Smiling

With so much sadness and gloom in the world,  it is important to see and to savor a bit the moments that make us smile.  Such as...

  
Do you know our church plant in Marion is meeting in the building of a catering business called Ala Caters?  The sign on the building has an alligator (Ala Cater, alligator.  Get it?) dressed in a tux, and the room we meet in has a glitter ball hanging in the middle of it.  Rest assured that we do leave it off during the service.  
  
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My nine year-old daughter Celia gave her teenage brother Spencer a handwritten note with drawings on it to encourage him in his soccer playing.  Her message?

Dear Spencer,

You played really well in your soccer game today for the five minutes you got to play.

Love,

Celia

  
Recently one of the two pastors here stood up suddenly while the congregation was sitting down singing, thinking we had concluded the psalm when there was actually one stanza left.  He recovered fairly well, reopening the psalm book to sing and walking slowly to the pulpit.  The other pastor thought maybe he was just emphasizing the words of the last stanza of the psalm we were singing, which began, "_While we are raised and upright stand..._"  
  

Tim Challies had a link  today to 25 funny analogies submitted to a _Washington Post _contest.  One of my favorites was this one: " The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work."

  
Miriam's folks arrived yesterday, their van laden with Northern Spy apples they handpicked in Michigan to make their homemade applesauce to restock our freezer.  Their applesauce is pretty famous in our church, and recently we had friends over with a one year-old who became another fan of it.  We enjoyed watching her hold her spoon in one hand while she shoveled the stuff into her mouth with the other.  
  

Watching this little girl discover her new face after cleft palate surgery performed by Operation Smile is a fitting conclusion:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4nUkE1moT-g]