I am so tired of...

Well I started thinking of that and here is what I am tired of... in no particular order... :-)

Election Ads - do they really think we believe them?
China's Air Quality - I am not running, biking, putting, throwing or any of that so why should I care. Try hanging around a bunch of 7th grade boys and then come talk to me about air quality.
SUV's - wah, boo hoo, so you bought a house to drive around and now you can't afford it...
Gas Prices - yep, it is 3.50something, still cheaper than in Europe, so we make adjustments.
Iraqi War - We won the war, now we are the police there. Yep everyone in that area despise us, so get over it.
Jamie Lynn Spears - I should care why?
Brittany Spears - see above.
High School Musical III - Shouldn't these kids have graduated by now? They are like Joe Bob in my class in Arkansas, body hair all over and still in the 8th grade.
California - So you hired an actor as governor and when he doesn't act like a governor you complain? You should have hired someone who played something other than the Terminator.
Illegal Immigrants - Aren't we all immigrants, I mean other than those who own all the casinos in Oklahoma. They should be the ones griping.
Lottery - I thought the lottery was to help out the educational needs of our state. Seems like our school budget has been cut so many times that no one must be buying a ticket.
Public Schools - that you have to pay to attend?
Michael Phelps - will he or won't he win 8 GOLD medals? The man is a porpoise masquerading as a human.
Alex Rodriguez - greatest baseball player NEVER to win a championship, and I don't really care if he is dating Madonna or not.
Madonna - see above.
Tour De France - if Lance isn't racing, I don't care.
Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi - she is from California, enough said.
Brett Favre - retired, not retired, retired, not retired, retired, not retired. Come on people, make a decision already!
Nascar - Hate the COT, need more bumping and grinding, how about some more racin'...
Tiger Woods - go ahead and shut down the PGA till he gets back... did anyone watch the British Open, now that was golf!

I am sure I can come up with some more, so let me think on it. For now... I am so tired of trying to come up with something else.

Doing things Halfway...

I don't like it when people do a halfway job. I was looking at projects yesterday and had the urge to do a halfway job in scoping these locations. I thought, "hey, it won't affect me" but then I thought of all the others it would affect. I thought about how that would tarnish my legacy and people would question me and my ethics. So I decided to do the right thing and finish the job right and not halfway.

As my picture depicts, doing things halfway is never a good thing. Imagine the thoughts that would swirl around all who would see my friend (at least he was my friend before I posted his pic!!) with his hair like that. What would they think? It might be something like, "dude, uhmmmm you missed a spot...hehehe" or it might be like "did the timer run out on the shaver and you didn't have another quarter to finish? hehehe" or maybe, "Hey man, don't drink and shave... hehehe"

But many of us leave things undone in our lives. Things that we never get around to fixing... things that we never get around to taking care of and it affects how people think of us. Sometimes our lives don't reflect that we are 100% commited to whatever our cause is because we leave things undone.

I will tell you, my friend did not like his hair cut halfway... he insisted that it get finished and I just have to say, I really appreciate that he finished the job!!

Honesty...

really is the best policy. My wife and I came clean with our church yesterday, first about our ministry and then about the finances.
Our Ministry is built on us being a team. Yep, we are indeed "one flesh" and we make home decisions, and church decisions together. Now we are not crazy where I call her about what I am going to have for lunch, but we do discuss major decisions together. I love her insight and discernment and her pushing... and I think she likes my logic and my thinking things through BEFORE we jump. We find that we complete each other in most ways but people have a hard time with that. I think it is a sterotype that "men" are the ministers and the "women" are the piano players and pretty arm hangerons... Wow how many ministers are missing out on a great blessing that GOD gave them by not allowing their wives to participate in ministry.
I am the head, the final authority in my home. But I do not "lord" it over my family, I love them like Christ loved the church and am willing to put aside my wants to see them blessed. The same is for the church as well. But when you don't really know, you would think that some strong willed women rule the roost when it is not really so. So we were honest and straighforward with our congregation in how we do ministry. Will some of them not get it? Perhaps, but at least they know.
Now the next thing was by far more hard. Finances, I hate preaching on them, looking at them or talking about them. But the church needed to know that we have been "bankrolling" the church for some time by not taking a full salary so that bills could be paid. Are we starving? No, GOD has provided through other means but we have sacrificed. And we brought that to the churches attention. I am sure some looked at it as a plea for money, others as a building up of oneself. I just wanted them to know that we are looking out for them and doing everything that we can do make this thing work. I figure if they want to talk about us, and face it, it does happen then they can talk about the good things that we are doing instead of the things that we are not. We are well above $10K in the money that the church has not paid us. Wow, what I could do with that kind of money, but I would not have it any other way. GOD knows and I believe that he will bless us with it at a later time when we really need it.
So in all things be open, honest, and transparent, it feels good!

Following Through....

How many times have you been around people who do not follow through. You know what I mean, they start something but never get it finished. I am a horrible follower througher (is there is such a word!!) myself. I always have about 10 projects going in one state of completeness or another.
So last Monday I resigned my job and I found I have to make a choice. Do I mail in the last two weeks, or do I follow through? Do I slump off all the work to the people who will be handling it when I leave now, or do I try to do as much as I can while I am here to finish strong?
I have decided to finish strong. I know that I am an asset to this company. I know that I will be missed, but this is my chance to secure my legacy at this place. They will never be able to say that I mailed it in the last two weeks. They will say that I gave when I had nothing to gain from it.
That is how I have decided I want to live my life. Giving when I have nothing to gain from it. So I have decided to finish strong...

Choices...

Do as I say, not as I do. How many times have I heard that? Isn't that just the stupidist thing you have ever heard.
We had a great class this evening on money management. And to apply what we learned is a wise thing, but we have to make the choice TO APPLY what we learned. That is the biggest problem we face today is making the RIGHT choice in life.
Face it, we are people who constantly will make the wrong choices when given the chance. We try to talk a good game, but when the decision is placed in front of us, we often do not make the wise choice.
I for one am going to make an effort to make wise choices. I was looking at some of the choices that I have made in life and some of them were not very good. It seemed I was looking not far enough ahead and was living in the moment. Well now I am going to look at things from an eternal perspective. So make wise choices that will impact eternity and I am sure you will do fine.

D O N E !!!

I quit my job yesterday. No, not the church job, but the job that pays the bills. I received a job offer from another company to do the same type of thing I am doing now at a better pay rate and benenfits. Sounds good right? It is all good except the people you leave behind.
I really thought my boss was going to have a stroke yesterday. I called him the night before and told him my decision. I meant to have a face to face meeting but he did not come in and I felt I needed to give him as much time as possible so I told him over the phone. The next morning he looked like he hadn't slept or ate since then. At lunch time he said he still had an upset stomach and refused to go eat. I realized then how much value I was to this company. One man I have worked with for 20 years refuses to talk to me. One gal called me a pot stirrer of feces material. One guy sarcastically said thanks for all the extra work. Some of these people I have known for almost half my life and the thought of leaving them is like loosing part of my family.
My emotions are running from sad, for those I am leaving behind, to excitement as I am embarking on a new jouney. It is going to be the longest two weeks of my life.

J U M P !!!

