The first part of the year, Bangor, PA (like most of the United States) was kept pretty busy from January-March just trying to keep dug out from all the snow storms that kept hitting our area almost every week. The common question almost every week was: "Do you think we will be able to have 'Soul Food'/Bible Study this Wednesday night???" For a while, it seemed as though every snow storm would hit each week on Tuesdays and last through most of the Wednesdays. Needless to say, we had several Wednesday night cancellations, sad to say. Everyone would say, "Aw, NOT AGAIN!" Oddly enough though, there were never any Sunday church cancellations. Thankfully, most of the major snowstorms that hit the Northeastern United States seemed to have by-passed the Bangor area. So that was good!
Even with all the snow, we still kept very busy with celebrations.
March is Mitchell's birthday and our Sunday School Class surprised him with a birthday cake...CHOCOLATE, of course!
Angel Food continues to be a big project every month; April was no different.
This time, a young man who needed a "community project" for his high school came to help us along with his mom and sister.
Before we knew it, we began to look forward to Lent and Resurrection Sunday. (Sorry, Folks...people who know me, know that I don't like to use the word "Easter" to describe the greatest event in History: the RESURRECTION of our Lord Jesus Christ!!!)
Of course, Lent in Bangor, always begins with the Community Churches getting together for a Lenten Luncheon each Tuesday; each church takes turns providing the lunch, with their pastor providing the devotional that particular day. This year Mitchell's message was on "Forgiveness", using the story about the woman accused of adultery. As a part of the devotional, Mitchell weaved it together with a monologue that I did, depicting her story from her vantage point.
On Maundy Thursday, there was a Foot-Washing/Communion Service at Cross Road Baptist Church. Mitchell invited our "friend of the church", Michael Sandt to assist him in this service. Michael is a "Gentile" whose ministry is on behalf of the Messianic Jews. The service was moving and we enjoyed an informal, intimate time of prayer and fellowship, following the Foot Washing. Thanks, Michael for sharing your insight on the Jewish view point regarding this event in Jesus' time.
Resurrection Sunday at the church this year began with a tradtional "Easter" Sunday Breakfast. As always, the food was outstanding!
Around the end of 2010, a family of four...Jim, Jamie, Evan, and Jillian Pysher...started coming to our church. Eventually, all four gave their hearts to God this year. They began to meet together with us in the parsonage for Baptism Classes, as they wanted to be baptized on "Resurrection" Sunday. What a joy that was for us! Jaime's mother, Laura, read scripture verses for each one of the family members, before their baptism.
On April 4, 2011, Cross Road Baptist finally had a pastor ready to candidate as the new full-time pastor...who received a 100% affirmative vote on his call to serve as their new pastor, beginning June 1st. So welcome Pastor Jay Van Horn and Larissa to the most wonderful church in the world! (I know, I know, WE are a bit prejudiced) :)
While Pastor Jay was canidating at Bangor, we were back in Cincinnati. You may remember my father, Howard Taylor, in my Christmas family post. (See below) At that time, I had mentioned there were signs of declining health. In April, Dad had made the difficult decision that he was no longer strong enough to stay in his apartment alone. So while we were back home the week of Pastor Jay's canidating, we were helping Dad get moved into an Assisted Living Home, not far from where he was living. I am so glad Dad got moved to Assisted Living when he did...just before Mother's Day, I got a call that he had fallen and broke his upper right leg. Had he still been in his former apartment, it might have been longer before he would have been discovered! He had a titanium steel rod put in his leg and then several weeks of Rehab to follow.
In the meantime, there was much we had to do at Bangor! Somehow, the few things we originally brought to Bangor with us seemed to have multiplied! So in addition to the normal duties still ahead of us through June, it was time to start packing and making weekly trips back to Cincinnati to bring our "stuff" back home.
In addition, it finally began to warm up in the mountains (then there was LOTS of rain), but finally, things began to "green" up again, and little by little we began to see colorful "blooms" again. Oh, I just love the Spring time...signs of "Hope Eternal"!
