Carol Service

We just had our annual Carol Service at the church last night. Everything went well. It is hard sometimes when you do not have your own building to make sure everything makes it's way to the car. When we have special things like this, it makes it even more difficult because you have to take decorations as well. But, all in all I think the room looked very nice for about a 1/2 hour of work.

Talk about nervous! Here we were trying to get everything decorated as quickly as possible (once everything is toted in from the car) so that we have time to run through a few specials that were being sung. Not to mention trying to then give the pianist a chance to warm up also. Talk about a mad 1 hour time frame. Ha! Ha!

In the end it all turned out just fine. We had a few visitors and that was nice. One of our church ladies husband actual came in as well as her mum/mom. She travels about 25 miles to the services (for Americans that is nothing, but for here it is alot) and her lost husband usually sits in the car and waits for her. It was such a blessing to see him come in. Pray the Lord will convict his hard heart and that he will be saved. We had 2 Salvation Army ladies visit. It is nice to know that they will have heard the gospel at least once in their lives. Also, Mr & Mrs. Lane visited with us again. They are the grandparents of one of the young men in the church. They really enjoyed themselves. They stopped off at his house on the way home and was telling his family what a lovely time they had had. His mother was not well pleased. Pray for these folk, as they need the Lord.

We had an added blessing to the service. Bro. Hendy, from Indonesia; was able to be with us last night. It was a blessing to have him in the service. He is an accomplished pianist and played one of the very hard pieces for us. I believe the Lord sent him just for us!! He was sent here (Nottingham) with his job for about a month and was visiting one of the families at church whom he attend school with. He leaves next week and we are grateful to have had the opportunity to meet him and for his willingness to help us.

Pastor did an excellent job preaching the message. It was really good. I know that it gets hard to go think of new ways to present the Christmas Story, but I thank the Lord for the message we heard last night. Some of the lost people had heard it before, but there were some who have never heard and I'm thankful that Pastor tells it straight (with love) and does not beat around the bush. Our society today is hard and calloused, sometime it takes being very direct to get their attention. It just depends on the kind of spirit that is behind the directness. You can say a whole lot more in love than you can get away with if you have a bad spirit about you. Anyway, he did a good job. Thanks, Preacher!!!!

Well, I think I'll go relax for a few minutes until it's time to get ready for church tonight. God bless!

Until the Shout,
Country Mama