Day 2153. Like last week, Randy got up at 5:30 am to go with the Dad of the house where we're staying to the men's Bible study. The boys woke up at 7:30 am, and at 8 am Randy was already back. Tammy was still asleep at that time. I got to get some more sleep and was not happy, when my alarm went off at 9:25 am. I got up and got ready for my 10 am student. Randy and the kids were upstairs for most of my 50 minute lesson.
After I was done and had wrapped up, I got ready to leave the house and so did the kids. At 11:20 am we all left.
We drove the half hour northwest to the little café that our friends had suggested. We saw the husband right away and found out that his wife was sick and couldn't come. I was really sad as they are good friends of mine, and I wanted to see them both. We sat down in a booth and ordered our food, then started talking. Randy and the kids all ordered breakfast dishes, and as the kids were hungry, they all ate well. Their tablets were all out of juice, so it was harder to keep them happy. Tammy and Emmy had our phones to play with.
Just before 2 pm it was time to say good-bye again. We got back into the car and drove back to the house where we arrived at 2:30 pm. I was very tired and just wanted to sleep but the kids wouldn't let me so I finally got up and finished writing yesterday's report. Then I lay down again. This time I managed to fall asleep but was soon woken up again. At some point I gave up and got up. The kids all had some food but I wasn't hungry yet. At 6:20 pm we left the house again.
We drove half an hour to the church where I went to ministry school over 20 years ago. We had already been there for fellowship night on Wednesday, but tonight they had a service.
I noticed right away that there weren't too many cars in the parking lot. We went inside, and some people greeted me right away as they recognized me. Then we found ourselves some seats as the service was starting. Sammy got into the music right away as the first one was a song he knows well. The other two were less excited. I was holding up Sammy for most of the time and couldn't get the others to participate in worship.
When the pastor's wife started doing the preaching/teaching, we sat down and I allowed the kids to use their tablets silently, which they did. It was bedtime after all; Emmy had already closed his eyes without the tablet. The teaching wasn't long, and everyone got up again. I told the kids to turn off their tablets. It was prayer time. Most people were already up front, and then they encouraged everyone to come and get prayed for. The five of us went to the front. The kids were tired and hadn't seen a prayer time like this before. A few people prayed for us, and when the pastor's wife did, the power of God touched me powerfully. After a few more minutes, we returned to our seats, and then the meeting was over. It hadn't even lasted 90 minutes which is the shortest service I've ever experienced in that church.
It was time to talk to people. Some people who still knew me came up to me, and we also went up to the pastors' wife to talk briefly and say good-bye. The kids were really sweet and gave her a hug, especially Emmy who hugged her twice. She asked Emmy his name, and he said Emmanuel. She said "beautiful name" and told him that he was handsome. Then we left and talked to a few more people before leaving the buildig for good.
It was 8:45 pm so pretty late for the kids. The sun was just going down, and Sammy commented several times on the way home on it being dark outside. Back at the house, they still wanted to have some ice-cream, so it was a quite late by the time they went to bed. I then sat down to watch the news and work on today's pictures and my report. Now it's 1 am, which is much later than intended as I have to get up early tomorrow.
