Some days are more encouraging than others.... this is one of those. We had wonderful attendance today and some of our guests are becoming regulars. This is a tremendous blessing. One of the neat things about today is our good SS attendance. We have been praying for children to come and God gave us 5 children in that class this morning. Praise the Lord. We also had good attedance in the adult teen SS with 7 adults and 3 teens. 5 others joined us for the morning service. There were several who were not with us this morning who are a regular part of our church. This is great! (Not that they were absent, but that they are an additional part of our church family.) Praise God. We're excited about His goodness. This is HIS work.

Tonight Pastor Don Clough is going to be preaching. His family is staying with us tonight as they fly tomorrow to Germany. The Cloughs have planted a Baptist Church up in Elgin. It will be a fun evening of fellowship.

I preached this morning from Ecclesiasted 4 on Meaningful Living. I shared a 9 question quiz with our church to help us evaluate if we are living purposefully or vainly. If "Christ, His Work, His church" are the answer to these 9 questions that we are living life purposefully. If other things fill the blanks, then we are sadly doing what Solmon observed and living life vainly. It was a helpfu study for myself and I believe to our church.

We are in the final push before our departure to the USA for our daughter's wedding on 18 May. John and Kay Lee are currently at a Baptist Church on the East Coast as they prayerfully seek God's leading for youth ministry. Please pray for God's clear leading regarding His will. Our family is leaving one week on Monday. The Seacrest's will be with us starting this Wednesday PM and will get to see all of  our ministry nights before they began their replacement ministry. Thank you for praying for God's watchare over all of the above.

It's good to have a normal outreach week going. With building works and weather, this has not always been possible in recent weeks. I street preached yesterday morning and it was a lovely morning with no chance of rain. We've had rain every day for weeks and almost months. It's not raining all day, but frequently most days. So, the change in weather right now is a breath of fresh (and dry) air.

Today I put out Gospel flyers and had asked the Lord for a divine appointment. He gave me two. One was with a vere nice middle aged Muslim man. He enjoyed the conversation as we spoke about Islam and Christianity. I'd love to have further opportunity and invited him to visit our church. The second was with a very fit 73 year old man who was working in his garden. Although it wasn't raining, it was mid 40's with a steady 20 plus mile an hour wind. I saw the Lord's hand in giving these conversations despite the cold.

Lord willing, we will do door to door on Saturday to finish up our evangelism this week. That is the plan. Thanks for your prayers for our outreach and ministry.

We've also advanced the building works by finishing the walls in the sound room and shower room. Finishing work takes a lot of time, but we are getting there. We've also begun redecorating our handicapped toilet (restroom.) This room was damaged by a leak which has now been sorted. The Lord actually helped Nelson and I to find it and fix it. Many of your were praying for it to be fixed and we praise the Lord for His help in identifying the source of the problem.

I was able to get out this morning and put out some literature. The weather forecast was for storms, but they missed us. I put out a couple hundred leaflets with invitations to our church on one side and the Gospel on the other.

In our church project, last week and this week we have been working on finishing the sound room. Today we were able to get the first coat of paint on it. My family all pitched in and we also; painted the shower room, plastered where the water damage happened in the handicapped toilet, mowed the grass, cleaned up the commercial kitchen....

Meanwhile, on the USA home front, my father is not doing well. He's falling daily or several times a day. Please pray for grace for Him and for my mom. It's hard to know what to do when it would be impossible for him to be monitored 24/7.

THANK YOU for your prayers. They are much appreciated!

It was good to be back in church at Southside this morning. We had the encouragement of a young girl who attends on Wednesday nights, coming for her first time to Sunday School and the AM service. That was a special blessing. It was a lovely morning outside after weeks of rainy weather. There will be some small showers today, but it was nice to see the sunshine.

I preached a message this morning which I shared at men's camp. It had to do with our theme for the year, "Thou Art Worthy." The message was, "Worthy of First Place." Tonight we will observe the Lord's table, have a Bible study on Mark and share some testimonies from men's camp. Thank you for praying for God's work in our church ministry.