We went to the lake this weekend and found this old bluff down by Honey Creek. From the water's surface it looks to be about 15' from the top of the bluff to the water. But once you get on top and look down at the water it seems almost twice as high. So this weekend our young adults decided to jump off the bluff and the not so young adult decided to do it as well.
Now we had checked it out for submerged obstacles first to be safe and once all was deemed good it came to jump. Now I had jumped off of this same bluff over 20 years ago as a younger man with some friends so I went head first without hesitation. But we had some others who were a little more reluctant to jump.
What we found out is that once they did it their fear was quite a bit relieved and then they started to have fun doing it.
Life is that way, when we are standing on the edge looking at something new, looking at life from a different aspect, it is a bit scary. But once we commit and by faith take that plunge it is exhilerating and fun.
So next time you are faced with a scary proposition, think about it, weight the risk and then Jump!!

Say What?

What has happened to our great country? I heard on the news today that our banking federal chief is saying our economy is in trouble. The government has bailed out Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, our countries two largest mortgage brokers. We have car companies about to go under, budgets that are out of control, airlines that are charging you $5 for a pillow and making you pack one change of clothes for a weeks stay unless you want to pay for shipping on the SECOND suitcase you want to take with you. By the way I had my shipping guy run the numbers, a 25# suitcase can be shipped all over the continental US for like $12, and that is on UPS's plane. So why can't the people who carry my body take it for less if they are going that way, but I remiss...

I am so tired of American's looking for the government to step into every trial and tribulation in our life and bail us out. Yes we pay taxes, does that mean if we make a bad decision on a house that was too big for us and we could not afford that the government owes it to us to help us pay it off? Gas is over $4 a gallon , so park the HUMMER and take the Volkswagon. Food prices are rising... have you heard of a garden? And do we really need to eat as much as we do? I know that I don't... but lets not get into that... I realize that our county is the greatest thing going... but lets get real folks, they are there to govern our land, make available the pursuit of happiness and secure our freedoms, not fix up our land because of mining waste, not ENSURE that we are happy (remember it is a pursuit of happiness) and freedom doesn't necessarily mean that whatever we want to do is good for us.

So what will fix this great country? You! Doing your part... all 304,614,311 million of us...

I N T E G R I T Y

Integrity - Doing the right thing even when no one is watching.

All that we are is based on our integrity. If we don't have integrity we don't have anything.

But that definition, doing the right thing even when no one is watching is the key. You see there are people who in the public eye look like people of integrity, but behind closed doors you find out who they really are.

I was kind of tickled this week as the news ran reports about Jesse Jackson leaning over to tell someone on a TV set a comment about Barak Obama. Pretty much what was said was that Jesse doesn't like it when Barak talks down to black people, and it makes Jesse want to cut a significant part of Barak's body off. Wow, in case you did not know, Mr. Jackson puts REV. in front of his name.

What really concerned me was that I was not shocked, appalled, or even outraged, for you see, I never labeled Mr. Jackson a man of integrity even though he has a designation in front of his name that would lead you to believe he is. Numerous times situations have come up where his integrity was questioned and the answers were not always positive. I will let you web search those things, but onto my point.

If we are to be people of integrity, we need to do the right thing when no one is watching and say the right things even when we think the microphone is in the off position...

Be Blessed.

Revived...

Have you ever really thought what being "revived" means. Well I looked it up and most times it deals with something that had been dead!! Now how many of us would admit that we are dead? I mean, really admit we are dead? No way would we admit that we are dead, not in a million years. Can you imagine how that conversation would go?
man #1: So how are you doing?
man #2: Dude, I'm dead.
man #1: Yeah man I know what you mean.
man #2: No really I am dead.
man #1: Oh yeah, you mean really tired.
man#2: No, dead, D E A D dead.
man #1: But dude, you are still moving.
man #2: Yeah, still moving but still dead, my body has just not quit moving yet.
man #1: So what it going to happen with you?
man #2: I don't know, I guess I will just stop moving and cease to exist.
man #1: wow, what will we do with you then.
man#2: I don't know, I will be useless and won't be able to do anything. I guess they will just set me to the side and have someone else do my stuff.
man #1: well, we are going to miss you...
man #2: well thanks. I will miss you too.

Sound familiar? I seem to hear that conversation with people all the time. They may still be moving, but inside they are dead. So what do they need? They need to be REVIVED. Shocked back into existance, charge up the paddles and yell CLEAR! and zap them back to life. But many times people come to revival and don't get revived. Why? Because they don't go to the ER of GOD'S world and let GOD bring them back to life. If we are not willing to go to the Hospital or the Doctor, how can we expect to get better? So the next time you are dead, go get revived and let GOD zap you back to life!

Hey, watch this...

Those fateful words...last spoken by some moron who is going to do something to get themselves hurt. I have said it, numerous times. Getting cute with a firecracker and not throwing it quick enough, bouncing a rubber super ball off the ground and not getting out of the way fast enough when it bounced back up, riding no hands on a ten speed, downhill, with potholes in the road!!!

I remember one time when I was younger trying to impress the ladies at the swimming pool. We had a 3 meter board (9 feet) that I would do these great looking swan dives off of. So there are about 4 or 5 gals lounging by the swimming pool and I have been doing my best to splash them to get their attention but they were too far away. So me and my buddy start talking real loud, showing off our muscles, and we finally get their attention when I say, "Hey watch this great dive!!" Of course half the swimming pool at this point heard me and turned to watch the next Olympic hopeful perform some kind of great dive. So my plan was to do the run up as normal, leap as high as I could, spread my arms out like a swan and go in with no splash. Great plan huh? So I get a mighty run and about as I am to leap in the air my foot slips out from under me, I go paralell with the horizon and the upper half of my torso lands on the end of the board. Which proceeded to throw me straight up into the air still horizontal with the surface of the pool. Now remember the board is at 3 meters, and with the rebound off of the board I am around 5 meters (15 feet) now horizontally above the water. Well everyone who knows diving knows that you go into the water PERPENDICULAR, well I did not. My friend said when I hit the water horizontally it sounded like a thunder clap and the water displacement was significant at least. After I gained consciousness (I don't think I passed out but I wished I had) I came to the surface and made my way to the edge of the pool, OPPOSITE of where the girls were hoping that they did not see my display of ineptitude. As I pulled my reddened body (half from the impact of the water, remember I was 15 foot above the surface and the other half redened from embarassment) I realized that my hearing had been affected. That was until I realized the ringing in my ears was not from the dive, but from the laughter, the clapping and the people holding up 10 fingers making fun of me. I limped off to the locker room to compose myself and adress my injuries.

Back - repairable but bruised by the board...

Side - water bruised but no long lasting affects...

Head - intact...

Arms - intact...

Legs - intact...

Pride- .... totally destroyed.

It was at that time I remembered the sign at the bottom of the diving board. It said "slippery when wet, use caution...".

Why is it we ignore life's warning signs? If we would just listen and pay attention I think we would live a life without the pain that follows those fateful words. But many times pride clouds out judgement, it impares our vision and it causes pain. So the next time you begin to feel pride rise up, remember there is always pain that comes after the pride.

Changes...

I have been contemplating a change for a while. It is a hard choice to make as once it is made, I may never be the same again. It will probably affect the realationships I have with people, the way people will look at me, and the way I feel about myself. It is not an easy choice. I am constantly putting myself in that dream world of what it would be like. Questions like, "will I like it?" and "will everyone else approve?" swirl through my mind.

You see, I am thinking of shaving my head........ I saw a wad of hair in the shower this morning. I do not think it is mine, but it could be. There was a whole lot of it swirled around the drain. As I am continually exposing the dome on top of my shoulders, I am thinking of speeding it along and going for it. Today on MSN there was an article that bald guys are better looking than guys with hair... so that may just be the incentive I need to go for it!!

