Every few months, a men’s breakfast meeting happens in my church. A few blokes would wake up very early on a Saturday morning and head to the church kitchen to make really good breakfast. A few dozen men would catch up over breakfast and then listen to someone speak.
Andrew Jones and his family had been in Tanzania from 2012 and recently returned to Melbourne. He has been a missionary there. He spoke on Saturday morning and for nearly an hour, everyone listened intently. I hung on to every word. He was a very good speaker.
Andrew simply spoke about his childhood, his family and how as a missionary kid himself, he grew in the Lord to eventually serve as a missionary himself. He grew up in Benin in West Africa and had his formative Christian years there and in Murrumbeena Baptist Church. His mother came from a family of Baptist ministers and he himself initially served as a youth minister in Syndal Baptist, then moved on to something known as Caleb Ministries, before turning to the corporate sector (Medibank Private) because his wife said to him he needed a real job if they were to start a family.
It was an earlier start for a Saturday than I would have liked but that breakfast meeting charged me up for the weekend. It was refreshing as well as reaffirming, that there are genuinely strong and caring men in my community.
I went home around 9.30am and immediately went to work on the garden, trimming the tall hedges, mowing and tidying and cleaning the yards. Tress also did much weeding and cleaning up bits and pieces of different parts of the front, side and backyards.
We headed to Madam K’s just before 2pm and it was crowded so we headed to Shangrila Inn again, after which we went back, walked the little fellow and watched a local soccer match. It was a glorious day weather wise and we wanted to stay outdoors as much as possible, as surely it won’t be long now before real wintery conditions kick in.
Later that night we watched “The Help” on Netflix and the familiar themes of black American woes were softened by moving and funny moments.
Sunday was the usual. After church (“All Ages” service for Mother’s Day) and lunch at Madam K we went home and cooked our meals for the week. When that was all done I rang my mum and Tress also spoke with hers. It was good talking to them. We also spoke with my niece who was visiting Klang from Penang. She was on a week long holiday before starting a matriculation course at the northern tip of peninsular Malaysia. We talked about visiting Malaysia for Chinese New Year in 2017. That would be really good, especially if Kiddo is able to come along.
Ante 