Fire, Beatles, and worship

Here are a few pictures from the weekend.





When I came home from work on Friday I could see that something strange was happening in the playground near the parking lot. When I checked it out I could see that smoke was rising from a number of wood chips around the swings. Strong winds with shifting directions were making the individual chips glow.

I had not seen something like this before. The coals were scattered over an area, but possibly had been ignited at the same time. I had seen lightning activity in another part of the sky as I drove home, but these separate glowing coals had totally unburned areas between them.

Fortunately, within about twnety minutes of my taking these pictures the whole area was drenched by a heavy rain.



I went to see the performance of the Cast of Beatlemania at the Greensburg Community Days. These guys do a good show that brings back a lot of memories.



Sunday it was my privilege to be the guest preacher at the Apollo United Presbyterian Church. They are a very friendly congregation, and give a warm welcome to visitors.



I was fascinated by seeing this stained glass window depicting Christ knocking on the closed door, with the window rotated open to let cool air (and light) into the room. There's a sermon illustration in there somewhere.

File under : Apollo, Greensburg, Lower Burrell, art, music, wierd, worship

Happy Pentecost

This morning it was my pleasure to be able to be the guest preacher for Pentecost at two churches in Ford City. I started the morning at the Crooked Creek Presbyterian Church.



Then I went on to the Appleby Manor Memorial Presbyterian Church.



Following the service at Appleby Manor they had a special reception to celebrate Pentecost. There was a nice turnout, and a lot of refreshments, including a special cake.

File under : Pentecost, Presbyterian, food, worship

Some pictures from my life

On May 1 I went to the "Building Block Blitz" in Macy's Court of the Galleria at Pittsburgh Mills. Ten teams of young people competed to build houses out of building blocks, the trademark name for which is not being used. The young people were way ahead of us. A number of them were thinking about green architecture and sustainability, but we did not even have a category for judging them on those criteria. The young people did this to raise funds for Habitat for Humanity of Allegheny Valley.



On Wednesday evening I went geocaching in Riverview Park in Tarentum with a few others. We found two well-hidden nano caches. There are no spoilers in the photo above. I just included it because it is a pretty park.



On May 8 I went to the CD release party for Nadina's Cube's CD "Shipwrecked: from birmingham to jericho with no prozac." What an adventure getting into downtown Pittsburgh - couldn't find a place to park. Lots of visibly empty, well-lit parking garages with signs out front saying the garage was full, and not an open parking meter for blocks around. Eventually found a place to leave my car.

The release party was happening in SPACE on Liberty Ave. I've been waiting a number of years to get a copy of this CD. Good stuff.



There was a neat exhibit at SPACE called "Rock, Paper, Scissors" featuring art in a wide range of media from a large number of artists. I gravitated to the piece above. Maybe it reminded me of people to whom I must relate from time to time. Or maybe I recognized something of myself in it. Or maybe it just dominated that corner of the room.

Yeah, that's it. It was big and filled that corner of the room.



This morning I was the guest preacher at two churches where I had never preached before. I've driven past the Mt. Zion Presbyterian Church, pictured above, a number of times when driving from my apartment in Lower Burrell to Cooperstown New York. Now it is a place I've been, with people I've met, rather than just a place I pass.



The Concord Presbyterian Church is the second place I preached this morning. Usually I am pretty successful in determining the location of the churches where I will go for the first time. I blew it when I was programming the location for this one into my nüvi. My nüvi would have taken me a few miles further down the road, but I noticed the sign as I drove past this church. If I hadn't turned back to check the sign I would have been late for church.

File under : Allegheny Valley, Frazer, Habitat, Pittsburgh Mills, Presbyterian Church, Tarentum, art, music, worship