"There and back again"

The title (with apologies to J.R.R. Tolkien) sums up this blog. Rene and I were able to go back to the USA for Preacher Lasley's special day. We thank the church and other friends for making the trip possible.




Here are some of the famous preachers present. I missed getting Preacher Lasley! Good planning, Graham. Nathan Foran, Bruce MacAlister, Ron Comfort and Joel Long (Preacher's son-in-law) and his son.

I think I surprised most of the people and Pastor Lasley too when I walked into the service. I also relieved the stress of the assistant pastors who had expected me 30 minutes earlier. (One of the things I forgot to ask was what time to be present and the service times were changed!)

People I hadn't seen for years had come in for the special day. Two of my former teens came up and tried to haunt me, but they weren't all that scary even in their prime.









The next big plus was seeing my newest grand baby, the incredible hulk, no...Caleb Nathaniel Foran. A big chunky little guy who definitely looks like his brother Isaiah only larger at this age. We had a great time making friends with him and then playing with sister Abby and brothers Ben, Isaiah and Brandon. Here's Becca and Nathan and on the bottom right Katie and Abby.





















Though all the kids came down to visit while we were in Tennessee, we did go up to see Ginny's new digs and take Katie to Washington DC. We could not have asked for better weather. It was pleasant for walking and taking in the sights. Katie was a baby the last time we did DC so she got to see the presidential and war memorials as well as part of the Smithsonian Museums. She can take her own kids some day and see the rest.







Here are my girls, Katie, Rene and Ginny.





I wrote about our "Bring Forth Fruit" campaign. Here's our final "tree"
picture. Each fruit represents a visitor and the leaves verses memorized. We ran out of apples for the tree after about a 125 so we started using pears. Not biologically correct, perhaps, but the tree of life in heaven has 12 different fruits. So two should be okay too. We had a more than 150 visitors. I get mixed up when trying to count the fruit on the tree. Higher math, you know.










The last picture shows part of our Jr High class that came to lunch Sunday. Not all of them came but we had enough for a good time.










Thanks for your prayer and love over they ears. We do appreciate your comments too. Lord bless, Graham and Rene