But change is so hard...

It is finished... those were the words of JESUS as he died on the cross. I felt like uttering those words the other day but not in the same attitude as CHRIST. I was just glad I was done!!
We finished the fireworks sale, got out some schooling on 4 hours of sleep, aced the test, got kids all picked up and off to where they were to go, preached a Sunday service, took my wife away, traveled some, shopped some, ate some and now back in the swing of things.

Sometimes it is good to finish something which goes totally against everything within me!!!

Say it ain't so...

So I love guitars, and I have always been a fan of great guitarist. And one of the best arguably was Jimmi Hendrix. I am not a big psyadelic guy, don't really wear tie dyed stuff, but I have heard some of his stuff. Know that he lived hard and died from a drug overdose far too young. But I don't want to talk about him, but about his guitar. See I have always loved that guitar's look. White on white, with a Maple neck. So simplistic, so elegant, so I decided I wanted one. have you checked how much guitars cost, so I decided to make one.

So I worked and worked and put one together with some parts I made and some part I purchased. Now I am not a guitar hack, I pretty much know what I am doing when building eletric guitars (this is my fourth) and I think I did pretty good. The one on the right is mine.

But what I found out is this, I can't play like Jimmi Hendrix. I don't even sound like him playing. I have the same looking guitar, even have the reversed headstock, the same color and shape but my playing sounds like me playing any other guitar even though I am playing a guitar styled after Jimmi's. Sometime we think if we act a certain way, or dress a certain way, or drive a certain car it will change who we are. When in reality we are all made differently, as David said, "formed in our mother's womb" to be who we are. To look like we look, talk like we talk and be who we are. So lets stop trying to be someone else, and be the best YOU that you can be.

Childish People...

What is it about fireworks that brings out the child in us? Is it the danger of playing with something that could injure us? Is it the loud noises? It is the fire?

It amazes me sometimes when we work the fireworks stand to see full grown people come in and get giddy about the prospects of fireworks. I delivered some to work the other day, and brought a freebie to the guy who bought a lot of fireworks. It was a 36 shot artillary set and he got this big grin on his face and giggled a little bit when I gave it to him. I thought it was the prospect of getting something free, but after thinking about it, I think it was the kid in him thinking, "Man, those are gonna be fun to blow up!!"

I wish that we would have that same attitude about other things in life. Things like GOD, Family, Fun... If we could get childish about some of these things... not in childish like, "Mine!! Mine!! Mine!!, but childish that we can see the wonder in all the things around us. The wonders of a sunset, a rain shower, or a rainbow that GOD created. The fun of running around in the yard, playing in the mud and sliding on the grass with the kids. The fun of jumping off the swings, the fun of blowing up fireworks, the fun of hanging with friends on a summer evening.

So be Childish sometimes, I think it is good for you...

Touch not GOD'S annointed...

I have heard this preached a thousand times, usually with that scripture of Elijah or Elisha being made fun of because he was bald, and he called a curse down on the children who were teasing him and a bunch of bears came out of the woods and mauled the kids. Don't mess with the preachers of GOD'S word!!!
I haven't really thought of that till this week, when I heard someone going off about their preacher. They were this and they were that and stupid too on top of it all as they bellowed out the list of failures that they had witnessed, as I overhead the conversation. I really thought that they were all insignificent things, but they were not to the "talker". I wonder if these people who talk out about the men and women of GOD realize the sacrifices and the work that they do? I truely believe that the men and women of GOD do not get the respect that they deserve. R E SP EC T!! And I do mean respect, love them or hate them, they are GOD'S people and because of their position should have our respect. I do not hear preachers sitting down with other preachers and telling every juicy morsel of rumor that they know about their congregation. I do hear them sitting down and getting advice on how they can minister to those that are hurting or those going through a trial though. Back in the old days, the minister was the respected, even revered ( I wonder if Reverend came from that?...) in the community that he ministered in. I do not know if it is a cultural shift or something else that make people feel that those in the ministry are fair game to criticize, condemn and converse about.
So the next time you want to talk about your Preacher, walk a mile in their shoes first. Here, I have mine off, you can borrow them IF YOU DARE!!! I have a feeling you won't make it out the door...

Wow... strong winds...

Well our annual fireworks stand is up and going and Saturday we had a doozy of a storm. I had just checked the weather to see what to wear for the day, and saw a huge storm cell heading our way. So I called my wife who was manning the tent and told her to batten down the hatches. So like, ten minutes later her distraught voice was calling me telling me the tent was blowing down and to get up there ASAP!! So when I arrived, both sides of the tent were flapping in the breeze, only the center poles were standing. When I got inside I found my wife and my associate pastor's wife holding the poles. They looked like two sailors in the midst of a storm who had lashed themselves to the mast to keep from getting blown overboard. We had tent stakes pulled up out of the ground, ropes that snapped and water everywhere. As the sideways rain came down, we finally were able to stabilize the tent and get everything locked down again. But we lost about half of our inventory to water damage and were soaked to the bone.

It taught me a lesson though, if you take the proper precautions to prepare anything to stand the tests and the storms of time, it will stand. But, if you build it shoddily, without thought and take shortcuts, it will all fall during the storm. Our tent was not put up very well, the poles were cracked and the ropes were rotted which translated into a tent that almost fell down during the storm. So if you are building anything, wether it be a career, a ministry, or a home, make sure you take the proper precautions and build it to withstand the storms of life.

Pass the dressing...

I read an interesting thought today from an atheist (a person who does not believe in a Supreme GOD) today about dress in the church. What was acceptable and not acceptable and I thought it interesting to hear a "outsider's" view on the subject.

If you ask believers about dress in church you will get everything from; "you must dress to please GOD in your "Sunday Best"", to; "GOD will accept me just as I am in whatever I happen to be wearing". And I do not believe that either of these statements are false. I believe that we do have in certain churches standards of dress that are usually set by the congregation and are relative to the social settings of that particular congregation.

Now to what my atheist friend said. He said that our dress for church many times falls into a catagory that we are trying to impress others than we are individually trying to impress GOD. In layman's terms, he said we were there to be seen, rather than there to see GOD. What an idea. So it got me thinking, what is our motivation in regards to our dress? Are we there to be seen or there to see GOD?

Da da da dum, dada da!! Da dada daaa da dada da da!!

Tonight, I will be Indiana Jones, my life will be filled with trapdoors, pungi sticks and traps that will inflict great harm upon me should I spring them. You see, I have made someone upset. Yep, she is mad at me. I left her hanging, did not help like she wanted and therefore I am about to enter into the world of Indiana Jones where there is peril around every corner.

Guys, communicate with your gals. Gals, let your guys know EXACTLY what you want as we are sometimes to much of the hunter gatherers that we get focused on one thing and can't read between the lines.

So as I head home I am checking the gear... Leather Fedora...check! Pistol....check! Bullwhip....check! Chocolates.....? I need to swing by the store and get my wife some chocolates so I don't have to go sleep in the snake pit tonight.

Cancel Church???

Are you kidding me? Sometimes that is the thought that runs through my head when I consider cancelling a church service. I have been conditioned that if the church doors are open, unless I am sick I am there. Sunday AM, PM and Wednesday nights are the times when GOD is open for business and how dare we choose to dismiss a service when he is waiting on our every word.

What?

