Today I began a three-month sabbatical.
It felt odd.
Honestly, the entire week felt weird not having a sermon to prepare for Sunday.
My oldest son came downstairs and saw me preparing breakfast and he said, "this is strange, Dad. I don't ever remember seeing you at home on Sunday morning." He's 16.
For all of his short life, I've already been gone to church when he wakes up on Sundays.
I am extremely grateful to our church for giving me this opportunity to take a sabbatical.
Today was a really good day.
If you are interested, I'm going to post periodic updates here on my blog page. I'm going to call these updates "Sights & Sounds from Sabbatical."
I was able to sleep-in this morning. I didn't wake up until 6am. :-)
It was refreshing to read through the gospel of Mark this morning, spend some extra time in prayer, write some notes to some of our church family, and do some extra reading.
Becky and I attended Brick Lane Community Church this morning in Elverson. Pastor Steve Estes, the lead pastor at Brick Lane, preached a message from Hebrews 11:20-22 about persevering faith. We were both encouraged by the worship at Brick Lane. Becky and I then got a cup of coffee at Morgantown Coffee. (We never do that!) After that we had lunch with dear friends from EBBC. (They didn't say anything about church! :-)
We finished the afternoon watching a football game with other friends from EBBC.
Nothing more to say about the game. :-(
One last thing.
We sang a song this morning at worship entitled "Lord, With Glowing Heart I'd Praise Thee." The hymn was written by Francis Scott Key who also wrote our national anthem, The Star Spangled Banner. The lyrics encouraged me.
Here are the words to the third verse:
Praise thy Savior God that drew thee
to that cross, new life to give,
held a blood sealed pardon to thee,
bade thee look to him and live.
Praise the grace whose threats alarmed thee,
roused thee from thy fatal ease;
praise the grace whose promise warmed thee,
praise the grace that whispered peace.