The last week of April, Mitchell's 88-year-old mom (who stays with his sister, Carolyn, in Indianapolis, IN) came to stay with us for a week, while Carolyn attended a work-related training event in St. Louis.
We drove her from Indianapolis, after spending time with her and Carolyn for a day. Then to break up time "on the road" for her, we drove back to our home in Cincinnati to spend the night, before going the rest of the way to Bangor. It also happened to be my birthday that night, and Ruth fixed a wonderful Italian Spaghetti dinner, and she had a lovely bouquet of flowers for me to celebrate. I would have liked to taken them back to Bangor with me, but I was afraid they would not survive the trip. So, Ruth took a picture of them for me...now I can look at them forever!
We had some concerns as to how Mom would handle our home in Bangor. You see, Mom broke her hip a couple of years ago and still uses a walker when having to walk very far; she also suffers from dementia, so we were concerned how she would be able to handle the trip as well as new surroundings (also, our bathrooms and bedrooms are all upstairs...so would she be able to handle the stairs?) But I am pleased to say she made an excellent transition during the week and she did absolutely great going up and down those stairs...WITHOUT her walker! She enjoyed going to church and Bible Study with us and meeting our friends in Bangor. The irises were in full bloom at that time...so I cut some for her to enjoy at the kitchen table. Nella Carhart found out Mom liked flowers so much that she sent her husband, Dave, with a bouqet of flowers to Wednesday night Bible Study. Thank you Nella...Mom enjoyed those flowers so very much! And oh, yes, Nella kept Mom supplied with lots of chocolate cake during the week! (Need I say that this is Mom's favorite dessert?) No wonder Mom adapted so quickly to being in new surroundings!!!
During the week, I got the phone call that that my 92-year old father had fallen, broke his leg, and was in the hospital. Thank goodness, he was now in the Assisted Living Home and had help right away!!!
To get Mom back home on Mother's Day, the plan was: After church on Sunday, we would meet Carolyn on the other side of the PA turnpike (half-way for both Carolyn and us), have supper together, and then Carolyn would take Mom back to Indianapolis. We, on the other hand, thought we would drive on to Kokomo, IN to get to visit with my dad for a couple of days.
However! Around Indian Town Gap, our right rear tire lost its tread! Why did the tire not just do a complete blowout? Instead, we were driving on just the steel belt! Well, we knew we could not get to our spare tire. So we looked for a place along the express way that might sell tires. Of course, there was no place to be found. We drove an extra two exits trying to get info on where we might get a tire. Finally, we found out that if we drove another 14 miles, we would find a Wall-Mart store. When we got there, and the attendents were surveying the tire situation, it was discovered that when the tire tread let loose, it took out the entire filler-to the gas tank...which we were NOT aware of! If there had been a spark of any kind (and there well could have been), we would have all been history! Truly, God's angels were keeping us all safe that day!!!
On to "the rest of the story"! We had to remove all of our luggage from the car, and wait in the Tire Service Center Waiting Room while the Walmart folks so kindly called Triple-A for us to make arrangements to have the car towed to a Harrisburg Ford Dealer, get the address to the nearest motel, and call a cab for us to get to the motel. I don't know how the cabbie got all of our belongings into his car trunk, but he did! Thank goodness for cell phones, as Carolyn had already reached our meeting point. After calling Carolyn to advise her of our dilemma, she came the rest of the way to the motel where we were staying and stayed with us until we could figure out what we could do next. Fortunately, she already was taking a vacation day for Monday. Anyway, it took three days to get the car fixed. In the meantime, once Carolyn had done all she could for us, she left on Tuesday morning to get Mom back home, as well as get back to work, so as not have to miss another day of work. We finally got the car back on Wednesday morning. By this time, all we wanted to do was get back to Bangor! So the trip to visit my dad didn't happen...it was decided we will just have to wait until we get our move completed back to Cincinnati, which is the first of June sometime.
Well, Friends and Family, that brings us current until our final "Good-Bye" to Bangor which will appear on our next post. So until then...
In His Love & Grace,
Wanda & Mitchell
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