Our Today Sunday 6th April 2008
Combined Church Service
Once a month some of the churches join together for a combined service. This month we had it out in the park. An outreach service. Our local country singer, Peter Brandy, was a “feature”. Not only did he play many songs but he gave an amazing testimony of how God grabbed his attention and changed his life. He also issued a fairly strong challenge to those in the crowd (a small gathering of folk other than the church folk) to think about their eternal life, their response to God. It was a lovely lovely day – the weather could have gone either way – hot or lovely – it was lovely with a gentle breeze most of the morning.
New friends
We saw a family, new to town whom I had met a week or so ago at a ladies morning tea sitting in the crowd. We intended to ask them to come home for lunch but they already had ski/boating plans so they asked us to join them instead. So we went home, packed a picnic, grabbed the swimmers and headed off for the afternoon. Unfortunately, time slipped away pretty fast and only Pete and Daniel got to have a go. Pete did quite well and Daniel was piggy-backed on one of the ladies’ back. He was a bit reluctant to start with but thoroughly enjoyed himself. Unfortunately we had to head off early which meant the other kids didn’t get a go.
Community Help
We then went onto a meeting that was discussing how neighbours and friends could help a family with a downs syndrome boy. The idea was that as people became aware of the transition he was making – from education to workplace – that people from the community could help the family give him training experiences and relational practice. Our family feels to help in this situation as Josh is about the same age as this boy. So our minds are all abuzz with how we can incorporate him into our activities or adjust our activities to include him.
We came home, around dinner time, pretty tired. The kids have done so well. They occupied themselves down on the lawn as we had our meeting. The younger two then served drinks and nibbles as everyone had some social chit chat time. It was a long day, outdoors. A quick dinner and everyone made it to bed early. Unfortunately we didn’t take the camera with us so we have no photos of this very full day.
