Prayer in Covered Bridge

Today I prayer walked up and down Rt. 9 by Covered Bridge (a huge adult community) in Manalapan. I have always wanted to explore the constructed covered bridge on Rt. 9 marking the entrance to the development. So I walked in it and found just 1 thing inside on the seats- a copy of the Jehovah's Witness Watchtower magazine! I was shocked. I picked it up and threw
it in the next trash can, so no one would be deceived by it.

I wish we Christians were as zealous as the JWs.

Ministering to ministers

Thanks to those who prayed! I spoke at 3 separate seminars last week to about 150 ministers. It was great, and went very well. This is something I have a burden for, to share what I have learned, and the mistakes I have made, to help other pastors to reach people for Christ and to get their churches to grow. I spoke on "Maximizing Your Ministries", which included starting ministries, managing them, stopping them, and training ministry leaders.

Some of the toughest questions asked-
-what are the biggest mistakes you have made? (ask me in person, and I will tell you)
-what do you do with a ministry/leader who has their own agenda?
-can you fire a volunteer?

Pastor Jasko #2 (or is it #4?)

It's official, my son Andrew is becoming our new youth pastor (Obadiah is going to start a church in New York City). He introduced himself Sunday as Pastor Jasko. Someone said he was Pastor Jasko #2. Actually there are 2 other NJ Assemblies of God Rev. Jaskos, my brother and my nephew, though neither is a pastor. But this makes 4 of us at family gatherings, which may intimidate some! In any case, I am very proud of my son, and looking forward to having him work with the church.

Free at last

Recently I finished a 10 year project, putting 3 kids through college. It is hard to believe that I have been sending outrageous amounts of money to the midwest monthly for so long. The hardest part was during the time when Andrew and Christina overlapped in school for 2 years, and we had to pay double (at the same time as our church building campaign). Here is a picture of my last college payment.

But now I am free! I plan to increase my giving sharply.

A rush from Greek

Lately I have been reading Wuest's "Word Studies from the Greek New Testament" in my devotions. You don't need to know Greek to read the book. I took Greek years ago, and it is an incredibly expressive language. Reading it (or about it in English) gives you a spiritual rush.

For example, Wuest points out the famous verse "Faith is the substance of things hoped for (Hebrews 11:1). He notes that the word "substance" is used for the concept of "title deed" in secular Greek. So faith means we have what we possess faith for without full possession, as long as we have the title deed of faith. This is staggering.

Also, consider Eph. 5:18-19, "be filled with the Spirit." In Greek, this is an imperative- we are ordered to be filled, and sinning if we are not. It is present- now be filled. It is continuous, we are to keep doing it. It is corporate, we are to be filled as a church and group. All this is in the 1 word "filled".

I love Greek.

Our cat Tabitha

Here are some photos of our cat Tabitha, and the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey says. After we got her a few weeks ago, she became deathly sick. She stopped eating, drinking and moving. Louise took her to a vet, who said she had feline distemper, and would probably not make it ("but there's always hope").

Thanks for those who knew and prayed! After two days of constant sleep, she gradually began to eat and drink and strengthen. After several more days, she was totally back to normal.

We named her Tabitha after the woman in Acts who was raised from the
dead. Also, she is a tabby cat, and you
can call her "Tab" for short. She has
energy and personality ("cuteness to
women") in abundance. Feel free to
come by some time to see her while
she is so young and playful.

Someone said she is the most
prayed for cat in Manalapan!

Church after the big storm

Yesterday morning was an unusual service. With a thin early service crowd due to the time change hour loss, a huge storm erupted during the message. The lights flickered several times, and then one-third of the electricity went out in church until evening.

We couldn't use our video projectors to show either of the two videos (we will show "rooftop evangelist" in the future to the later service, it is a classic), message notes, scriptures, or song lyrics in the later service. Some of our classrooms were dark. Several of our members were up most of the night bailing out their basements, since their sump pumps were out due to an extended power loss.

Jesus didn't use technology, but I never realized how dependent we were on it.