Month: July 2019

I trust you noticed on the front page that two books are being considered for our Sunday night adult study this year. I really like them both, and feel either one would make for a good study with lots of discussion. In fact, we may eventually study both of them. But for now, it’s up to you to decide which one we will begin on September 15th.

The first one up for consideration is 7 Reasons Why You Can Trust The Bible by Erwin Lutzer, pastor of the Moody Church in Chicago. Dr. Lutzer does an exceptional job of exploring seven foundational arguments for the reliability of Scripture. He explores the Bible’s claims about itself, its historical reliability, prophetic predictions that are fulfilled, what Jesus said about it, the harmony between science and the Bible, and how God has preserved it and lives have been changed by it. In a day of skepticism about everything, we need to make certain we understand why we can base our lives, and our eternal destiny, on a book that’s thousands of years old.

The second book is The Hand of God by Alistair Begg. Alistair is the pastor of Parkside Church in Cleveland, who is from Scotland and still preaches with a brogue. His writing, however, transcends cultures and speaks powerfully to the people of God wherever they are. In this delightful book he reveals things about the life of Joseph, and God’s providential care of him, that I had never considered. If you would like to be reassured about God’s guiding and protecting hand, this study will help you face the trials of life.

Please let me know which study you would prefer within the next two weeks so I can get them ordered. We’ll decide how to best cover the material in them once we start meeting together.

And speaking of Sunday nights, I’ve been talked into showing pictures from our European trip this Sunday at 6:00. But be forewarned, I still have a ton of pictures on my iPhone, and Chris is figuring out how to project them all on the auditorium wall. So if you come, you may want to bring some snacks to stay awake, or just bring a pillow.

God Bless, Rick

We’ve seen some of the most famous churches in the world, but as I noted on the front page, our favorite church in the whole world is C.C.C. We’ve been to churches where they say the remains of the Magi, Mark, Peter, Michelangelo, and Galileo have been interred, but Chatham is where we live and worship a living God. It’s good to be home.

After deleting a thousand or so pictures, I still have over a thousand on my iPhone. I may bore my immediate family with them all, but I can’t put my church family through it. I will, however, show you some if you ask, and here are a few highlights of our seventeen days in Europe.

In London we saw the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, cruised the Thames, and ate fish and chips. The Eurostar then took us to Brussels at 180 miles an hour where we met the rest of our 18 member tour group and boarded our wonderfully uncrowded luxury coach.

In Amsterdam we ate dinner on a glass topped boat while cruising the canals and saw the home of Anne Franke. The next day we visited the amazing Cologne Cathedral that took over 600 years to build and cruised the Rhine past umpteen castles. We then traveled through the Austrian Alps to Salzburg where Mozart was born, and in Vienna had dinner and a classical concert at the Opera House.

In Venice we rode through the inner canals in a gondola while being serenaded and watched Venetian glass blowing. In Rome we tossed coins in the Trevi fountain, toured the Colosseum where martyrs died, and spent twenty minutes in awe at the Sistine Chapel. In Florence we saw where both Michelangelo and Leonardo Di Vinci lived, and then had dinner at the villa in the Tuscan hills where Machiavelli was held in exile.

We cruised through the lake to Lucerne Switzerland where we ate cheese fondue, and went to the top of Mount Pilatus. In Paris we saw the Eiffel Tower, cruised the Seine, and I ate snails.

The history of all the wars and rumors of wars that formed Europe made us realize how blessed we are to be living where we do. And like I said, we’re glad to be home.

God Bless, Rick