Weekly Contact

Good morning Vietnam, USA and Northern Ireland!

 

Just keeping in touch with a brief Weekly Contact as I know how much you all look forward to this, just like church and worship and weekly fired-up anointed spirit-filled sermons!

 

Anyway, Kathleen and I are having a great time on the east coast. We spent the first night (Thursday) in Times' Square. If you ever want to see real legitimate weirdoes you need to visit Times' Square! (and no! I don't need to there for the experience to work!). The following day we drove north through the states of New York, Connecticut; Rhode Island and Massachusetts and into Cape Cod. The traffic was a crawling nightmare at times, but the visit was well worth the drive. We stayed with great friends of ours, Pastor Erik and Tami Eskelund and their son Luke and daughter Tehillah.

 

On Saturday morning I spoke at a Men's Breakfast (8 am!) which was held at one of the local Cafes. We had a fabulous time with several men expressing their deep appreciation for the challenge and encouragement they received. The breakfast was also good! I had an omelette called "The Whole Hog", because it had everything in it.

 

On Sunday I spoke at two services at Living Hope Church. The worship was so awesome, which was led by Pastor Erik and his family plus other members of the church including a guy who Roasts Coffee for a living and plays steel drums on the worship team; plus another guy who plays the guitar and sings, and for the rest of the week is a Pipe Doctor! He drives a large red van with the words "PIPE DOCTOR" on the sides. It made me think that if everyone paid their tithes he would be out of business "twice" as no-one's pipes would be bursting and no-one would be getting sick!!! (Hope that's not lost on you!). The services were amazing. The words I brought were so timely for the church. I spoke on "Know what field you're in" and "Know what you're building".

 

After dinner we said farewell to our friends and then drove through Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut to New London where we took a ferry to Long Island. This saved 3 - 4 hours driving and was a good trip across the ocean lasting 1 hour 20 minutes. That night we arrived at Bobby McIntosh's home where we stayed overnight before driving through the states of New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia and into Maryland where are right now with John and Tracey McInerney. We will be here until Saturday when we will drive back up to Philadelphia. I will speak at Living Word Church on Sunday morning and we will fly home from New York on Sunday night.

 

Last Sunday morning I was able to tune in to New Life Live. I noticed the worship team was very thin (obviously due to holidays!). But thank God for the Thornton Boys! Well done lads. And well done Craig McCurley who spoke a good word on "Love" where he underlined that although we might have it all together in terms of structure and departments etc, it is so important that love binds all of these things and binds us together.   

 

I also heard good reports about the outreach into the Lower Shankill on the 11 July. This is further seed sown into a community that is very much on our hearts. We continue to pray that someday we will witness a mighty a harvest as many come to faith in Christ, not only there, but in other places where God enables us to be a God-influence.

 

Have a great week. See you all soon.

 

Stay focused; stay strong; and keep being a God-influence.

 

Pastor Jack