Kerry Taylor is a great guy, an enormous help, and part of the Tuesday night family even though he doesn't show up on Tuesday nights. Here's why.

Mr. Taylor makes the pickup for us every week at Jesus Ministries. Jesus Ministries operates a food bank and they provide us with a box of sweets every week and other foodstuffs as they are available. Twig and I were doing it at first but they began to request an earlier pickup time and we weren't able to be there. Enter Mr. Taylor. He's one of those people who look way too young to be retired, and even though he is retired, stays busier than most by volunteering all over town. He agreed to be our pickup guy. We talk on the phone on Tuesday mornings about what we might need and he goes later in the day and picks it up and brings it down to the church for us. If it needs to be frozen or refrigerated, he'll put it up for us. He's about as good a representative as we could have to be our hands and feet at Jesus Ministries.

The group on Tuesday night doesn't see or interact with Mr.Taylor but I do.
He is integral to what occurs on Tuesday night and we are thankful for his dedication.

On the rare occasion that Mr. Taylor can't do it, Joe Sutton is my first choice for a back up. We appreciate him, too.

......even 7 and 8 year old girls can do it!

I've been looking forward to tonight all week. Gaynelle (Renee Griffin) called me up a couple of weeks ago and set up tonight as a night her daughter Virginia's Girl Scout Troop could come and help. They had a project where they collected food and now they wanted to use it to cook with us on Tuesday night. They came with a ton of food and we made Ham and Cheese sandwiches with lettuce , tomato, mustard and mayo and Turkey and Cheese sandwiches fixed the same way. They made them on these huge buns. They also made chicken noodle soup. The parents that came and helped them did a great job.
The reason I was looking forward to it is
A.) Since the BabyFast program switched nights I don't get to see Gaynelle and Virginia as much and
B.) Little girls are fun to do stuff like this with. They're all about helping and doing it right and being polite....all the things teenagers forget.

We were blessed so much tonight by God. The things the Girl Scouts brought were great and then John Liverman got us ham and field peas and mashed potatoes from the Rotary luncheon. Smithfield gave us some pork last Friday. We were also given 9 pizzas from Sam's that we bagged individually and gave to people as they left, along with a bottle of water. We didn't spend a dime tonight and fed 75 people.
I always try to keep in mind God is so good to us in these ways because God knows our needs even before we do.

While the Girl Scouts were in the kitchen with me, Twig took the regulars and went down to our storage under the LEC and cleaned and rearranged and just spruced it up from top to bottom. They did a super job. It looks great.

The Girl Scouts hadn't planned on staying and serving, but most of them wanted to after cooking and so they came up with us and we let them do as much as they could at the serving line. These were 7 and 8 year old girls, but they hung in there like champs. And the regular youth were cool about letting them do it.

TROOP 1925
ANNE, CAMERON, MADDIE, and JUDD STOHL
SUSAN AND SOPHIE DONNER
SUZANNE and TYLER HAMILTON
MATT and LILY DOLL
STYEPHANIE and BRITTLEY WOODS
ISABEL CARLIN
VIRGINIA and RENEE GRIFFIN
JULIE and LINDSEY HOLTZ

CRAIG / PRUDEN / STEVE / BLAKE / MADDIE / MAGGIE / PEYTON / ANNA / PEYSON / SHANE/ ANDREW / AUSTIN / CAMERON / LIZ / MICHAEL / J.BOGGS / CHRISTIAN / TWIG / BRIEN / KIMBERLY / KIMBERLY'S MOM /ELAINE /MERRITT / CREEEEECH ! / ALEXANDRA and me were there too.

43 people! That's infrikkingsane!
It was great.

Gotta run. I'll try to get on here tomorrow and tell you more about tonight.
I love doing this. Part of it is it feels good to help people. Part of it is it's good to know you're doing something God wants us to do. And part of it is the people I get to (and have gotten to) do this with.

If you're reading this and you haven't ever been with us on a Tuesday night, you should. Don't be afraid,...........

...Tonight was a really cool night to be doing this.

Sometimes Heaven opens up and just pours out, and when it does, the best thing to do is get out of the way and let it.