I think sometimes we need to shake ourselves that the appointed meeting times for the church are just that appointed meeting times and not the "church" itself. Is that not what is happening with the church in America today, they say "Amen!" from the pew on Sunday and "Oh me!" at work on Monday. From Sunday saint, to Monday ain't, the church has gotten confused that we are with GOD whether we are in a sanctuary, sanitarium, or stadium, GOD has not moved. GOD is there with us every morning that we get up, until we go to bed at night. And I admit that Paul cautioned that we should not neglect the assembling together because togetherness builds up the body of Christ, but that does not mean that we have to set aside EVERY Sunday AM and PM and Wednesday nights as our GOD time. For if that is the case, we are a very shallow Christian indeed.

So there; I have cancelled a service, the one after fourth of July, the evening service, which is usually attended by the faithful few and the ones that are required to be there. So be cautious if you are standing near me for the next few days just in case GOD decides he needs to punish me for this blasphemy of historic proportions!!

Kung Foo Panda!! Yesterday we took a family outing and checked out Po and his latest movie. It wasn't great, but it was a good entertainment for an hour and a half. But I did learn something. Sometimes we put too much value in things that really do not mean anything. Not to ruin the story, but Po's father is a noodle soup maker who has a secret ingredient. And in the end Po finds out that his father's secret ingredient is "nothing". Too many times we are looking for the secret ingredient when in reality there is nothing more needed to make something special. We all feel if we loose weight, get more hair, have whiter teeth, drive a fancier car, live in a bigger house, have more money that we will be happy. Well in reality those are just things and are really not that important in the grand scheme of things. What is important is you, just as you are.

Well, I watched a documentery about some fliers who were POWs during WWII. One statement they made has really stuck with me was this. The hardest thing to do for an extended period of time is.... nothing. Huh? how many of us love to do nothing? I do!! I love to set around and do nothing and play guitar. Or set around and do nothing and watch TV. Or set around and do nothing and read a book. Oh, but that is really not doing nothing. Doing nothing, is doing nothing!! Have you ever tried to do nothing? You get really bored after a while and then need to find something to do.
So next time you have nothing to do, try doing it. Nothing I mean and see how long you make it.

Decisions, Decisions...

Man, as a comfort creature I despise change and when decisions have to be made to change things it is one of the hardest things I have to do. I am grappling with a change right now that will affect a large part of my life. I am barraged with the thoughts of success and failure. Is this a GOD thing or a me thing? Am I supposed to pursue or wait? Do I need to put another fleece out and this time ask that the ground be dry and only the fleece be wet? I feel like Gideon today, knowing GOD is steering me but really, really, really wanting him to boom from heaven the direction I am to go.
I know that GOD puts up with us untrusting souls like me and Gideon who need multiple "signs" so we can move on, but sometimes he wants us to just follow because he is leading.

Sometimes it is good to...

blow off some steam. Too many times we try to hold everything in. Pastors especially, we need to be seen as the rock, the pillar, the immovable object that when the storms of life blow we are not moved or swayed. But can I tell you, we are all human, with the same frailities of humanity and sometimes we get discouraged, and sometimes we get angry, and sometimes we withdraw, and sometimes we blow up. Yesterday I had a time of letting go, you know just giving in and venting. Luckily I have a group of individuals that are very good at looking past my faults and allowing me to just be normal. It felt good as I typed and typed and typed some more about the situations that have surrounded me. I felt a release of emotional pain as I recounted situations in my life that have cut me to the quik. Hopefully my rant will shed some light into some situations that I have kept hidden for too long, and hopefully I will be able to let them go and heal from the wounds inflicted upon me.

Weather...

Boy talk about extremes. We have nice hot days, and then wet rainy days where it looks like someone needs to start building an Ark!! With all the flooding in the midwest it is going to be an interesting summer. Which got me to thinking the other day. I was crossing a river and noticed these tree trunks and stuff floating down the river. All was good till I saw that farther down the river is a train tressle bridge with a good amount of debris pushed up against it. And of course I had a spiritual moment of interpretation. When we have debris flowing through our life, through the purification time there is a bunch. It is all good as it cleans and takes all the junk downstream and out of our spiritual house. But if we have some blockages in our spiritual house, all that junk can clog the move of GOD in our life and create a dam that blocks off the flow.
I know in my life sometimes my job can get in the way of the flow of GOD in my life. I start worrying about next week and next month and pretty soon I have a blockage and the river is not flowing like it should.
So get out there and tear down those blockages before the river of GOD tears them down for you.

Change, Change, Changes...

That was the name of a song way back in the day, "Changes". Change is a funny thing. It is happening all around us, just go look at your yard after a storm or your kids pictures. It is an integral part of nature; we have day and then it changes to night. We have summer and then it changes to fall, and then it changes to winter, and then it changes to spring, and then it changes back to summer all over again. Our bodies change, sometimes for the better, most times for the worse. Our outlook on life changes, we start as a teenagers thinking we know everything. Then we get older and realize that we don't know anything. As a young person our desires are to acquire things, and as we get older our outlook on life changes and we decide it is not more important to acquire things as it is to give things away. Change is all around us, inside of us and part of our makeup. So why is it so difficult for us to change?

1) Fear... We fear what we don't know. Think about it, you aren't really scared of the dark, you are scared of what MIGHT BE in the dark. The unknown is a scarey thing. It requires faith, it requires trust, and those are two things that we are very stingy with. Things that we know won't hurt us and are safe, while new things could be dangerous. But how will we ever know if we won't try? Remember when Henry Ford came out with the car? Everyone loved it, right? No, there were people who said that the car went too fast (30MPH!!) and that people would die if they started driving them. Horses were so much safer... yeah right!!

2) Comfortableness... if that is a word (it is now!!) We are creatures of comfort. We don't rock the boat unless the boat is filling up with water faster than we can bail it out. We like to be comfortable in our surroundings and with ourselves. Throw us into new surroundings that we haven't experienced and we are not sure we like it. Throw us into a new group of people that we have never been around and we are not comfortable. Think about when you went somewhere and people were speaking a language you did not understand. Did you feel comfortable? How about when they said something and they all laughed? Did you feel comfortable then? Absolutely not!! You just knew they were talking about you, and laughing at you... see we like to be comfortable. Change changes our surroundings, our friends, and our outlook on life.

3) Failure... we are all afraid to fail. I have heard that the greatest inventors of our time were failures many more times than they were ever successful. Think about this, Thomas Edison failed almost 2,000 times trying to make a light bulb work. But that one time it did work, Viola, there was light! You see, we are scared to fail just one time trying something new. The "way we have always did it" is a powerful suggestion to keep failure at bay. If our kids crashed their bike the first time they tried to ride and gave up, Scwinn, Mongoose, Huffy and all those other bike manufacturers would be out of a job. But we fell down, got up and tried again because we knew that we needed to ride to get somewhere. Many times we try a different approach because of failure and finally succeed in finding the right approach that is hugely successful. It is because of failure that we can grow, learn and succeed in life.

So next time you encounter change, embrace it, encourage it, and enjoy it, for you will most likely learn something and grow better for it because of it.

Anniversary Thoughts....

