There Goes the Neighborhood!

Tonight on the way to worship practice I noticed a disturbing thing/event in the neighborhood of the church. We are not in the nicest part of town. It got me thinking about our church location in a new light. I have always disliked (OK hated) the location of the church. It is in a flood plain, landlocked on a corner with a creek diagonal behind it. It is not on a hill top, or highway, or in a visible place at all!

But, instead of complain, we need to get busy praying for our neighbors. Let's start praying for the business neighbors and the residential neighbors. We need God to do some things that we could never force into existence.

I always encourage you to pray for your neighbors and be a witness to them. Let's start praying seriously for the Church's neighbors too!

Kids in School

The second week is about half over and things are going well for us with our first school experience. I can see now that the routine of homework is going to be tough to get into. The kids are whipped (that means exhausted, I am not the old woman in the shoe) when they get home. So, sitting down for home work, and 20 minutes of required reading per day, per child, is tough to get in with two boys.

Gabe will not play by the rules. He is writing his numbers in his homework, and will not draw the number like it is supposed to look. When we correct him, or even gently show him an error, he says, "I want to draw it like this." Actually, I think he is trying to get us to believe that he meant to make the drawing mistake, when he really did not. He gets discouraged fast and so a lot of encouragement needs to go with the correction so he won't give up or fight us.

An that was only the first 8 minutes of homework in his life!

The Story of the Saints

I am excited about tonight's lesson in the "Story of the Saints" series. We did not finish last week's lesson because we took time to answer questions in the middle of the message. I love, and I mean it, love teaching when people are asking questions. Sometimes I don't know the answer, but it makes for great learning when you get to learn specifically, what you don't know.

Tonight we will look at some of the cultural, political, and religious factors that led to the Reformation. We will be looking at Western Church history from 1300 to 1450 AD. There are lessons for us to learn form this period that effect us today.

Weekend Rewind

Sunday was a day of attacks from the Devil!!! I can't even tell you about them all, it would take too long. In the end, God is so good, he worked through them all!

We had all these things planned out just right, and most of them worked. Just a lot of little kinks that made me crazy, and made it hard to share the message as clear as I imagined it before hand.

Here is the good news. First, people worshiped like Jesus was standing next to them. Even when I, or other musicians make mistakes, the worship is not about the music, but the hearts of the worshipers. Second, the message was bumpy in its presentation, but many people were affected by it deeply. I received many comments. Third, the attendance was 147, and that is good.

Crazy

Last week was one crazy week. We hung doors, sprinted to get more door hangers printed. Prepared for a memorial service. Prepared for the September calender to go out. And last, made a trip to Branson for two days to go to a Christian Education planning meeting for the District.

Last week turned out to be a good week, for the boys at school. However, it turned out to be a bad blog week. I have not checked Face Book for over a week either. Whew! Made it through.

Weekend Rewind

I am a bit late with this, but it is really good.

Two people responded on Sunday to the gospel message. It was great to welcome people into the body of Christ.

Also, we had several hundred door hangers and several hundred invitation cards to give out. All of them were gone, and people wanted more in the second service! I am excited about all the invitations to church that are floating around Washington this week. More door hangers have been printed, come and get em' any time!

An Extra message

I have an entire extra sermon as a result of study for the Powerful Parenting Series. I liked it so much, and realizing some of these truths for myself, really moved me in my study. Never before have I found myself so close to tears, so often as in preparing for a series of messages.

“Your Kids Need Love” or “The Love Factor”

The foundation for good parenting is having and showing unconditional love for each child.
We all have love for our children. Having love for our children is not hard.
The key is in showing that love to our children!

Showing love requires us to overcome some barriers that we have been taught through some lies of our culture.
Barrier 1 – Too much love.
Barrier 2 – Men don’t get mushy.
Barrier 3 – Kids grow out of the need.
Barrier 4 – My kids will reject me.
Barrier 5 – Girls need more affection than boys.

Understanding A Mother’s Love
A mother's love is an unconditional nurturing love.
A mother’s love nurtures and shows children the unconditional love of God.

Understanding A Father’s Love
An unwavering, encouraging love.
A Father’s love encourages and shows the child that they have the innate qualities that are needed to become a good man or woman as they grow older. A Father’s love is needed to instill a strong sense of confidence and feeling that the child has what it takes to become what they are intended to become. Lacking a father’s love can result in identity crisis of various kinds. (See the book: Bringing up Boys by James Dobson.)

Understanding A Step-Parent’s Love
An unexpected, adoptive love.
Our culture has created a stereo-type of the step parent.
In the fairy tales the step mother is the opposite of what a real mother should be, but that is not the way things have to be. There are stresses that pull any step-parent toward their own children to the detriment of their step-children. Those stresses can be overcome. The key element to overcoming the barriers that a step-parent faces, is to understand the adoptive nature of God’s love for his children. The Bible says, that we are adopted into God’s family. We have been grafted in and now are considered full heirs of the Father.

Understanding God’s Love
An unmerited, eternal love.
Finally, the primary way to have the right kind of love in your home is to make your home a place where:
1. God’s love sets the definition of love.
Real love does not say, “I will let you do whatever you want.” Real love says, “I will help you do the best!”
2. God’s love sets the demonstration of love.
Real love does not just discipline, but also praises for good.
Real love is demonstrated in a holy way, not in evil or sinful ways.
3. God’s love sets the duration of love.
God’s love is everlasting.
God’s love is not limited in time or by time. Kid’s spell love, “TIME.”

