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I’ve made a few observations the past few weeks. Don’t throw rocks, they’re just what I have observed and processed in my head.
- Opening presents at the park either means a birthday party OR it’s Christmas and you live with your momma but not your baby’s momma.
- The meanest old ladies are part of the Ice Skate Rental Union.
- People read blogs at work.
- People write blogs at work.
- When people are on vacation, nothing gets written or read.
- WordPress spellcheck doesn’t recognize blogs, WordPress, or spellcheck as a words. Strangely ironic.
What have you observed lately?
Wow! Last Sunday of 2008! Sorry about the absence of the rewind last week. Something about Christmas and Santa must have made me forgetful.
The band did an acoustical set, with Mike leading worship. They did a great job, and Emily brought it on Let Me Sing (I’m pretty sure she owns that song.) Timm did a stand-alone sermon on trust, and he preached one verse – Proverbs 17:20. Here are my highlights from the message:
- Life is relationships – the rest is details.
- We live with a lot of suspicion.
- “I’m just cautious.”
- Every day you are faced with a situation where you don’t know the whole story, and you fill in the blanks yourself.
- When we fill in the blanks with suspicion, our relationships take a hit.
- When you choose to conduct your relationships under a cloud of suspicion, you have signed up for failure.
- When you choose to fill in the blank, you WILL fill them in wrong.
- A perverse heart sows discord and resentment.
- There’s something liberating in “I don’t know.”
- We love conspiracies. You wouldn’t watch CSI if it didn’t have a twist at the end.
- When we choose doubt, we choose disappointment.
- When you don’t trust, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.
- You never know the whole story and you can’t read minds.
- We cut ourselves a lot of slack and mercy and grace, but we want to go Old Testament on other people.
- Make it a choice, not a feeling. Choose trust over suspicion.
- Choose to trust God first. Some of you are tired because you’re trying to be God.
- You have to forgive. Not because they deserve it or they asked for it, but because God forgave you.
- Bitterness leads to a lack of trust.
- When you drag baggage into your current relationship, your asking that person to pay the bill for your past relationships.
That’s it for me. Happy New Year.
Then consider giving some away.
There’s still time to give to wellsforafrica-dot-com. Not to brag, but the youth gave $78 to this cause. (That’s 1.2 water filters)
Clean water not your thing? Then how about shoes? Go to 50000shoes.com and $2.50 gets a kid a pair of shoes.
Well, what are you waiting for? Go.
….and Felix Mazel Tov.
Today the Mathews family opened presents, ate at the Clock, went to the park, took a nap, played Nerf football and ate leftovers for dinner.
Quite possibly the best Christmas ever.
We have a fake tree. It lives in a box in the attic 11 months out of the year. I’ve never had a real tree. Never. The only people I know with a real tree were my “rich” friends.
What about you? Real or Fake?
Today they announce the results of our company’s layoffs and restructuring.
I’m not concerned about losing my job, but I just saw the first person leave with severance. It’s a lot more real than I expected. Especially since our office is more like a family than other offices. Work will be strange for a few weeks.
This sucks.
What’s worse is in a few weeks we (those left) will be back to normal, while those displaced will still have life upside down.
What do you do with that?
I did it. I read 12 books this year. This was a goal I set earlier in the year, and I actually accomplished it. (First time for everything)
Actually, I am almost finished with #13, and have 2 weeks left. So I actually exceeded my goal.
What goals have you achieved recently?
Have you succeeded or failed in your goals/resolutions for the year?
…we’re having a boy!
Yes, I put the stem on the apple.
Apparently my Y chromosomes were better swimmers than the X’s that day.
It appears that I posted about the sonogram, but not the results. Sorry.
BTW, Ginny, Josh and myself are excited about the boy. Riley, not so much. (she is yet to understand the advantages to being the only girl)
So, any suggestions for boy names?
Yesterday at RPC we continued our Revolutionary Love series. Timm did an interview style service with Mike Morell, the guy responsible for introducing us to Seeds of Hope. Mike has been to Africa numerous times, and he served as a bridge to explain how things are over there. It was a powerful service. Here are the high points:
- Mike – Sometimes I can be hard of Hearing when it comes to God.
- Seeds of Hope has supplied clean water to over 190 thousand people in Zambia.
- Timm – I know what you’re thinking – Missionary talk, time to go to sleep.
- We’re not going to ask you to spend you life in Africa.
- Africa can seem so big that you don’t know where to start. You CAN make a difference. Everyone has a role to play.
- The town of Chipulukusu, which means “cursed”, was changed to Mapalo, which means “blessing”.
- It’s not AIDS that’s killing them. It’s a lack of clean water.
- We have the opportunity to give them life.
- People follow you around and stare at you because they know you represent hope.
- We spend lots of time trying to impress others – when was the last time you represented hope?
- It’s not their fault. They’re not lazy.
- “God, you gave us hope. Let us give others hope.”
- $65 will give a family clean water for 15 years. $5500 will dig a well and give 2000 people clean water forever.
There’s a ton more from today, but my words wouldn’t do it justice. Check out wellsforafrica to see how you can help.
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