During the past eleven summers, Sue and I have run a summer camp in northern Maine.  The camp, Baptist Park, is in Mapleton, about 300 miles from where we live the rest of the year, and it is during this time that we do our show for churches in the north.  Often, they  are too far to travel to during the school year when we are both working full time.  Over the years, our daughters have been part of this ministry, too.  With only 13 year old Rose at home now, and she on a mission trip of her own for three weeks, Sue and I are starting the summer with, if not an empty nest, an empty director's cabin.

 While camp is off to a good start (more on that in later blogs) we have also had shows each of the two Sundays we've been here.  Last weekend we had two shows at the Woodstock (NB) Wesleyan Church.  This is one of our regular stops almost every summer, so we recognized some familiar faces.  I don't know exactly how they have done it, but the church has grown in attendance a lot since the last time we were there.  We had one show for the whole congregation and another just for the kids.  We were well received as usual, but that's not what I want to write about.

I love Canada.  We go there once or twice a year, and have spent up to a week there for various ministries.  Although I have never been further west than Quebec, I like what I've seen.  And this trip was no different.

MapQuest took us a different way this time, which was a much more rural drive than going Route 1, which is our normal way.  It also gets us into Canada quicker by using the Bridgewater / Centerville Crossing.  Never heard of it?  That, I suppose, is why it's a quicker crossing.

Almost immediately on our journey, we saw a very large deer. Then a sign welcomed us to Florenceville, "the French Fry capital of the world."  McCain's, it seems, employs almost the entire little town at their main plant which is located there.  We passed the world's longest covered bridge, which we've actually been on in the past when the good folks of Hartland Wesleyan have had us to their church for weekends over the years.  We also drove by Potato World, New Brunswick's potato museum.  I mentioned to Sue that this might be a fun thing to see on a day off, to which she responded, "It sounds like a nice father-daughter date for when Rose gets back."  I suppose Rose wouldn't be any more interested in old potato farm equipment and displays than her mother is, so this is one sight we won't be seeing any time soon.  If my dad was alive, though, he'd love something like this.

After our time in Woodstock, we reversed direction and headed back to camp.  We saw another deer, then, in someone's side yard, we stopped to look at two large moose as they saved the family who lived there the task of weed whacking some tall grass beside the barn.  Moose are both the coolest and ugliest animals you'll see when traveling around the Maine / New Brunswick area, and these two didn't disappoint.

So, yeah, I shared God's Word with a large number of people last weekend, but I was all the more blessed to be treated to these sights of God's creation and human ingenuity.  And blessed beyond even that to have my wife for a total of 2 1/2 hours in the car without counselors asking where to find mop heads, CITs asking when their time off will be or campers suffering from homesickness.

Now that's a true Sabbath Day's rest.