I know that I don't have the time to preach this message on a Sunday, but it is well worth thinking about. Don't hesitate to send a link to this post to your friends!

Commenting

You know why I don't comment much on blogs? Because there is no spell checking application. I am not good at spelling, or typing. I am striving for better! So, I just posted a comment and then went back to look at it, and I have a typo!

In the words of Charlie Brown, Ar-r-r-r-gh!

First Day of School

Today was the first day of Kindergarten for my boys. (Ben and Gabe are twins so their first day is the same day.) They did great. It was cool to see them marching off to class with all the other kids.

I know this sounds selfish, especially watching all those moms crying this morning as they left the school, but my primary feeling was, now I am old. I have always felt young since I did not have kids in school. Now I am old.

All the marriage counseling stuff I have read says that the school years, and teen years primarily, are the toughest years of marriage. I am praying that I get an extra dose of wisdom along with this new sense of "old." I will need it in the next few years I am sure.

I am looking forward to Stephanie having a lighter load at home this year. That, I hope, will be great for her, and for us all. God is good!

Wild Goose Chase

Just finished reading a copy of Wild Goose Chase by Mark Batterson. By following his blog I have been watching the writing process move forward. Earlier this year he mentioned the pressure of producing the "sophomore project." What if your second book is not as good as the first!

Hey Mark, the second book is great! Wild Goose Chase follows in the same attitude of, In a Pit With a Lion On a Snowy Day, his previous book. It is inspiring Christians to follow the Holy Spirit's leading especially when it is risky. Mark is a great life coach, and it comes through in his writing.

Here is why I like the sophomore project even better! I really like the outline of Wild Goose Chase. I like how the book follows, "six Wild Goose chasers who come right out of the pages of Scripture" (p. 11). Each investigation into these Bible characters highlights a "cage" that keeps us from following the Holy Spirit.

If you read this book get ready for something big to happen. You never know where the Holy Spirit will take you, if you have the guts to follow!

Reading Day

Today Stephanie had several ladies over for brunch and for the kids to play together. Since they were all busy doing the ladies things, I got to read.

I am reading a text book for a class I will teach at MBU and an inspirational book that I volunteered to review. I will post the review Monday. Tonight, off to our Small Group.

Tomorrow I will be out most of the day. We are going to visit some friends who just built a beautiful new house. We are going to be a part of their house blessing get together.

School Prep.

Last night we went to Washington West Elementary to meet the boys teachers, find their classrooms and fill out some papers. The boys are very excited about school. They already know several students in their classes.

New Series

08-24 Raising Cain: Your Child’s Temperament
08-31 Raise Your Game: Boys vs. Girls
09-07 Raise the Roof: Get Ready for Teens
09-14 Raising the Odds: Moving toward Adulthood

Raise your Expectations
Raise your faith
Raise your kids

The Story of the Saints

Tonight we will continue in "The Story of the Saints." It has been a great learning opportunity for me and I hope that you are learning as we go.

It is important for us to understand the trials and lives of typical Christians in the past. We can learn from history. We can understand why things are the way they are today. We can understand people. Why is this important? Because we are in the people business.

You have to read this post

Paul church has a post titled: "Quitting the Ministry" It is worth a read.

If you are reaidng this line, and did not read the link go back and read it!

After you read it you will understand why I don't like being called Reverend and Preacher. You will know why I don't like all the superficial stuff that goes with "the ministry." I am not your social coordiantor. I am not in charge of inviting friends to your party for you, or planning your party. I am not the chief pot-lucker. I am not called to "do" weddings. Where is that in the Bible? I do weddings, but not when I am being asked to be a human peice of religious decoration for a tradition that really has no spiritual consequence for the couple involved.

I am called to join with and assist you as you reach your friends and family for Christ. Along the way we will share life's hurts and pain and will see the miracles of God in each other and espically in those God saves when he works through us. We will have some great weddings and great fellowship. But if we just want a club led by "the reverend," then we will be sad, sad, sad. I know I will be.

The Attic Youth

The Attic Youth will be starting up their Sr. High and Middle School Small Groups on September 14th. They will meet at church on Sunday nights at 6:00 p.m. I had this picture of Dylan sitting around and finally get to use it. Sportin' the old school fro! Love ya' Dylan.

The Fair Parade

I have received some pictures from the fair parade. I will be gettig a few more and will post them later. SInce we did the patriotic theme Kaler thought it would look cool to take a picture of us all in the pledge to the flag pose. Actually, we should be facing the flag, not the camera.

Back in Blog Land

This week was the fair. We took the kids every chance we got and I did not get to do any blogging for a few days. It was like another, very short vacation.

Weekend Rewind

Sunday was a very good day. We had a large attendance. It was great to see people that we had invited to church attending.

Worship was great. I think that we figured out the volume levels in the room finally. In the second service I could hear people in the congregation singing over the sound system. I think they were really excited by the worship time. I don't usually hear the congregation over the sound system!

The message was titled, "The Loving Response to the Homosexual Movement." People really responded to the message. People were literally in tears at the end of both services! People left with a powerful sense of hope. It really is essential that we as Christians talk about the Biblical viewpoint of every subject. Jesus Christ is not intended to affect and effect your church time only, but every part of our lives. I think that we need to preach on the tough subjects. That is why we do the "Sizzling Summer Hot Topics" series each Summer. We just let everyone know, we are going to talk about things that make people uncomfortable.

I have not posted the sermon on the church web site yet, it needs some editing. In the service in which the recording was done I had something in my throat that really messed me up! I want to edit out some pauses, coughs, and throat clearing before it is posted.