Well Wednesday was my 20th wedding aniversary. I noticed that my wife blogged about it. 20 years is a long time and we have great plans for this milestone. Together on a cruise or on a tropical beach, spending time together with the kids at grandma's or something. But it was not to be. Finances, work, schedules all get in the way of doing something like this. And that can take some of the lustre off of an event like this. But I think back of when we first got together, decided we wanted to get married, have kids, go into the ministry , revitalize a church, do a builing project, buy a house, and on and on it goes. What a journey it has been and I relish the thought of where the journey will take us.
So relish the journey as it is far more exciting than the destination.

I really like riding a motorcycle. The other day I was lucky enought to get to ride to work and to the hospital for visitation. I love the fact that when I am on my bike, I have time to think, ponder and wonder about life. You see, you have to ride with everything in sight and ready to react at a moment's notice or you will find yourself in trouble. You don't enter a corner without taking a look to see if there is loose gravel, you always are keeping an eye out behind you in case someone wants to run you over. You are watching for animals coming out of the bar ditches or turtles crossing the road. You pay attention to the wind; when and where the gust are liable to be that will try to blow you around. You watch the clouds and avoid those that are filled with rain. All your senses are engaged and your mind is processing every threat and every thing that comes within the area you are traveling.

I wish we would do this in our personal life all the time. I know that when I get in the "cage" (car to all of you non riders) my senses are turned off to an extent. I don't look for those things that could cause an accident as much as I do when I am on the bike. If a deer runs out in front of me; in the cage I have a better chance of wrecking the deer than the deer wrecking me. The "cage" is indeed safer, but also cuts you off from the surrounding world.

Sometimes church does that to us. It is safe being around people who think like you, act like you and talk like you. But it does not thrill the senses like it does when you are all out in the open and you notice every single detail of the people around you. How the talk, how they act, what they do and how they respond to situations in their life. So I would enourage you, saddle up your spiritual steed and start riding some new roads. You never know what you might encounter along the way.

Travel...

Well I have been on the road as Willy Nelson sings it and I've been everywhere like Johnny Cash. From New York to Ohio and all places in between I have been busy. I can tell you that traveling by plane is a pain today. Long lines when you send your baggage to the great warehouse in the sky, ling lines when you have to take off any metal object (belts included and for those of us that NEED a belt that is a compromising situation), keys, coins and even removing your shoes to go through the metal detector only to brush the sides and have to get frisked by the little old grey headed lady in a uniform. Then to have to show your ID to everyone and anyone who asks for it, flying has become an uncomfortable thing. But I think it is worth it to make sure that there is not someone smuggling something on board that could hurt someone. Making sure that people bent on evil will not get access to that plane.
I guess if taking off my shoes, belt and putting all my metal objects in a tray, having my ID out and ready means that I can fly without fear, it is worth it. And it is good to be home.

There was an article written on MSN about unknown indiginous tribes in the Amazon. There was also a picture taken from a plane or helicopter that showed some indiginous Amazon tribes aiming bows and arrows at said plane or copter. It really makes you understand just how big a world we live in. Can you imagine that in your backyard there is a group of people who have never seen a bic lighter, a ballpoint pen, or a screwdriver let alone a screw? Can you imagine a people who have never ate at McDonalds, hunt each day as they don't have a refridgerator?

At first glance we might think, man I am so lucky to live in the US, to have access to a computer, eat fast food and live in peace. Well I seriously had to rethink that when I saw that picture. To be cut off from the society that we live in and thrown back into a more "simple" culture, where cars, houses and bank accounts are not more important than family and friends. Where each person of the tribe has a specific duty to the tribe and they fulfill their duties with great devotion and attention. Where each member of the tribe is reliant on every other member for the wellness of the group. Where corruption of mind and soul is so afar off it is laughable. Sometimes I think that is what GOD is looking for in a people. Those who don't care for the things of this world but are more concerned with him, and his people.

Stand for something...

or you will fall for anything. That was an old country western song that I still remember from my youth. I have always said that there are only two types of music I don't particularly like, country and western but that song has always held a space in the grey matter between my ears. It's title rings true today, we need to stand for something, anything. Too many people I come into contact with are afraid to stand for something. What kind of life are we living if we are not willing to stand up for something we believe in. There is a dose of fear that goes with taking a stand, but if we allow that fear to keep us from standing up, then we really probably don't believe in what we say we believe anyway.
It takes courage to "take a stand". Courage is not the absense of fear, but overcoming our fear to accomplish what needs to be done. It takes moxie to "take a stand". Moxie is not arrogance, but the belief that what you are doing is needed and worth doing. It takes peristance to "take a stand". Things won't change overnight and persistance is the staying power to see it through until change occurs.
What the world needs now is not more people watching from the sidelines but people of courage, moxie and persistance to take a stand against the things of this world that need changed. We have enough spectators, will you be a participator?

Wow....

Have you noticed the natural disasters on the rise? Earthquakes, tornadoes, Tsunamis...
Have you noticed the countries wanting and itching to go to war? Someone said today that the war in Iraq is the longest on going war in history...
Have you noticed the disease and famine that is ravaging parts of the world?

I am not a doomsday person, I am not a rain down hell fire and brimstone prophet, but I do know that in the last days the Word says that the earth will go through labor pains as a woman about to give birth before the son of GOD parts the Eastern sky.

$5 Gas???

Huh? $5 for a gallon of gas? Can this possibly be true, well guess what Americans, it is and it may get worse. Now I don't want to be all gloom and doom on you but we brought this on ourselves. You see, we love excess!! Hey, if two is good, then three must be better and four is GREAT!!
Take a look at our roadways today and what do you see? Most of the time large vehicles, SUV's, Hummers, large bulky vehicles that we can carry a lot of people or a lot of stuff in... for you see we like our stuff and our stuff is making gas prices rise.
So a few months ago when gas prices really started to rise, I started to look into options that would increase my gas mileage. Hypermilers http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18923454/ was something that I really loved. These guys take ordinary cars and work on them and do things to them to increase their milage to excessive amounts. They block off any holes in the body that would increase drag so they will slip through the air better. They take off anything that will increase drag, mirrors, spoliers, and even attennas so they will not have to push any extra air. They inflate their tires to the maximum to increase roll, they do special things to their bearings to increase roll. But most off all they change their driving habits, no jack rabbit starts, keeping the RPM's down, drafting behind other cars, getting rid of the junk in the trunk (take that anyway you want) that adds to the weight of our vehicle, and no hard braking, in the world of hypermilers, coasting is your friend!!
So I was thinking of this the other day (and yes I have gained about 2 miles per gallon!!) and started to think how we can apply this to our Christian life. You see to improve (and that is what CHRIST calls us to do) we need to work on certain things. Taking off the things that drag (get it?) us down and make our lives easier to cut through (get it?) the trials of this life. We need to make sure that we are operating as efficiently as possible, maintainence is important and we need to make sure that we are spiritual tires are filled up (get it?) and that we have lubricated our spirit regularly (get it?). And we need to make some changes in our habits as well, not get too excited that we blow off the line (get it?), don't use excessive braking when GOD is moving us along and keeping our RPM's in check (get it?). Get rid of that excess stuff that you carry around for no good reason, offenses, greivances and such that may not even apply today is like carrying around a jack that doesn't work, it is useless and cost you.
I really believe that we can learn a whole lot from those things around us, if we will just look for the application. Gotta go weld up my hood opening and cut off my rearview mirrors, as I just can't abide $5 gas...

Knee pain...