John Liverman has Rotary Club on Tuesdays. When there has been enough food left over to make it worthwhile, he has asked for it and brought it for us to use. We were talking Sunday about what we were going to serve this week and I said I didn't know. (Twig wasn't going to be there so I hadn't made a plan yet, mainly because it doesn't really panic me to not have anything decided on Tuesday morning since I'm the only one that will be running around shopping that afternoon. When Twig's gonna be there it's different and we talk and plan ahead of time to share and map out responsibilities.) Anyway, we talked about the possibility of there being some food from their lunch on Tuesday and we could just add to it.
So I had a rough idea of something we could do. I was thinking baked potatoes and corn...something that would take more shape later.
He texted me today and said there was BBQ chicken, maybe enough for the 1st stop.
Cool.

I went down right after school and looked at how much there was and it was a pretty decent panful along with a pan of sweet potatoes. So I looked in the freezer and we had about enough chicken to thaw and add to it. Some mashed potatoes, some corn on the cob......now we're talking.

So I make the Sam's run and pick up some other essentials like plates, pans, cups, etc. that we were low on. I get back to the church, run over everything in my head and and wait for folks to start showing up.

CHRISTIAN / J.BOGGS/ MICHAEL/ PRUDEN/ CRAIG/ CREEEEEECH!/ ALEXANDRA/ LAUREN/ TAYLOR/ SARA /CHRIS / NICK/ JOSH / LAURA / BRIEN / TERESA/ MITCH/ SHANE /AUSTIN /HAMPTON / PEYTON / ANNA / MAGGIE / ELLEN / JOHN/ BLAKE / ELAINE / SAVANNAH / MIKE QUEEN / SEAN / STEVE / MADDIE and me
are the ones who showed up. 33. That amazes me.

So we cook and get it all together and go up to serve and ....there's 4 people there.
Now, we were a little early but still...4?
I wasn't sweating it because there's a regular contigent who don't come until after 8. Then one of the guys mentioned a lot of folks got their "250's" today.
Huh?
Government checks for $250. I wasn't sure why or if I'd have a "250" waiting for me at home, but I knew what the checks meant. We wouldn't see as many because they would get a room for a couple of nights and stay there or they'd just eat somewhere they could afford because they had money.
But we still had a nice crowd.

Then Heaven started pouring.
Now we've been blessed lately anyway. A Girl Scout Troop is providing next week's meal and God has blessed us with some some unexpected financial resources.
But it opened up tonight.
In the middle of cooking, I got a call from Robert Boggs and Phil Marion. They work for BB&T and had a cookout today. They'd cooked a whole pig and had half of it left. They wanted to know if I could serve it tonight. I told them I was already set for tonight but I could freeze it and use it later. They said they'd bring it to us in a little bit.
About 8:20 they rolled up on Market St. pulling the pig cooker behind them! I sent some folks to go take care of it and do whatever they had to to freeze it.
They all came back saying"man, that's good. It's really good.", which made me wonder how much made it into the freezer. But we got 7 aluminum pans of pork that came right off the hog and we are very grateful to Phil and Robert for thinking of us. Robert's son is the J.BOGGS you see listed every week. Oh, they also gave us some potato salad, cole slaw, and hush puppies that we used tonight.

So we get to the 2nd stop and we're serving it out as fast as we can and then I see people I don't recognize walking up with stuff in their hands. Then I see a guy named James that I do recognize and a kid from Hanover named Adam that I know. They've got a cooler of sodas, a cookie tray, crackers and all kinds of other stuff and they just start setting it down with our stuff to be passed out with the rest of the meal. They were a young guys bible study from Global River Church and they were just bringing the stuff down for the Mercy House. How great is that? They stayed and hung out and we shared prayer together at the end.

By the end of the night , we were literally having to get out the way so God could bless us with His abundant and inexhaustable resources in ways we could never see coming.
We literally could have cooked nothing and still fed everybody. The 1st stop would have gotten the chicken and the 2nd could've had the pork. How cool would that 've been! I don't know if my faith is taking me to that step yet, though.
Check this menu out:
BBQ CHICKEN
SWEET POTATOES
CORN ON THE COB
CHEESED-UP SOUR CREAMED MASHED POTATOES
POTATO SALAD
COLE SLAW
HUSH PUPPIES
WHITE BREAD
SWEET TEA / WATER
SODAS
wow.

