LAST MONTH'S BLOG, BROUGHT TO YOU JUST IN TIME TO BE A LITTLE EARLY FOR NEXT MONTH

Sunday, January 23rd

Well, I'm three weeks in and the sabbatical is really starting to be interesting.  Brenda and I had two great weeks together, sharing boxes and bottles of cold and cough medicine, going on dates, and meeting some great people.  Our pretty regular regiment was writing and reading in the mornings, walking, lifting weights and doing sit ups in the afternoons, dinner together, and some form of a date most evenings.

Two fun moments for me came in the past few days.  I had scheduled a week in palm dessert, writing and reflecting but had two days to burn before the condo was ready for me, so I decided to go to the guest house at fuller seminary and stay there for a little while.  While there I got to have a coke with one of our members who is currently enrolled at Fuller and take 10 Azusa Pacific University students (8 of which are MCC "kids") out for pizza.  It was especially enriching for me to eat with students from each of the churches I've pastored (well, all but one, actually.  the one student that is still here from our Portland church had a class he wasn't willing or able to cut - not for lack of me trying, though) and introduce them to each other.  In fact, we were all thrilled to find that some of them were already friends.  There was a lot of laughter and love around that table!

The second "moment" came just this morning.  I knew we had planted a Covenant church here in the Palm Springs area and decided to look it up and worship there.  I got a double treat when I was greeted by Paul and Elizabeth Larsen (Paul is the former President of the Covenant and former pastor of Peninsula Covenant in Redwood City, so well acquainted with Marin Covenant) and then invited to have lunch with them after worship.  How fun it was to catch them up on some of the great things that are happening in our church.  It cost me the first half of the Green Bay/Chicago game, but I'm pretty sure I traded up.

For those who might be interested, I've completed about 60 draft pages (first two chapters) of the book and am really having a great time writing.  Must run now.  I have to grill my fish and prepare my salad before getting back to the writing tonight.  :-)

art