Wow, well I went to the doctor today and I might have damaged some cartiledge in my knee. It has been swelling up, which the doctor said was a good thing as it protects and lubricates the cartiledge which keeps bone from rubbing on bone. So he gave me a cortizone shot in my knee. That was a lot of fun!! 3" needle injected right into my knee joint...
The doc presecribed an MRI to really see what is going on and possibly surgury to correct it.
Now I am thinking this is like shadetree mechanics, keep putting parts on till it corrects the problem instead of really diagnosing the problem and taking care of it. If the MRI comes back good, then it is rest and relaxation till it heals up. But if the MRI comes back bad, it is to surgury. So why don't we just do the rest and relax for a week or two and see if it gets better and skip the MRI till we know that or not.
I mean, I have insurance but it is going to cost me $2500.00 for an MRI out of my pocket. And I was wanting to take the kids to see Narnia Prince Caspian this weekend. Well I made a decision, Narnia it is. I am taking responsibility for my own good, and putting off a $2500 bill as long as I can. I mean the knee can't get worse....
So sometimes, step back, evaluate the situation and make a good decision...

Ghost in the Machine...

Well last night was the first in a series that I stole the title from Mark Banderson on called "The Ghost in the Machine". Centered on the Holy Spirit I believe that it is going to be real good.
We went over the introduction of Pentecost, Biblical references for it from the Old Testament, to the New Testament, to the Epistles.
But what really got me was that we had almost everyone in the room raise their hand and proclaim that they had been filled. But then GOD dropped a new thought into my head.
How many have ever filled their car with gas? I mean filled it all the way to the top?
When I was much younger, I remember a friend and me wanting to go to Joplin on the day before payday, so we scraped together $2.59 to buy gas. It filled my car up to a quater tank (yes gas was cheap!!) and we went and ran around all night. Well that car very rarely ever got a tank full of gas. $5 here, $3 there but not very often did it get full. We were at the service station every couple of days, but there was not much of that Petrol that got into the tank. I remeber one time buying a Big Gulp, a huge bag of M&Ms, a bag of Funyuns, and some gas. I paid with a $10 bill if that tells you how much gas I put in. My car may not have been full but I was!!
So anyway, I ask how many had been refilled that day, not one hand went up. A couple had been filled the day before, I am sure they had a finals test or something and needed all the help they could get. But the point got across, we need to be filled to the top continually, not just get a couple of bucks worth to get us through the week, but filled to capacity with the Holy Spirit.
So next time you are at the serving station, get the full service and fill'r up!!

Blockage?

I mentioned my trials at work lately, we have been having internet problems for a while now. Well I think I have a handle on it, we have too much information coming in and our bandwidth is not big enough to handle the traffic. Imagine a big city at rush hour, that is what is happening, everything is crawling to a slow stop.
I started thinking about this in relation to our spiritual being. Sometimes we can have so much of the world coming into our lives that we end up slowing down or blocking the spirit from coming and giving us direction and insight. Kind of like a ambulance on a busy freeway, bumper to bumper traffic, it doesn't matter if you have lights and siren blarring you aren't getting through. So do a constant check on your spiritual traffic lines, make sure they are clear of the world's influence so when that emergency call comes down from heaven it doesn't get stuck in traffic and can't get through.

Purpose Driven???

I just finished Rick Warren's purpose driven church. Inside I found plenty of insights to the growth of their church in the LA area as well as plenty of how tos and don't dos. But the whole while I was reading this something kept nawing at me. Is church all about growth or is about something more. We look at churches and automatically classify them as a success or failure by their attendence numbers. Come on, we all do it. "So how is the church?" "Whatcha running?" and on and on. When you hear of a church having two or three services your first thought is, "wow, they got it going on..." and success is assumed. Well I got to thinking about that, we could go to four services this week, have a Saturday night service, and then do a 8:30AM, a 10:00AM, and an 11:30 AM for those late sleepers, and we will be successful, right? Well I can see we would have a few younger adults there for the Saturday night service as they hang out anyway on Saturday night and they would not have to get up Sunday. And the early AM service, well the lake people would love that, get out early enough to be on the water by noon. And the other two services would be filled with the not so early risers and the ones who want the traditional meeting time when GOD goes to church. So we go to our next big Pastors conference and when they say, how is the church, we can say, "Man it is crazy, we have gone to four services!!" and the people will look at us and go, "you got it going on..." when really we haven't done squat...

So what is success? Was JESUS successful? In the light of today, he had 12 members, no permanent meeting place, and the other church down the road hated his guts. Of his 12 members, lets see, he had a hothead, a couple of dirty ole fisherman who were unemployed, a tax collector who has no friends and had recently quit his job, and some other ragamuffins. Of the twelve that he had, one ran away and hid after denying him three times, the other 10 hid away in town afraid for their lives and one sold him out for 30 pieces of silver and went and commited suicide. Yep, that was successful!!

So I think when qualifying success in church, you have to look at two things. First, are the people growing their relationship with GOD. And second, is the leader replicating himself. Well in JESUS' church the first is answered with a yes. They were all growing in faith and wisdom in the things of GOD. And to answer the second question, JESUS groomed 11 men to continue on the ministry he started. And the one that fell away, well even after death JESUS commisioned another to take that one's place to fulfill the 12. So when looking at success and failure in the church, we need to take a different look at how we define success and failure.

Got the RIGHT plug in?

I have been fighting at work with computer network issues. I am by default the computuer guru here, not because I have extensive training, but because my brother is an IT guy. You know, they assume since my brother knows about computers, that somehow it is embedded in my DNA that I will know that stuff too! I know just enough to be dangerous, but because I know that "just enough" I am the man here. So when things associated with computers start to go bad, I am the one they call.
Well our network while not as sophisticated as some is pretty expansive, from computer to computer communications, to internet to e-mail we are pretty dependent on our network to keep us all connected.
I started thinking about that is how it is with the church. Sometimes it is hard to keep everyone connected!! Sometimes the plug gets pulled inadvertantly, sometimes on purpose. Sometimes the wires get messed up, and sometimes the hardware is not set correctly. It takes a lot of running, trying and messing with parts to get it all working right. The church is the same way, it sometimes runs all right by itself, and at other times needs someone to run around and try to keep it running efficiently.
So if you are having problems, first, make sure you are connected. If you have cut yourself (or unplugged as the case might be) with others, then you are the one that needs to fix that issue.
If you are having problems communicating, then take some time to diagnose the problem and then go about getting it fixed. And if you are having hardware problems, then it might be time to upgrade your relationship or your position in Christ so you can get on the same web page as him... happy surfing...

Oooops...

Ever have one of those days where nothing goes right? When everywhere you turn and everything you touch just falls apart? Some days it just doesn't pay to get out of bed. But the blessing is that tomorrow is a new day. The problems of yesterday sometimes affect our tomorrow, but in many situations we are the ones that drag our yesterday's problems into today.
So when you are starting your day, make a decision to cut those ties of yesterday that will drag down today, for today is a new day!!

Mistakes...