Steve Ledger is a great guy. His son Blake comes every week and Steve picks him up. But he doesn't just pick him up and leave. He gets to the second stop as we're packing up and helps us do that. Then he goes back to the church with us and helps unload and wipe down coolers and whatever else has to be done. THEN he and Blake go underneath with me and help put up tables and coolers., which is a HUGE help to me at that time of the night 'cause most people have adios'ed (and that's fine) and it gets me out a little earlier than I might have otherwise. He's a great guy for a ton of other reasons too, but I speak from experience on the reasons above.

Again - The weekly "Thank you Lord", for Brien and Teresa and their willingness to do what me and teenagers have no desire or ability to do and that's clean up. Hallelujah and Amen for them.

Our pastor Mike Queen saw me at the Center Monday night and said "I plan on coming down and helping y'all tomorrow night."
I said "Come on" but in my head I was already placing even money that he wouldn't make it.
Why?
Because pastors don't have jobs that end at 5 and let them plan stuff to do at night. They're always a phone call away from dropping their plans to go deal with the emergencies of folks in their congregations. But 6:00 came and there he was.
I asked him if he was going to stay throught the 2nd stop and he said yes.

Then the call came at 8:30 and he had to go to the Hospital.

It just comes with the job and Mike and our ministerial staff do it better than anyone.

Having said all that and trying to give as much attention and thanks to all the great folks who are a part this every week, I'll just end with....

...COOKOUT and grab a caramel Milk Shake!

Writing down and dirty this week. Typing whatever comes, as it comes....
Hang on...

Another big crowd helping tonight, which is great!
TWIG ANNA TERESA EB SEAN MICHELLE JOHN J.BOGGS ELLEN NELLIE JENNIFER ALEXIS MADDIE ELAINE CHRIS JOSH SAMANTHA SARA NICK MICHAEL CHRISTIAN LAURA HAMPTON AUSTIN SHANE BLAKE CREEEEECH ALEXANDRA STEVE and me
fired up the griddle for a breakfast supper.
PANCAKES
SCRAMBLED EGGS
SAUSAGE
DESSERTS
SWEET TEA/ WATER

It's crazy how many people are actually in the kitchen at one time doing stuff, but it works.

Like I have said on this blog many times before and say every week to myself..what an absolute blessing it is to have people who come and gladly clean every pot, pan, spoon, knife, cutting board, etc...that we mess up each week. They know who they are and I love them. One of them brought their daughter tonight and they worked as hard as their mom. It's in the genes.

We actually saw a pretty light crowd at the second stop tonight. Don't know why, ...just did.
Which worked out good for the ones who stayed to help and was in the mood for some cheesy scrambled eggs.

I try to do my running around as quick as I can so I
(I hate having to capitalize "I"'s all the time. Probably means I'm talking about myself too much) can get down to the church and get things ready and maybe steal a little "book" time. I was able to do that today and finished "Jesus Wants to Save Christians" by Rob Bell. I read it in three big chunks. I really, really like his books and the way he thinks. I download his podcast sermons every week, too. I recommend all three of his books, especially the one I mentioned above. But I'll warn you - be ready to examine the way you live. Find out for yourself, read it.

Thanks to all the parents who faithfully bring and pick up their kids each week. and especially to the ones who stay and work side by side with their kids. I'm sure one day the kids and the parents will look back and be glad for the times they spent together in service.

I'm tired.

By the way, last monday was STAR WARS day because it was May the Fourth...as in May The Fourth Be With You.

I my be tired, but I still might ride by ......

I'm too ashamed to admit to Notting Hill.

Now, back by nothing even remotely close to Popular Demand:
A new List for you to ignore and not comment on.

I came in the other night expecting to watch the ballgame and ran across "The Outlaw Josey Wales". That was it. Sat down right then and watched to the end....just like I do every time I see it on TV. Doesn't matter what I'm doing or when, if it comes on, I finish watching it.

What 3 movies do you always watch anytime you come across them on TV?

I'll throw out TOJW since I just mentioned it.
There's several but I'll give you:

1. Godfather II- I love it when Fredo gets whacked in the boat
2. Dumb and Dumber- And I make no apologies for it, either. Funny from the first minute to the last.
3. A League of their Own- I wish the Peaches had won, though.

Yours?

.....just ask an 8 year old

Because we're topical and on the ball, Tuesday's Cinco de Mayo meal was.......meatloaf sandwiches?



