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Pastor's Page

Posted on May 10, 2007 ...

Mother?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s Day causes each of us to reflect upon the unique gifts and talents our moms brought to our lives. One of the special abilities my own mother possessed was creating ways to keep our family entertained on long road trips. We McCluskeys have always loved to travel. On more occasions than I can count, my mom and dad loaded up their four children into the family sedan and headed out on a long adventure. Well before the days of individual cell phones, personal stereos, hand held video games, or built in video players, my Mom was in charge of helping us pass the time. She led us in every song that we knew and taught us some that we did not know. (The McCluskey Family Singers especially excelled in tunes that could be sung in rounds.) We took turns telling silly jokes. But mostly we played numerous games including Category, Car Bingo, Find State License Plates, and Cow Poker (which, for the record, had nothing to do with gambling.)

To this day, my own family cannot go on a road trip without spending some time playing a game. Inevitably, we engage in some version of The Alphabet Game where we look for, or think of things that start with each letter of the alphabet. And when we are up for a challenge, we play The Numbers Game in which we think of things associated with each successive number, such as?¢‚Ǩ¬¶.

There is ONE God.
There are TWO sides to a coin
There are THREE persons in The Trinity
There are FOUR seasons in the year.
There are FIVE players on a basketball team.
There are SIX points for scoring a touchdown.
There are SEVEN days in a week.
There are EIGHT legs on a spider.
There are NINE innings in a baseball game.
There are TEN fingers on our hands.
There are ELEVEN players on a football team.
There were TWELVE disciples of Jesus.
There were THIRTEEN original colonies in the U.S.A.

As you see, this game gets more difficult as the numbers increase. Fourteen is often the first major stumbling block. But I will share with you today a good characteristic you can associate with the number 14:
In April of this year FOURTEEN individuals presented themselves for membership at North Cleveland Baptist Church. Now THAT is a great number!

Like all new members, these people pay us a high compliment by sharing their desire to identify with our church family. It is very exciting to receive the blessing of these new lives as our church journeys ahead toward days of challenge and opportunity. Jay