As many of you might know, I like to build guitars. Not fancy acoustic models, but solid body electric guitars. You see I am too cheap to buy new ones, so I started buying used ones and refinishing them. But then it got to expensive to buy used ones so I started buying parts and putting my own together. I did a bass for my daughter, and made a telecaster for myself and my other daughter, and I am in the middle of Stratocaster for myself.
What I am finding in finishing these guitars is that any mistake you make is amplified in the finish. Bump it with your watch and put a small scratch on the wood, yep it will show through on the finish. Sand it uneven and it will show up when you put your shiney finish on it. It is painstaking work, sand on and sand off, paint and primer and sand some more. And then when you go to put everything together you have to be real careful with the screwdriver, and the soldering iron or you can mess things up pretty good. What is frustrating is even if you get that guitar perfect, in the course of playing it, you sometimes ding it and all your effort for a perfect instrument are thrown out the window. I even had one that broke a string and the string whipped the face of the guitar and made a mark. So why put all the effort into making it perfect from the start. Well I think it comes to the "creation" gene in us.
That is the same gene that GOD has. He created us perfect but sin came in and damaged his perfect creation. So GOD provided a way to cover our imperfections with his son JESUS. Now when I look at a guitar that has been played a lot, and has all sorts of nicks and dings on it, I see character instead of blemishes. I think GOD looks at us the same way, he sees our character over our blemishes. So next time you are being dented and dinged in the course of life, remember that GOD still covers our flaws, but the world is able to see all of our character.

The mind is willing...

but the body is not. Well that is not true, actually the body tries, but with limited success. Let me set the stage for you... I was an athlete... baseball, basketball, football, any and all sports I loved to play. While in Jr. High and High School I was good at academics but I loved sports. I would drag myself out of bed on test days, but on game days I was ready to go. All day long my mind would drift to game time, readying myself for the competition. After school was over I went onto college and played pickup basketball games at college and around town. Then it was onto softball, in church leauges and industrial leauges. I have stayed active throughout my life until I started Pastoring. Then time got tight and the sports had to be cut out as church time adn family time were more important to me. So it has been at least 5 years since I have been in a competitive enviroment. Of course I have played on some summer softball teams during tournaments, told myself I was not going to slide but when faced with scoring the go ahead run found myself belly flopping into home plate but the tremors were felt a county away. Was part of a church leauge softball team a few years ago, pitched our team and got plantar fasciatis (bottom of the foot tendon problems) that took six months to go away. But I was still an athlete!! I played basketball and softball with my kids and was still athletic but last Sunday something happened.
We went bowling as a family. I of course was going to kill everyone at the alley as first I could have been a good bowler if I applied myself. I am an athlete remember? I can roll a 150 in my sleep and have gone as high as 190 without practice... so it is me, my wife, and my four kids. The game started off well, spare off the bat, and I am cruising through the first five frames with two spares and a strike, probably on my way to at least a 150 and I am just warming up. Then it happened. Going to throw my ball down the lane I looked like a pro, four steps forward, ball goes back, bend over left leg sweeps behind the right as I throw my perfect hook for a strike when, SNAP, I feel something in my right leg pop. The ball ended up in the gutter and I limped back to the ball return. My wife laughed at me and I told them I think I hurt myself. Well I am an athlete so I can play through pain. I retrieve my ball, take my stance and proceed down and I can't bend my knee to follow through without it feeling like someone was sawing on it. Five pins as I did not get down low enough. I gutted out the remaining frames and decided I was done for the day. The knee felt like it could lock up and I was having pain on the inside of the knee. I have never really injured my knee before so I am thinking what is wrong. We get back home and it is so stiff that I put some ice on it. Sitting at work on Monday, it is getting so stiff that it takes effort to bend it back straight. And last night it looks like it is swollen. So what happened?
Age happened... I am not 20 any more, or 25, 30, or 35 for that matter. I am 40 and things I used to be able to do I find myself not being able to do it anymore... When did I get old? What happenend to me? How did this happen?
Well my friend, it happens to all of us. It is part of our design that we begin to break down until eventually these earthen vessels cease to work. I am now faced with my own mortality and it is a sobering throught. So as I lumber into the sunset, limping as I go, remember to enjoy the things in life to their fullest, you never know when you might blow out a knee...

Wow what a busy day... not only did we have people in our church have a new baby, (it's a girl) we had others in the hospital getting test run at the ER. When it rains it pours sometimes, you know.
But through it all I know that GOD is in control. Sometimes we may wonder if he has fallen asleep at the wheel. With things like the cyclone in Mrynamar, the earthquake in China, tornadoes in Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri. But even through it all, GOD is still in control. Many people ask me if GOD is a god of love, then why does he allow all these things to take place? Well I love my kids, I love them so much that I would probably give my life for them, but yet bad things happen to them. My oldest still reminds me of the time I put alcohol (thats what they said to use in boy scouts) on a bike wreck cut she received. My second youngest broke her ankle one day in a softball game and I had to drive her to the hospital as she cried in the backseat. My third child once smashed his finger in a window, and my youngest, well he hasn't hurt himself really bad yet (for we know it is coming). So my point is, do I not love my kids because I allow them to get hurt? No! I love them through their hurt, and we can say the same about GOD. GOD had an utopia, the garden of Eden, and sin came in and ruined that, but GOD also made a way for us to escape the trials of this life, through the sacrifice of his son. So GOD has made provision for us, even in the midst of the storm...

What's really important...

Sometimes we need to set down and think what is really important in our lives. With this weekend's wild weather, power outages, and new arrivals the first of the week it really makes you think about what is important.
Lets start with Saturday, it was a lazy day around our house. Sleep in, since we did not have anything pressing like the previous twelve Saturdays. Got to play with the kids, babysat a one year old for some friends, made brunch for the boys (thats what you call it at 11:00AM), stripped and refinished a guitar body while the owner was out of town, got to go to a guitar shop while they were making $5,000 guitars and pretty much had a lazy day till 5:35 PM while I was setting down watching a little TV when the power went out. Dinner plans had to change as I heard the fire department wail off to the north. As information came in we came to realize that 6 miles north a tornado had tore down some power lines and had impacted a house or two. At that point, the important things start to weigh on you. Not stuff like, I can't watch the end of the game, or I can't turn on lights, or make dinner. No the important parts like, is everyone OK? You see I have people that live up that way, so in trying to run them down and find out if they are OK (and they were!!) you then begin to find out that the storm it is impacting a whole lot more than you initially realized. We knew others who lived in the path of the storm, some who had family that had not been heard from, and others that we were not sure about. And at that point in time you begin to see what is really important...
... as I got to work today, the cars in the parking lot look like someone had taken a hammer and were swatting flies all over them, the ground is pock marked like some monsters where playing golf in the front yard, and the storm wreckage was strewn all over the place in the aftermath of the storm along the road to work.
But...
Even though our power was off for 24 hours, church services were cancelled, and our weekend was not what it was planned to be, the important things in life were brought to the forefront.

And this morning on May the 12th, just after 7:00, at the same place where the injured were treated this weekend following the raging storm, new life was brought into this world. I watched in awe as a new little person was taking her first breathes, opening her eyes and squeezing hands for the first time and realized this, life is precious and is the most important thing.
Buildings can be rebuilt, cars can have dents removed, but the lives of people is something that can not easily be fixed or replaced. So today think about the things that are really important...

Makin' Music...

