Today several of us guys had the opportunity to help some friends who are expanding and renovating their barn.  

It was a lot of work, but it was certainly not without its rewards!

Thank you for the refreshing ice cream Jonathan and William - and Mrs. T. (and also for the delicious lunch!).

"In all labour there is profit" - Proverbs 14:23 

   This spring the Lord again opened up the opportunity for us to play some music and to do a Gospel chalk art presentation at Mont Saint-Dominique – a Catholic nursing home at which Daddy works. We were amazed at how many people came. The nuns all showed up for the presentation, and even the "curé" (the chaplain) was there. Through the chalk talk, the Gospel was clearly presented. We pray that the Lord would use His Word to convict hearts and draw them to Himself.

Everyone loved seeing Daddy, the beloved doctor, playing music with his children.

A few pictures of the chalk talk...

   We were invited to stay for supper, which we readily accepted. This proved to be an excellent opportunity to interact with both the nuns and the residents, and to begin to get to know a few of them.

    Something I have often wondered when we do Gospel chalk art presentations is why we rarely see much response to the Gospel message. Everyone loves the presentation, but though it often elicits conversation about God, I don't believe I can say that I actually know anyone who has come to the Lord through it.

    As I pondered this, the Lord opened up two things to me. The first was that God calls us to be faithful, not to see results. “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.” (I Corinthians 15:58) Our toiling for the Lord is not in vain even though we may never see the results of our labour. God has promised that His Word will not return to Him void, however He has not promised that we, the bearers of that Word, will see Him accomplish that work. His withholding from us the visible encouragement of results necessitates a response of faith on our part. We must trust that He is at work, though we do not always perceive it.

   The other answer came to me through a book I read recently. I share a quote from it:

    “It [the knowledge of the sovereignty of God's grace] should keep us from being daunted when we find that our evangelistic endeavours meet with no immediate response. God saves in His own time, and we ought not to suppose that He is in such a hurry as we are. We need to remember that we are all children of our age, and the spirit of our age is a spirit of tearing hurry. And it is a pragmatic spirit; it is a spirit that demands quick results. The modern ideal is to achieve more and more by doing less and less. This is the age of the labour-saving device, the efficiency chart, and automation. The attitude which all this breeds is one of impatience towards everything that takes time and demands sustained effort. ours tends to be a slapdash age; we resent spending time doing things thoroughly. This spirit tends to infect our evangelism (not to speak of other departments of our Christianity), and with disastrous results. We are tempted to be in a great hurry with those whom we would win to Christ, and then, when we see no immediate response in them, to become impatient and downcast, and then to lose interest in them, and feel that it is useless to spend more time on them; and so we abandon our efforts forthwith, and let them drop out of our ken. But this is utterly wrong. It is a failure both of love for man and of faith in God.

    “The truth is that the work of evangelizing demands more patience and sheer 'stickability', more reserves of persevering love and care, than most of us twentieth-century Christians have at command. It is a work in which quick results are not promised; it is a work, therefore, in which the non-appearance of quick results is no sign of failure; but it is a work in which we cannot hope for success unless we are prepared to persevere with people.”  Evangelism & the Sovereignty of God by J.I. Packer

    We are called to patient labour. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.” Galatians 6:7-9

Good evening,

We have recently received some comments regarding an issue about the comments on the blog posts.  In certain circumstances, it is impossible to place a comment, and the blog just "hangs".

I have reduced the issue down to an issue in the theme.  I am currently working on this issue, and will update this post as soon as everything is working again.  Thank you for your patience.

For those people who would still like to make a comment, there is a work-around currently available.  Click the name of the blog post (at the top of the post), and then add "?theme=Indigo" without quotes to the URL.  Example: to comment on this post, go to this URL: http://www.createdinchrist.com/Blog/post/A-comment-on-comments-not-commenting.aspx?theme=Indigo  The blog will look different, but it is the same blog.

Please note that the blog may have temporary outages or peculiar quirks as we attempt to resolve the issue.  I appologise for any inconvenience this has caused.

Last Saturday we had the privilege of taking a 95-kilometre (60-mile) bicycle trip to an ice-cream shop with some friends.  I know, that sounds like a long trip just to get ice cream, but you must realize that this is Coaticook ice cream, directly from the factory.  Actually, Coaticook ice cream was not our only reason for bicycling, otherwise we would probably have driven there.

At 8:00 it was raining lightly, but we started nevertheless around 9:00 in the fog and humidity.  Several of us were taking pictures: Elizabeth with her Kodak, Nathanael with his iPhone, and I with my Blackberry, so we ended up with a well documented bicycle trip.  

Around 10:00 we stopped for a short time to look at a river and dam.

In spite of the cloudiness of the day, There was much very beautiful scenery to be seen - streams, farms, woods, panoramas, and tree-covered roads to name a few.

We decided to stop to take a group photo at the top of the last hill before lunch.  There was very little traffic on this road.

Meanwhile, at home, William was having a great time with Daddy building a Piper Cherokee 140, and Amy was greasing the pizza pans for Mommy.  Stephen was practising his sermon for Sunday at the Grace Christian Home.  (I will try to make time to post on that, too.)

Finally, we arrived at the ice cream shop.  We then had lunch at the Coaticook gorge.  Yes, we had our dessert before our lunch, but we were good and ate our lunch anyhow!

After lunch we were blessed with more beautiful scenery.

Later in the day, the sun came out.  We never got rained on at all, in spite of all the ominous clouds we saw.

Finally, shortly before 6:00 PM, we arrived home, where Mommy had prepared pizza for supper. (With Amy's help, remember?)  Thank-you Mommy for that delicious meal!  Oh, and a special cookie-cake made by Elizabeth...

Finally, after all those kilometres of hills, we were persuaded (by the ones who hadn't gone) to play badminton.  It was really interesting - the number of birds started at one, but there must have been at least half a dozen when we got near the end.

And we wound it all up with a game of hide-and-seek.

Matthew 7:7-9 "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened."

Job 34:21 "For His eyes are upon the ways of man, and He seeth all his goings."

   This comes from a proud sister...

   Not long ago, David planted his first real estate sign!  The duplex has actually been listed for a little while now, however, for various reasons, he was not able to put up the sign until recently.  I was intrigued by the way these signs are actually put up. (Odd, isn't it...  Why have I never noticed the methods of installation for the "For sale" signs in front of houses previously? )  In the first picture, David is hammering in the metal base for the sign.  Then he tied up the sign using plastic screws and nuts.  The reason for this, I learned, is that the plastic will not rust and leave stains on the sign the way metal ones would.

   So, if anyone is looking for a nice, well-maintained duplex in Magog, you now know who to ask!