"Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule." - Stephen King

By tomorrow we’ll be back into the low 70’s where we belong and I can put my gloves back into storage.

Office Max (we don’t have Office Depot here) has stopped carrying Kodak ink cartridges. Instead, they’re now selling their own brand of cartridges to fit Kodak printers. Do NOT waste your money. Nothing but trouble with them. I had to do a “clean print head” every time I started a print job and now, with half the ink left in the cartridge even that tactic won’t work. Whatever profit margin increase they thought they’d see will be unrealized and customer good will gone with it. Grrrr!

At Costco on a Saturday:
The chance of a car stopping to allow you to back out of your parking spot is directly proportional to how close that spot is to the store entrance.
I wasn’t, they didn’t.

You need this:
Super Chicken!
(thanks, Jodi)

Went for a bike ride this afternoon, in 57-degree weather. Didn’t feel too bad, actually. I’d layered everything from socks (2 pair) to shirts (2 shirts and my cycling jacket). It felt good to get out and exercise after almost a week with this cold.

Dad is home from the hospital and doing great. It will take him a few days to recover from 90 minutes under general anesthesia but everything looks good. At least that’s what he says.

At the very beginning Pathway committed to doing ministry biblically in every area where the Bible speaks. One of those areas is church government and structure. To that end our elders are overseers and pastors (shepherds). That is, they are recognized as mature spiritual leaders (elders; Grk: presbuteros). We exercise oversight over all the ministries of the church (overseer; Grk: episkopaes). And we all serve as pastors, providing care for the flock (shepherd; Grk: poimaen).

To that end I’m going to begin teaching our (great) group of elders how to do the work of the ministry. We’ll be going over some of the specific skills involved in being a good shepherd like how to make a hospital visit, do a funeral and meet with people who have visited Pathway.

We’ll also work on how to teach an adult class. Actually, we’ve already started that part. I’m really looking forward to tomorrow’s adult Foundations class. Todd, one of our elders, will be teaching the next in our series on the Ten Commandments - “Honor your parents.” He has worked very hard, using the tools to explore the meaning of key words in the Hebrew and the Greek (Paul quotes this commandment in Eph. 6). Todd has a lesson plan that includes a great hook, effective look and a bring-it-on-home took.

Lowering expectations the first time out is key, so I told him what I used to tell my homiletics students before their first sermon. “If you get to the end and you haven’t wet your pants, consider it a roaring success.” But I’m not worried at all. He’s worked hard and will do a great job.

Lord willing Pathway will be a church with strong leaders who can truly do the work of the ministry. As the leaders go, so goes the organization.

They’re running a Top Gear marathon today, and the last episode compared the new Mustang GT 500 Shelby and the same car in the Roush version. Yikes! I thought of Shelby as the ultimate muscle car builder but the Roush, with less hp, blew his out of the water. The Shelby has a live rear axle and a standard differential. The Roush has independent rear suspension, a limited slip diff. and better brakes.
So, I’ve decided I’ll spend the extra $10k and get the Roush.