We usually talk and plan what we're going to do a week ahead of time and try to base it on what we have to work with. Even so, I failed to pick up on the fact that our Tuesday coincided with Cinco de Mayo. We could've had burritos, taco salad, tacos or maybe even nachos.Heck, even if we'd thrown some salsa on top of the meatloaf, but.....sadly, no.

Unfortunately, most of my focus was built towards the Springsteen concert this past weekend in Greensboro and I missed the opportunity to have a little fun with May 5th. I did however, pickup on the fact that Monday was the unofficial Star Wars day. Why? Talk about that later.



Cinco de Mayo or not, last night was a great meal. I'm on record about how good Twig's meatloaf is and last night was the best yet. (and technically, I'm not even a meatloaf guy. My mother's fondness for bell peppers and onions kept me from that.) We baked them on cookie sheets, 3 to a sheet, in big logs. The reason for that is we didn't have enough pans to do it the other way, plus, when you cook them on a flat pan, you get more "top crust" on the meat loaf and that's the best part. (With just about anything you bake, the top is the best. Muffins, pies, pound cake, anything with cheese on top,...I've researched it.)



We sliced it thick, too. Big ol' slabs of meatloaf on a hamburger bun....You're probably saying "Gary, why a hamburger bun?

After giving it some analytic thought, I realized a hamburger bun is sturdier than sliced bread and holds up better for the huge slices we were using....okay, I'm lying......



.... it's actually because the Bread Lady didn't have any loaf bread but did have plenty of hamburger buns we could use.

And the buns did work out better than bread because of the reasons I mentioned, it's just that I got them because I was lucky and not smart.(Insert your own Joke here)



MEATLOAF SANDWICHES

JACKED UP BAKED BEANS a la whatever we had in the fridge or cabinet to jack them up with

DESSERT

SWEET TEA / WATER

Let's see if I can remember everyone who helped put it together last night....

ELLEN ALEXIS JENNIFER MAGGIE JOHN J.BOGGS CHRISTIAN BAILEY McSWAILEY ANDY ZACH DEMETRIUS CAMERON MIKE MITCH HAMPTON ANDREW AUSTIN MERRITT PEYSON BRIEN TERESA RYAN TWIG LAURA ELAINE SAVANNAH CREEEEECH! ALEXANDRA MICHAEL DUB NICK and me.
That's right. 32 people


SPOTLIGHT ON............THE BREAD LADY

There's a lot of people who contribute to making Tuesday night successful and ongoing. Not all of them are members of FBC, not all of them come on Tuesday night, and some don't even live in Wilmington. One of these is The Bread Lady.

The Bread Lady is the manager of a bakery outlet on the corner of Wrightsville Ave. and Independence Blvd. She has been incredibly good to us over the past 3 years or so. I walk in on Tuesdays and she says "What are you cooking tonight?" and almost always has bread or buns or whatever need that she can give to us for free. And on the rare occasions when she doesn't, she always cuts us a deal on what we buy.

Have you ever bought 20 packs of hamburger buns, hot dog rolls, or loaves of bread at one time?

It's a lot.

This is an incredible help to us.

So without cooking a thing, passing out a plate or even setting foot in the church, she's part of us. She's a reason we can do what we do. The folks that come on Tuesday night may never lay eyes on her, or she on them, but their separate actions towards a common purpose help bring God's Kingdom and Love to a place where physical and spiritual needs can be met.

I consider myself fortunate because I am able to see the big picture for this better than most. I see the ones who help in ways that never involve being in the kitchen or handing out food. There's quite a few. Next week I'll tell you how big a help and what a great guy Kerry Taylor is.

I didn't post this Tuesday night because of Michael W. Smith. Not the famous one...the infamous one. He's done with school and back before he heads to Canada for the summer. He said "I'm hungry. Where we going after this?"
Don't see him enough to turn down hang-out opportunities like that so we headed out after we got cleaned up and caught up with all the latest.

Why was this past Monday STAR WARS day?
If you figure it out post me a comment and tell me. Otherwise you have to wait 'til next week.

HINT SAYING IT OUT LOUD OVER AND OVER HELPS
SO WOULD WRITING IT OUT IN ENGLISH INSTEAD OF NUMBERS

or you could ......