First Assembly of God, O'Fallon, MO

It was truly a pleasure to be with Pastor Aaron Bernabe, his family, and the congregation of First Assembly in O'Fallon, Missouri this past Sunday, October 2. We shared in music and drama in both morning and evening services.

Before you commit yourself to a fine institution of your choice, O'Fallon has been the topic of many of our blog entries and does have a close tie to Whole In One. I'm pretty sure you haven't lost it...yet. As of September 25, Todd and Angela assumed their new staff position at O'Fallon A/G in O'Fallon, Illinois....where, ironically, Gail and I served during the turn of the century, (Y2K...You know!) and it has been our church home when we're in the area without any other commitments.

Our services this past Sunday were across the great Mississippi, in Missouri. O'Fallon, MO is about 20 minutes west of the STL Airport (Lambert).

Whole In One has officially begun its new season. Gail and I have spent hours praying, practicing, and preparing music and drama for the two of us to continue fulfilling God's call and the mission of Whole In One. It was appropriate that our first solo WIO service was with Pastor Aaron. Pastor Aaron Bernabe has been a dear friend since college, and he has been instrumental in the development of Whole In One. Prior to his pastorate in O'Fallon, Pastor Aaron was the pastor in Correctionville, Iowa. His church in Iowa served as our "guinea pig" for ALL of our drama and music material. They had us back so often that we were constantly having to develop new material. While it was challenging, they had a great hand in the development of this ministry. Needless to say, there have been MANY 'firsts' with Pastor Aaron.

While this story from our service on Sunday may serve as my last blog entry as my wife may shoot me, I feel compelled to share it. If only there were pictures!! Gail and I adapted 'The Prayer Skit" that we used to do with Todd & Angela. Going from four people to two people requires some creative genius...so we kindly made the prayer skit into a clever infomercial of the "To Do's and Not To Do's" of prayer. One of the 'not to do' types of prayer that we highlight is the ever famous "sneak attack" prayer. Formerly, I approached Todd (who needed prayer) and very nicely told him that I could pray for him. I then proceed to pray at an ungodly volume and toss Todd like a rag doll.

Obviously, this would not work well with just Gail and I...so I told Gail to come up very sweetly, offer to pray, begin by 'spiritedly' saying, "Help him, Lord", stomp her foot and hit my forehead with a good stage hit.

Well...she did most of that...minus the GOOD stage hit. Needless to say, our faces were both priceless as she was too short to hit my forehead, but, rest assured, she got in a good whack !! She hit me just above the nose...and broke my unbreakable titanium framed glasses!! I may have losted a pair of glasses, but I gained a firm respect for her left hook!

Even after that crazy skit, one person made a first time commitment to Christ and many others responded for prayer. Thankfully, Gail was there to see that one hand go up in the back...I couldn't see that hand without my glasses! You'll be glad to know that we have plans to change our skit, but we pray many continue to respond to the Holy Spirit's tug on their heart in our services.

As of October 2, since January 2003, over 400 people have made first time commitments to Christ in our services...Praise the Lord! God is still in the life changing business! That is why we travel!! Blessings to you all!