Greg's Monthly Updates: September 2016

Hello family and friends, and welcome to another exciting update from the Greg Matthews Family!

In order to properly enjoy our hot summer, we decided to all go to Seabreeze, our local amusement and water park. My family, Hannah’s family, Ella’s family, and Krista’s sister Nanita’s family all went on Saturday, 8/20, and enjoyed a day of sun and fun. My wrist didn’t give me any problems, which I wasn’t sure about going into it, although it was a little sore the next day from holding tightly to the rides (I love roller coasters). I never even got my phone out to take any pictures, so you’ll just have to imagine how cute my granddaughters were on their rides. No, it was cuter than that. Try again.

I only have one PT session left, and then I just have to continue doing my home exercises until I’m completely back to normal. The nice thing about having PT every week is that my boss has let me work at home each day I’ve had PT (once a week). I had PT on 8/22, which was also Krista’s and my 36th anniversary. So I took a long lunch that day, and we went out for a nice lunch together.

My Mom would have been 88 on 8/23, and Dad would have been 88 on 9/15, but they are both happier now without having birthdays.

On 8/26 and 27, Levi and I took Cai back to college at Cairn University outside of Philadelphia. We briefly saw Carissa, Matt, Caitlin, and Ben. We slept at Caitlin and Ben’s house Friday night, played some games with all of them, and then all went to Chick-Fil-A for lunch before we had to drop Cai off at school on Saturday afternoon. Then Levi and I headed home. It was a long driving weekend, but by God’s grace, everything went very smoothly.

We caught Matt replacing his kitchen flooring (see the small patch of old flooring?)

Playing games

On Labor Day weekend, our family fantasy league had its draft. I got a very bad draft grade, so I guess I better keep my job and not try to break into managing an NFL team. Although the Bills are winless this season, so I couldn’t do much worse than whoever is doing that job there now. I had and still have much higher hopes for the Seahawks, although Sunday’s loss was just embarrassing. Can we convince Marshawn to come back from retirement?

On Labor Day itself, we labored in the morning (isn’t that what the day is really for?), then played in the afternoon and evening, with rousing croquet matches, grilled chicken, and lots of family and fun.

At church this fall, I started teaching one of the adult Sunday School classes. My topic is “What Is The Gospel?”. It’s been a good study for me, and I trust God is using it in our church family’s lives to help us better understand what we may be mistaken about or take for granted, and be thus better able to share it with others. The simple outline is: God, man, Christ, response. 1. There is one God who created us all, and because He is the Creator, we are all accountable to Him. 2. We all, every one of us without exception, have rebelled against His rightful authority over us. 3. Instead of condemning us to death as we deserved, He sent His only Son, Jesus, to take the death that we deserved. Christ willingly came and died in our place, and God raised Him from the dead to prove His ultimate victory over sin and death. 4. When we respond in faith, trusting only in His death and resurrection for the payment for our sins, we are redeemed and saved from our sin, and allowed to spend eternity in heaven with Him instead of separated from Him forever in the eternal torment of hell.

Please pray that God will use that amazing truth to penetrate my own heart more and more, and to win souls to Himself through this class.

My son-in-law, Mat, celebrated his birthday on 9/12. Please pray for him and Kortney as they are preparing for their baby’s birth in mid-October, and Mat was recently laid off from his job. This seems to us like awful timing, but they are trusting in God’s sovereignty in their lives.

That’s all for now, so until October!

Oddly enough, all the rest of my pictures are of my adorable granddaughters. Who'd have guessed that?!?!