Today I watched an amazing team prepare bags of food to feed 65 families! I sat there amazed at the team that God has assembled to meet this need and to share the Gospel in our city.

Our food ministry is very unique. We truly believe that while the people need Groceries they need the Gospel even more; so every Thursday from 11:00 – Noon we provide both. We open the door to our little waiting room and allow in around 25 people. They sign in and find a seat to sit and listen to Gina share from God’s Word. She teaches a 10 minute lesson while the people in the back are very busy. We have one group putting canned goods in a bag, another putting dry goods and finally one more putting frozen meats. Those three bags should feed their family about 4 meals not including leftovers. After the lesson we carry the bags to them and help the ones who need help to their cars with them. And then we repeat the process all over again, some times as many as four times!

It is amazing how this ministry goes and grows without me thinking twice about it anymore. A group of seniors from Mt. Vernon goes on Tuesdays to the food bank and shops and another group comes on Thursdays and distributes! They understand my vision and work within that vision. Sure they do a lot of little things different than I would but in the end the main objective is reached, People are fed and God is glorified! It all happens without me Micromanaging everything. A lesson that I am still learning,

I have a shelf full of books telling me how to do urban missions; yet the answer always resides within the bible. The parable of the wedding banquet could have been written just for Mission Raleigh workers. Let’s take a look.

I love that the NIV translates Street Corner instead of highways. That really made the parable relevant to me. The street corner is where we do ministry; the street corner is where MR workers live! I have spent a lot of time on Corners over the past 16 years. The same corners many of hang out on. Places like Raleigh Blvd and Glasscock, Terrace, Park Drive and Winter Place, Libscomb and Dixon, Sandy Forks and Suburban, Navaho and Navaho, Lee Street and Walnut, just to name a few. It has been a privilege to stand on those corners with you inviting people to the Wedding Feast.

The Word says in verse 10 that they gathered both good and evil. You never know who the Holy Spirit is convicting; therefore, we should invite everyone. In verse 11 we see the king tossed out one who did not belong (That’s a topic we will save for another day). Our work becomes easier, sweeter and loving if we do the inviting and allow God to do the judging!

The Cross is not about 10% of the people! So invite the drug dealers, prostitutes, crack addicts, thugs, and the mean kids as much as the nice kids. We don’t know if they will go to heaven, but that won’t be because we failed to invite them. Verse 14 tells us MANY are invited but FEW are chosen. Let’s quit trying to figure out who is chosen and concentrate on the inviting.

Highway and Byway Kind
(Matthew 22:1-14)
The highway and byway kind
is my kind,
too humble to think they could be on God’s mind.

Have you ever felt your heart die
as you held a byways kid
and just let her cry?

Have you ever left your house a mess
to clean for a highway mom
who is lonely and depressed?

Have you ever had to leave for the hood
after being lonely at church
and wonder why no one understands?

Have you ever have talk with a sigh
to a byway kid with
a rock in his hand and a window in his eye?

Have you ever wanted to run and hide
as you prayed with a highway mom
who has a rock in pipe and baby inside?

Have you ever walked the church hall in bare feet
or the project streets
with a bible and a bag of treats?

Have you ever stopped your Mullin’s CD
before you picked up a byway teen
who never knows the sacrifice you made?

Have you ever gone to pray
and as you sit in your car
hear Gods say get out and play?

Have you ever taught a highway class
and have to leave early
to pick up trash and broken glass?

Have you ever had to leave your family
and friends to be lonely
because God is holy?

The highway and byway kind
must be your kind
Go and tell them they’re on God’s mind!

The weakness and lack of energy is really sitting in as I come to the end of three weeks Liquids only. Thursday is the day I should be able to move on to soft foods this should be a better way for me to get my proteins.

Weakness is a strange feeling for me. I have always had plenty of energy and strength. I find myself dosing off for naps, sleeping late, and set here knowing what I need to do but not being able to go get it done. I am sure that the Lord will use this time to teach and grow me.

It is so odd to me that I am still not desiring or craving food. The only reason I am excited about going to soft food is as a better protein source.

Sorry for the short post. Please pray for me over the next 3 days as I finish out this stage and prepare to move on to the next one.

Week two of the three weeks of House arrest is over. I have to admit that overall this all liquid stage is not as bad as I feared. I really have craved or missed any food so far and I have done everything they said not to do. I’ve watched the Food Network (I’m not going to miss Chopped), I’ve spent time working on my cookbook, I’ve went through my Grandmother’s cook book (more about that soon), yet I have not felt hungry at all. A few times I have missed the idea of food. That is all strange to me.

I had a small bump with an emergency room to deal with some bleeding but all is fine. They weighed me at the ER and I seemed to have lost 26 pounds in ten days. That is amazing to me.

