Well, the formal riding season in the northeast is coming to a close.  Not due to the desire to ride but the cold weather and snow usually put a damper on the enthusiasm to ride.  NorthPointe Fellowship Riders became an affiliate in June 2009.  Since our affiliation, we have created the NorthPointe Fellowship Riders logo (inset) and banner that we have used at a variety of events.  This year our organized riding season actually started in late April with our first "Bible and Bike Night" on April 23rd, 2009.  "Bible and Bike Night" was organized by our NorthPointe Community Church Pastor and fellow rider, Randy Johnson.  His concept of "Bible and Bike Night" was to meet at the local community park for a short devotional and then take a ride, for an hour or two, until dark.  Bible and Bike Night was a success.  We had a core group of between 5-7 riders that met every Thursday evening throughout the summer with our last Bible and Bike Night on September 24th, 2009.  We had occasional riders that joined us on any given night.  Bible and Bike Night was a fair weather event so we did not ride every week since the rain fall this summer was considerable in our area.  A, more unique aspect, of Bible and Bike Night was established by our first ride and the destination of that ride.  Our first ride took us to Longacre's Dairy Farm for an ice cream cone or coffee since it was a cool night.  This established a trend for Bible and Bike Nights and since then the group has visited many of the ice cream serving establishments in the surrounding counties.  Next year we may have to rename it to "Bible, Bike & Ice Cream Night".  We only broke the tradition with our final ride where we rode to a Chinese restaurant for a buffet dinner.  Yes, they did have ice cream! 

Our organized rides for this season began in early May when NPFRs joined the Penn-Jersey Fellowship Riders for a combined ride through scenic Lancaster County, PA on May 2nd, 2009.  Our final organized ride this year to Jim Thorpe PA was delayed to next year due to heavy rain.  However, several of us took the opportunity of a beautiful mid-week day the following week and rode to Poconos of Pennsylvania to see the leaves changing as autumn arrived in the town of Jim Thorpe on October 21st, 2009.  Along with our planned rides this year NPFRs participated in several events where we set up our ez-up tents, banner and tables to share our message of Christ, enjoyment of motorcycles and the Fellowship Riders.  These included Gilbertsville Bike Night and Limerick Community Days.  Limerick Community Days was coordinated with other ministries from our church where the church presented "NorthLand" as an outreach to the community.  "NorthLand" included seven large inflatable rides, a trackless fire truck train, children's music, balloon animals, a prayer tent and the NPFRs tent for all to enjoy.  Several of our members provided their bikes for people to sit on and have their pictures taken.  Our NPFRs team then printed the pictures real time and distributed them to our visitors.  In all we took and distributed about 160 pictures.  In addition, NorthPointe Community Church sponsored Michael King of Kingdom Stunt Riders to participate in Limerick Community Days. He performed his motorcycle stunt show and shared his testimony.  It is amazing what one person, powered by God, can do on a 600 cc sport bike!

All around a good riding season for our NPFRs.  We are looking forward to getting together during the colder months to fellowship and organize next year's events.  We will get an early start next year with our first ride on, January 1st, 2010, to Black Rock Dam and Boat Launch.  Provided there is no snow on the roads we will ride to watch the New Year's Day water skiers on the river!  I thought we were crazy!

Rob Wentz

NorthPointe Fellowship Riders

rawentz@comcast.net