April Newsletter

Click on the image to zoom in.Click here to read the unabridged version of Elizabeth's Story.
Click here to read my version of the story from September.

Wow!

Monday nights' Gathering went amazingly well. God did all the work.
The music team was wonderful, and we had a great time of musical worship. My message seemed a bit rough. Half the time, I wasn't sure I was really communicating, but God made great things happen nonetheless:

one student received the gift of speaking in tongues, as a sign of the infilling of the Holy Spirit! Praise the Lord!

...in other news.
1) newsletter should be out next week sometime.
2) our leads for potential staff next year have all run out, at this point. Please continue to pray that God would send laborers. We're in a good place: the realm of human impossibility.

Today

As I make final preparations for the Gathering tonight, my heart is heavy for the students and families of Virginia Tech University. Please pray with me.

-notes for tonight's message

consumption

finishing the previous post...

Ulrich Beck is a German Sociologist. In his book, World Risk Society, he wrote this astounding fact:

On the back of crucial free-trade pacts like the WTO and NAFTA, for example, consumption is now virtually out of control in the richest countries. It has multiplied six times in less than twenty-five years, according to the UN. The richest 20 percent of the people are consuming roughly six times more food, energy, water, transportation, oil and minerals than their parents were.

All, but the homeless, in America are included in that 20 percent.
Is this a moral issue?

An Easter Break

Jen and I have had some time to relax some lately. It's been great!

Jen's birthday was the 5th, so I took her to a show the week before in Baton Rouge. She had been wanting to see a Cirque du Soliel show for quite some time, and I found out about a show on the road. DELIRIUM was quite spectacular.

Later that night, Jen let me in on a secret: she had purchased tickets to the Houston Dynamo's home opener. We watched a great match between the Dynamo and the LA Galaxy (future home to David Beckham). They tied up 0-0, but it was a fun match, none-the-less.

While on this little weekend jaunt, I've had some time to do some reading. I'd like to share a couple things with those persistent enough to read:

First, from J.P. Moreland's Love Your God With All Your Mind:
From Old Testament times and ancient Greece until [the 20th] century, the good life was widely understood to mean a life of intellectual and moral virtue. The good life is the life of ideal human functioning according to the nature that God Himself gave to us...Happiness was understood as a life of virtue, and the successful person was one who knew how to live life well according to whatwe are by nature due to the creative design of God. When the Declaration of Independence says we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights, among them the right to pursue happiness, it is referring to virtue and character. So understood, happiness involves suffering, endurance, and patience because these are important means to becoming a good person who lives the good life. (p. 35)

Second, from Ulrich Bech's.... I'll finish this post shortly

Fire Insurance: part One

When I was 14, I attended a small youth group of about half a dozen kids. At the time, we were meeting at the pastor's house of a small church plant that only survived about 4 more years. The youth leaders, Ryan and Tracey Westphal, had a profound influence on my life over the next couple of years. One Wednesday night they asked a question to our small group that has stuck with me more than a decade. That question, I believe, put a seed in my heart that would bear much fruit later on...it still bears fruit today.

The question was a simple one: "Why do you believe in Jesus Christ?" or "Why are you a Christian?"

At the time, I thought this was a silly, and simple question. My answer seemed obvious, "I don't want to go to hell." D'uh, why wouldn't I believe in Jesus? Who wants to roast in an oven of wrath and anguish for eternity?

The Westphals responded: "Is that it? Jesus is just fire insurance for you?"

I kinda mumbled a reply, but I can't remember what I said. I was confused, honestly. I remember thinking to myself, "what more is there?"

That's my question to you today, readers. What more is there to trusting in Jesus? Or, is there anything more to it than a ticket to heaven?

Please post some comments. I'd like to make this a real discussion. I have a direction, I want to go with this, but am hoping to learn more along the way.

ps: Please pray for Jen's MawMaw (paternal Grandmother). She is very ill in a hospital in St. Louis.