My arch nemesis during this recovery has been the evil protein. My stomach turns sour to even thinking about drinking another protein drink. Lets look at some drinks I have tried:

• Ensure. I am sorry but I threw up a little in my mouth from just typing the word. I am pretty sure that they serve this to the elderly to “ensure” that death doesn’t look so bad.
• Carnation Instant Breakfast. Instant is never a good adjective for food. This stuff is as bad as Instant Grits or Instant Oatmeal.
• Milk. You can’t drink whole milk or even 2%. So I tried taking my skim milk and mixing in nonfat dry milk. I thought I had found something. It didn’t taste to bad and it wasn’t chalky. But I was tasting it all day.
• Shakes. I tried a couple but they are a lot of work and only good straight out of the blender.

Thursday I can start having some soft foods. I have never looked forward to Cottage Cheese so much in my life.

It has been interesting I am ready to see how the next step, 3 months on soft foods, will play out.

Let me take a break from Gastric-bypass recovery and share some thoughts that came to me this past Labor Day.

Usually on Labor Day I am either having a picnic or out in the apartments playing with kids because they are out of school. Most of the jobs I had before this one I would have been at work on Labor Day. America we have lost sight on this holiday is all about!

The first Labor Day was in 1882, which was a time when 12 hour work days were the norm in the factories here; a time that a 10 or 12 year old could be working those hours for a few cents an hour. Labor reform changed all that in our country long ago, but we have chosen to forget that piece of history and it is not even honored on the first Monday of September as planned. Labor Day is now the time to recognize the end of summer, a time when the laborers of this era have to work. Cooks, retail worker, and other 21st century labors have to supply the service for those who do get off.

Edmund Burke once said, “Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it.” That seems to be what happens. We don’t know the reason for Labor Day and we are drifting back into a country where 12 hour work days and 6 day work weeks are a norm. Sure working conditions are better but where is time for family, relaxing or even to be still and listen to the Lord.

The American Dream tends to crush everything in its way. That is why family and the Great Commission suffers as we all pursue the dream of hording things that are just wood, hay and stubble to be burned one day.

Just some thoughts.

Kristi asked me how I felt the other day. I told her I felt like a Ribeye Roast. When I use to cook a nice roast I would make about 6 small but deep slits in the roast and I would push in some garlic to season the roast. Well here I sit with 7 small slits in my body from the surgery. One is in my belly button where the put the camera in, which I find funny since when I was little my old man would put his eye to my belly button and saw let me see what you ate today. He was always ahead of his time.

Those small incisions have knocked me for a loop, but not the Lord. He has used this time for me to study, read, pray, and write; things that I always push aside so I could be in the field loving on kids and teenagers, whom I miss so deeply right now. So even if I sound a bit whinny right now know that I am being blessed by the Lord every day.

Tonight I sat down with my beautiful bride to watch a Labor Day classic movie Picnic. More years ago than I would care to remember Kristi played the part of Flo and I had built the set and designed the lights. Oh those bohemian days of our youth. It was nice because I wasn’t exhausted and we have had such a great time watching it together. The world doesn’t understand the sacrifices she has made to allow me to follow my call. When you average 15 hour days serving the Lord it does not usually leave much for 9 hours homes, especially if 5 of those are used to sleep. Kristi never says things like; where are your time for me, or why do I only get the tired Scott. She just supports me and loves me.

These are things that God is showing me as I am getting sick of only liquids and ugh protein drinks. I don’t sit well but I am trying,

Well today is Friday, September 3 and today is the first day I have felt like writing. I went in bright and early Monday morning for the Rouen Y Gastric Bypass. The average surgery time is 2 hours, my surgery went 4.5 hours. I was 421 pounds at surgery time and they say the surgery gets much tougher if you over 400 pounds. I was up and setting in the chair and walking around the hall on Monday. Yet, my Doctor was instant that I spend 2 nights in the hospital due to the difficulty of the surgery. I came home Wednesday around noon. I was glad to get home but Wednesday was a very tough day for me, I slept most of the time I was home. I can honestly tell you as of Wednesday night I was regretting having the surgery. I was feeling better on Thursday and to a couple walks in and did much better drinking all the fluids I have to drink over the next three weeks.

It is a real challenge to get in the amount of protein they want me to take in, 3 oz of Ensure feels me up! Don’t forget that my stomach is the size of an egg and there has been a fair amount of Trauma to that region. It’s also hard to get in all the hydrating fluids they want me to have by that’s a bit easier than the protein.

Today I walked Gumbo to the back yard and walked around the house measuring stuff, I can’t watch the food network so I have replaced it with HGTV and DYI network, so I am feeling more like myself.

I will not be released to drive or return to work on September 16, so lets see how that works out.

The journey has begun and there are no take backs so I appreciate all your help, encouragement and prayers as I wonder down this road. I will try to share more tomorrow..