We have had a LOT of rainy weather over the last several weeks. Anyone that's here would give their agreement to that. So, when it wasn't raining this morning and it was calm, I decided to go into Edinburgh. My weather app called for rain, but I thought I'd get some preaching in before it came. I think it started raining just a minute or two into my opportunity and so I preached half an hour in the rain. I had a jacket with me and put that on my speaker. Please pray for the power of God's Word to open the hearts of those who passed by. 

Meanwhile, in the rain we can still work on the property. William, a man in our church, helped me yesterday to mud and tape the sound room. We need to get it sorted so that our sound equipment will have a home. The sound room is the old back bar of the dance hall. God had it all ready for our purposes and we thank Him for His good provision.

We had good attendance at our church on Sunday even though I and the boys were absent. God even sent a visitor who is planning to come again. We also had return visitors. So, praise the Lord! Thank you for praying for our attendance. 

My boys and I are just back from men's camp. We were supposed to arrive on Saturday evening, but our flight was cancelled due to a storm. We were at a friend's home when it canceled (Declan and Bethany Flanagan) and they kindly had us stay with them for two nights. That stay was a lot of fun for all of us. The Les Hill family spent the afternoon with us yesterday and we had great fellowship. I was also able to preach at Lighthouse Baptist Church in Sword's (Declan's ministry) and be blessed to meet his church family.

Camp was awesome.... it always is. Those of us who are ministers wish all of our church family could benefit from the focused preaching, good singing, great fellowship, etc.... God's blessed us with very close ministry friends in Scotland, Ireland and Europe. We are striving together for the faith of the Gospel. Pastor Craig Ledbetter runs the camp with his church family. They do a great job! 

For those who were praying for the preaching - thank you! God gave great liberty to all of us as we shared His Word.

Well, it's a bit like Christmas this week with things progressing very quickly. We got a very good price on a digital mini grand piano and we were able to take delivery today. The company stored it for 2 months while we worked to finish the sanctuary. God's good and we are thankful for His provision and guidance.

The carpeting is finished and it is beautiful - Praise  the Lord. Here is a link to a 4 minute before an after video on google drive.

...So, below are 7,000 words and a big praise the Lord! The carpeting should be completed tomorrow.

I don't normally go this long between posts, but it's a sign of the times. We have been super busy and have been leaving the church at around 8:00 PM most nights for the past few weeks. Thankfully, we hit a milestone in building works on Friday as everything was finished in the creche and sanctuary so that the carpet can be installed tomorrow and Tuesday. The piano (baby digital grand) is expected to be delivered on Wednesday. We got a wonderful purchase price on the piano and the carpet is also paid for - praise the Lord.

We're tired, but God has been very good. I wasn to give a shout out to my family for their hard work. The boys have done well keeping motivated on work that isn't always fun, but was necessary. (My wife has done much work as well.) Some in our church also helped this past week which was an added blessing.

God gave us a great time with the mission team from Nolensville Road Baptist Church. They were only with us about 6 days, but God blessed their efforts to push our building work forward. They also helped in evangelism, testimonies, music and preaching. They were special days.

Today we enjoyed our Resurrection Sunday. We had 5 guests last week from our village. This week we had two guest from the United States,  Gary and Tami Neil. They were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary with a trip to England and Scotland. It was a joy to have them visit our church. We also enjoyed a fellowship meal after the service. 

I preached from Luke 24, on Resurrection Reactions. It's interesting to consider the roller coaster of emotion/reactions surrounding the news that Jesus tomb was empty. Tonight we are going to look at some pictures from Israel, read the story of Christ's death and resurrection and sing the Resurrection Hymns.

special prayer request: some of us our attending men's camp in Ireland starting this Thursday. I get to preach one of the session. My slot is 8:30 PM Thursday night. Please pray for all of the preachers and for God to do a great work in the hearts of the men. Thanks for your prayers and interest in God's work at SFBC and for our family.

PS. In family news - Logan and Nelson's pipe band was in a competition on Saturday and Logan participated. If you'd like to see the video it is on our church facebook page - freebaptistlothian.