit in the small cafeteria area in one corner and are not allowed to take any drinks out of there with you into the gate area. They examine your bags as you leave food tables just in case you couldn’t finish a 20oz bottle of diet Coke and were harboring the stupid idea of holding on to it to sip while you waited for the plane to come in.

They don’t even do that to you at a serious airport like JFK. But in McArthur they coral you into one small designated space where the drinking of liquids is permitted.

Somewhere in a cave in Pakistan or Afghanistan Osama Bin Laden is laughing his socks off.

Years ago I heard the first heart transplant surgeon, Dr. Christian Barnard, say – There is a quality to life as well as a quantity. The quality of life isn’t great over there in Islip while they supposedly work to keep people breathing.

Disagree with me all you want, but the First Amendment, which our enemies would love to see crushed along with every aspect of our lifestyle, says I have the right to an opinion and to expressing it.

Speaking purely for me, I don’t want to be kept so safe at a small, suburban airport that I have to sit in a guarded area where I am compelled to down my beverage of choice in its entirety and then have my belongings searched as I leave.

Rant over!

This morning I woke up in Little Elm, Texas. It wasn’t a Wizard of Oz kind of experience, or one like Phillip’s in the book of Acts. I started the day here because we flew here last night and will be in sunny Texas until Saturday.

I am due to attend a board meeting in Dallas on Friday for a new missions organization I am advising, but we decided to come down early (it was a tough call!) to have a few days with our son and his family. We also brought our other grandson whose parents are currently in AZ – he was great on the plane and I enjoyed watching RV with him on his portable DVD player!

Back to this missions organization. A friend of mine has started it and its goal is not to do missions, but to gather resources (that’s politically correct speak for raise money) for overseas projects helping children.

I love the concept of course and I appreciate the heart of people who don’t need to build their own empire, but are content to undergird those that are doing the job.

Kingdom work takes money – lots of money. People tell me all the time that God will provide, but last time I checked, his program for doing that has got sadly diverted. God’s plan for always having more than enough cash around to achieve his purposes is for those who belong to him to be generous and that just isn’t going on as a general rule.

Most Christians have assumed God’s role where finances are concerned. They clearly reckon his way stinks, so they do it their way. The kingdom suffers and they do too, because the blessings promised to the obedient just don’t come their way.

I wonder how much could be achieved if God’s people committed to really living God’s way and doing his work in his way too. I wonder!