From Australia...

Greater love has no man, than he lay his life down for a friend...

Redemption Story

I am collecting redemption stories and will post them here for you when I find them.  Please send me links of great redemption stories like this one and I will post it. 

Happy New Year! 

Time is a Commodity

I wonder what would happen if we looked at our time as a commodity.  A resource, like our money, that we trade for things we need.  

So just as we trade money for things we need, we also exchange time.  What are we getting for our precious time?  Time is something you can never get back.  Once it is traded, its gone. 

This week in our message series, Family: Under Construction, we will talk about our kitchen table.  That table is often an indicator of how good a job we are doing at managing our time as a family.  How much time do you spend around your table? 

Hope to see you this Sunday!

Family: Under Construction --- Choosing the Right Architect

But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD."            Joshua  24:15

As God's people entered the promised land, each one setting out to live within their own family, they had a decision to make. They could choose to blend in with the people that lived in their midst; adopting their morals, their values, their gods.  Or, as Joshua puts it, they can choose to serve the one true living God, no matter the cost.

Every house has a designer, an architect.  Choosing the one to design your house is important.  It is just as important that families, particularly parents, choose who is going to be the chief designer of their own household.

The message this coming Sunday will continue our series on Family, talking about the choices we make for our households.  Hope to see you there!

Family: Under Construction

Time

Get up and get ready for work, and get the kids ready for school.  Make sure they get breakfast --- I guess a pop tart will have to do for today, "you'll have to eat it in the car!"  Pick up daughter from basketball practice, pick up son from football, deliver other son to scouts.  Pick up son from scouts, take other daughter to volleyball.  Somewhere in there have dinner together, or with whoever happens to be home at the same time. 

Culture

Turn on radio.  Kids change the station from your oldies station (1990's) to their music.  You catch a lyric that would make a sailor blush.  Turn on the television --- the sexual innuendos are rampant.  Even on the "family" programs.  You check your child's facebook page and see that one of the friends on their list likes to post statuses of a pornographic nature.  You have to make your child delete that contact, and vow to spend time every night doing moral maintenance on their internet activity.  Every night when your head hits the pillow you dream of living on a farm somewhere far away from the world --- a place where your family is safe.  Does Walnut Grove still exist? 

Priorities

We work more hours to make more money so our kids can have the phones, video games, cars, and gadgets that they "need" in order to be happy.  We bow to peer pressure while at the same time hoping that our kids do not.  An hour or two a week they get to hear about Godly priorities and values, and spend the other 105 waking hours of the week immersed in the world.  Are you like me?  Do you ever worry that in the midst of providing for your family, if you are actually passing along your values?  If your honest, do you even know your values? 

The family is one of God's most practical ways of being present in our world. I know this to be true.  And for a long time now I have wondered, sometimes out loud, "Is this really what God has in mind?"

For the next several weeks we will talk about family; sharing our frustrations, our confusions, and our hopes.  I hope to see you there!    

Ukraine Sunday

Join us this Sunday, October 10th, as we celebrate our connection to the nation of Ukraine.  Hear about the impact our church is having in Eastern Europe and the opportunity for a summer short term mission trip! 

5. And I Don't Want to Write a Boring Story

I am a Donald Miller fan.  He is one of my favorite authors.  His most recent book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, is one which has had a profound effect on me.  Sharing the experiences of the last few years of his life, Miller talks about the choice he made to make his life better --- to write a better story for his life.  I definitely recommend this book.

If you think about it, your life is like a narrative.  It has a definite beginning --- the situation surrounding your birth; parents, hometown, decade, region, etc.  And it will have a definite ending.  Several years ago I heard a preacher talk about the two dates on your eventual headstone.  There is a date which represents your birth.  And there is a date that represents your death.  The two dates are separated by a dash, and that dash represents your life.  His challenge to his hearers was simply, "How are you living out your dash?"

Your dash is unique in as much as you are unique.  Every day that goes by has choices and opportunities.  In almost every case you are free to write your own story.  Are you living well?

This hits home with me and is very convicting.  I will admit, I am a "get around to it" kind of guy when it comes to things like my health.  And I am at the point where there are likely less days ahead of me than behind me.  Its time to change my story.

How often do you choose to live an adventure?  What keeps you from doing so?  My wife is an inspiration to me.  Last year she decided that she wanted to compete in a triatholon.  I thought she was crazy, but she decided to live adventurously and began training.  Months later she competed in a triatholon.  Doesn't that make for a great chapter in her life?

I was there watching her.  Yeah, I know.  Not as interesting.

This idea of writing a better story is the culmination of these blog entries about things I do NOT want to do before I die.  I DON"T want my story to be boring.  And all of these other entries are meant to encourage you to approach your departure date with peace of mind.  To be able to look back on your life and say, "I lived well."

And, perhaps more importantly, to hear your master say, "Well done!"