Have you ever thought what goes into making music? It is a bunch of different instruments all playing at different times playing different things with different notes and yet most times it comes out sounding great. Now I would like to challange you on this to think about these three settings. First, take any large city orchestra, strings, percussion, brass, woodwinds, and all the ther things I don't want to type, put some music in front of them and let the conductor direct and they sound great. Second, take all those people out but leave the instruments, what does it sound like? Well it sounds like nothing because it is the people making the sounds. Thirdly, take a whole new group of people off the street and go plop them into the same seats the original people were setting in, place the instruments in their hands, and get the same conductor and have him start directing them. Will it sound the same? I think not Sherlock!! It probably sounds more like the slaughter house at the local butcher shop than a ochestra concert. So what happened?
The chairs are the same, the instruments are the same, the conductor is the same, the location is the same, so then how did one setting produce beautiful music, the other setting no music and the third setting a horrific amount of noise. It is the people... the people are what makes the difference. If you have well trained people, a conductor can get up and direct and the results are beautiful. But if you have no people, you can do all the conducting that you want, but you are not going to make any sound. And if you have untrained people, well, yeah...
So if you want to make beautiful music, train your people in the skills that they need, if you want to make no music then run everyone off so you don't have to deal with them but you are going to be the idiot up there conductiung a bunch of chairs, and if you want to make bad music, then just throw an instrument on someone and tell them to play, but don't gripe when they play the wrong notes, the wrong tune and don't take your direction, they don't know any better.

Power failure...

Over the last few days we have had a lot or storms roll through our neck of the woods. One thing about living where we live, strong storms means that we are probably going to loose our electricity for a few hours. I notice that when I am sleeping and we don't have electricity it really doesn't bother me. But when I am up trying to get stuff done, having no light, no power tools, no computer or TV really does make it difficult to work.
It is kind of that way with GOD, when we are sleepwalking through this life, we really don't need his power, his direction or his annointing and we probably don't really miss it much. But when we come to a roadblock in life, and we need the power of GOD to get through it and it is not there, then we realize the shape we are in.
So my question today is, have you checked in with your power supply today?

It is all in your persepctive...

I got to thinking about a situtation I saw yesterday and something very similiar happened to me almost the same as this poor guy. I saw this guy on a motorcycle almost get wiped out by this old man driving a beat up old truck. He made a right turn on red right in front of the guy on the motorcycle making the motorcyclist stop and wait for him to pull out in front of him. What was strange was there was a policeman right behind the old man. I was ready for the lights to go on, and someone to at least get a warning about trying to run someone over. Well, guess what no lights, no warning the old man just drove off like nothing happened.
Well I had a similiar experience, but mine was an old lady, and she was at a stop sign and I had the clear right away but as I approached the intersection I saw her look at me and then to the right, and then back at me and then to the right and then I saw her start to ease out into my path of travel. Luckily I was only doing 25 MPH and my motorcycle has good breaks!! So I get it stopped and as she was inching out into the intersection into my lane of travel I honk my horn at her. Now I am sitting still about 5 feet from her window when I honked. She swiveled her head around and look somewhat surprised when she saw me. At that point I thought, "OK she has seen me know and has seen the error of her ways". Nope! She rolls down her window, (yes still sitting in my lane and half into the other lane) and snaps at me, "you need to slow down!!!". I was sitting there mouth agape, thinking "what?" as she rolls up her window and proceeds to almost hit the truck coming the other way. He stops and honks at her and she then proceeds to tell him he is number one with her middle finger. This lady (I use the term loosely) was like cutting people off and driving like a maniac. But then I began to think from her end. She was almost hit by a big biker guy wearing leathers who honked and looked menacingly at her. And then some Redneck in a pick up truck tried to rear end her while she was on her way to get her hair done. "What a day", I am sure she told her hairdresser, as she recounted her harrowing journey to get her weekly perm.
That just goes to show you that sometimes life is all a matter of perspective. It comes down to how you react to situations in life and how you see things. So next time you get almost runned over, think what the other person is thinking before you kick their mirror off their car.

Busy, Busy, Busy...

In the movie "Clockstoppers" a young man whose father is a mathmatical genius ends up with a watch that can allow him to speed up so fast that it seems time is standing still. Well the premise is that time is standing still, but in reality he has sped up so fast that it seems as if time has stopped. Sometimes I feel that I am in the exact opposite space time continuem. It seems that when I look up, that hours instead of minutes has flown by except those times when I am wanting the clock to speed up, like between the hours of 4 and 5 PM on Monday through Friday, like when you have to go to the dentist or get a physical when you reach that magical age of 40 and the doctor tells you, "you might feel a little discomfort" as he snaps the rubber glove on.... In those times, time does not defininately fly...
Sometimes we get so busy in life that we don't have time for the important things in life. Like spending time with friends and family, doing our outlet hobbies, going fishing or hunting or spending time with the creator of the universe. Can you imagine GOD'S disappointment when he is waiting for his time with us and we decide we have something more important to do?
So take some time and spend it with the only one who can control time and space, you never know, you might find that your time is managed better all day long...

Pastor Pat

Weekend Warriors...

Wow, this weekend went fast, I guess that happens when you have school all day on Saturday (well just 5 hours but it is a 1.5 hour drive to get there) and then Church on Sunday. It seems like it flew by. I wonder if that is how eternity will be? We will look up and 100o years has past. We got to talking a little about eternity in our class when one of our classmates started talking about the finer things in life. Nice houses, nice cars, nice vacations, well all of those things are for just a moment in time. Solomon said our lives are as a vapor, wow, now that is fast! Think about those cold winter days when you are outside and let out a deep breath. Remember how you could see your breath for a moment and then it was gone? But in comparison to eternity that is how our lives really are. So the question I pose this Monday morning, is with life so short, why are you sitting there reading about my weekend and not out living yours? He he he he... go do something today!!

Pastor Pat

In the master's hands...

Have you ever tried to replicate something. Hopefully I have uploaded an image of a guitar. It is a guitar that I built with some parts and hand crafting some other pieces. It was my attempt at duplicating a 50 year old guitar. So many intricate details to duplicate and yet even though I had the original at hand to compare to, it just did not come out exactly the same. To the naked untrained eye, it might look the same but to someone who is trained and schooled in guitars, it is different as night and day.

Have you ever tried to duplicate something that someone else does. Wether it be in work, play or even preaching? Sometimes we are best off doing a new thing, something that has never been done than trying to duplicate something else.

So next time you are tempted to do something that has already been done, try something new. You might be surprised at the outcome.

When it rains...

it pours sometimes. Wow, I have had some challanges lately. First off my leadership was questioned by someone who I always thought would always be there right behind me. Imagine my surprise when I find that they were not as solid as I thought they were. Secondly, my mom is diagnosed with cancer, treatable but cancer none the less. And then thirdly, my company is struggling and I just found out that one of my longterm customers fired us. At least he had the decency to let me know that he was not happy with the company (at least he was OK with me personally) but that we needed to shore things up to continue to do business with them.

It is very much like a storm, wind, rain, hail, all beat against the structure and sometimes inflict damage. But most times it just messes things up enough to get our attention. I think GOD does that sometimes with us. He allows situtations in our lives that "get our attention" and get our focus back on him.

I had to refocuse my leadership, am I am man pleaser or a GOD pleaser?Am I going to follow GOD or my own rational thoughts? I am glad to say that that someone has since come to an understanding and is once again backing me up and for that I am thankful, but those doubts still remain. My mom, well she is being well taken care of by a doctor who is doing tons of test to make sure that they do the right thing, so much better than the other doctor who was lets cut things up and ask questions later. I know it is making me think of the more important things in life, as it is my mom as well. And the company, well, who is my source? Is it my job or is it GOD? If it is my job, then I should be in a world of hurt as that customer accounted for a large portion of my $$ last year and the year before. But if it is GOD, then I know that he will supply all my needs (not all my wants as some will preach it!) but all my needs. He knows what I need and he knows what is best for me and the way that he will have me go, so for now I am leaning on his arms and trusting in his ways in all things...