Who are you?

Which Harry Potter Character Are You?
	You are Fred and George. You're a joker at heart, but when push comes to shove, you know what's important.
Find Your Character @ BrainFall.com

Thoughtful Quote

"God loved a lost world and gave His only Son to be a missionary. I love a lost world and I am a missionary, heart and soul. In this service I hope to live and in it I wish to die."
- Dr. David Livingstone

A New Face

I just joined Facebook a couple of days ago. It is similar to myspace, but is pretty cool. Check it out when you have a chance.

Always Remember...

Karlovac - A strategic defense plan for over 500 years

Reminders of a war

Leftovers

Scars

Memorial to the Homeland War

Oot an Aboot in Croatia

Pigeons everywhere

The only guard tower left of the old city walls dating to the 1450's

The Kupa River

Goin' fishin'

National Theater of Karlovac

On of the last sections of the old city walls

A Passion

River Trout

Chevapi

Palechinka's (excellent!)

Ice cream and cappucino at Mozart's

Leftover mashed potatoes made into a dough with a plum inside and sweetened sour cream sauce. Decadent!

Highlight of the Trip

The highlight of the trip, for me, was being able to preach twice. Before I left, I knew that there would be a chance that I would be asked to preach, so I reached in my sermon file and took all of them with me. All two of them. I had preached in Brazil and at home the previous month. Well, as I was looking at my two outlines, God told me that day old bread would not do, so I started praying and searching for what God wanted to say. Being new at this and having God say such a thing scared the bejeebers out of me! But God had a message of encouragement for the church and I was honored and humbled to be the tool. I used the text of Philippians 3:12-15 which is about running the race and reaching for the prize. Scared as I was, I had a peace that overcame me as I started preaching and God filled my mouth with His words.

What a cool way to do missions and ministry! It was a great joy to be used by God in this way and this confirmed to me that God wants me to preach. We shall see where the Lord leads.

Amusing Images of Croatia

I wonder if the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention knows they are targets of graffiti in Zagreb?

Marching beer cans are always an attention getter

Mr. Postman's cool ride

They don't care about shirts or shoes

These guys are cheaper, drink less coffee and don't need 4 supervisors

Images of the ESL Classrooms

Mark's Intermediate Class

Lona's Advanced Class

Tally's Beginner Class

Images of Croatia

Pastor Ladislov & Melanija (Tally in the middle)
He pastors the Baptist Church of Karlovac and his wife is an amazing cook!

Tim and Danna with Madeline, Piper and Zoe

Tally, Lona and Mark

The first two pictures are of our main contacts in Croatia. I will include some pictures of other people, ESL classes, the beer festival and food next week.

Yes, its all Greek to me

Ok, the first night of Greek is over. I was in Croatia teaching ESL at a Baptist church for two weeks and missed the first two sessions of Greek. I took my text, workbook and flash cards and studied everyday for 1-2 hours. My wife has her own workbook and studied along with me. She is more task oriented, so she gets all the credit in keeping me focused.

I took the quiz and only missed one fill in the blank. I got all 10 vocabulary words. Woo Hoo! I felt I was on the same page with the other students which is "What in the wide world of sports did I get myself in to?!?!?" Seriously, I felt real comfortable and the guys (and 2 ladies) are really cool. The prof was in California speaking at the main campus of the seminary, so we had a student who has done all the Greek classes and is a savant to do a review over the first 12 chapters and explain how to diagram Greek.

Oh, I got extra points from one of the students for making coffee my first night at seminary. I told her that coffee is a major food group and I was only doing what was needed to sustain life as I know it!

Greek 101

Well, I start seminary today. I actually started 3 weeks ago, but I was on the mission trip to Croatia and missed the first two weeks. I took my Greek text, workbook and flashcards and studied 1-2 hours every morning, so hopefully I am not far behind the curve. This will be my first class to attend. I like what I have done on my own so far, but I don not like that the class is one semester only and then exegesis next semester. I have friends in seminary now and they are using the same book and it is a two-semester program. Other friends who have done seminary within the last 10 years took 3 semesters of Greek before the semester of exegesis. While I am not complaining too loudly, I feel I am being short-changed.

I will let you know how it went.

Need a Phaser?

Buy a Toshiba HD-DVD player and the box set of Season One of Star Trek - The Original Series in HD-DVD and you get a free phaser remote! Cool!

Update on the Reds

I haven't mentioned the Reds much lately, but not surprising since there is not much to say. A couple of weeks ago they did climb to within 6 1/2 games to entertain the idea of getting in the playoff race, but then promptly lost 5 games.

What's nice about this time of year is that you get to see a lot of new faces just called up from the minors. These are kids who might be fighting for a spot on next year's opening day roster. Let me highlight a couple of rookies and a veteran:

Bronson Arroyo - He has not had the success he had last year. The first part of the season, he pitched pretty bad. Yes, he did have a couple of decent games, but there was no consistency. The second half has been better, but he has been victimized by the horrible bullpen (4 blown saves) or lack of any run support. Here is what the Reds page on Fox Sports has to say:-RHP Bronson Arroyo makes his team-leading 30th start Friday when the Reds host the Brewers. In Arroyo's previous starts, the team is 10-19 while scoring 113 runs (3.9 per game). The Reds have scored two runs or fewer in 13 of his 29 starts, and he has been victimized by four blown saves.

Josh Hamilton - The kid, the natural, keeps playing hard, making good decisions and staying on the straight and narrow. He was a featured speaker at the Faith Night hosted by the Reds last month. He will keep the starting CF position for next year.

Joey Votto - --1B Joey Votto's first major league hit Wednesday was a home run, joining teammates CF Josh Hamilton and C Ryan Jorgensen who this made their first major league hit a home run this year. Joey went 3-3 with a walk, a home run, 2 singles, 2 runs and an RBI in his first start. He will be the first baseman next year. He was huge in AAA this year.

Tom Shearn - Tom is a 30 year old, career minor leaguer with 354 minor league appearances before getting his first start. Now 2-0 with a 3.12 ERA, Shearn has put himself into consideration for next year's rotation. Manager Pete Mackanin says that he is fearless, which is attributed to his age and experience over the fact that he is a rookie. He is not the typical rookie. He will be vying for a rotation spot next year.

Well that is it for the update. I hope they sweep the Brewers this weekend.

Happy Birthday!

Monday was Ian's 4th birthday. We decorated his cake to look like the Candyland board game. I will post a picture of it next week.

Today is my beautiful bride's $$th birthday. She looks about 15 years younger, which is good for me, but she is stuck with a guy who ages 2-3 years every year! Happy birthday babe!

Home Again, Naturally

We returned home last Saturday, September first, after two weeks in Karlovac, Croatia. It is a historic town for that region of Eastern Europe. Most of the country is Catholic. It is a cultural thing: if you are Croatian, you are Catholic. They view any other church as a cult or sect.

We taught English as a Second Language (ESL) during that time. This is a way for the church to reach out to the community and to break down that "cult" barrier through the building of relationships between the people and the church. There were a lot of new students from previous years and they seemed very comfortable visiting the church each day.

I will discuss other mission opportunities and describe more of the town and culture over the next few days (with pictures).