Blackberry Storm addiction

I just got my Blackberry Storm a couple days ago and I think i might have a problem. It's awesome not quite as cool as the iphone but let's be honest Mac rules. But I do really love it. But the Bible says don't put any gods before me....luckily I don't worship it so I think I'm safe.

Don't put any gods before me........hmmmm brings to mind many things. We live in a world full of things some good, some bad but things. Most of us all have a lot of things you know like my Blackberry, TV, or whatever. Some of the things we have are real important like clothes I don't want to see anyone at church without clothes, that might be kind of distracting. We also need food, shelter, a bathroom, you know typical stuff that's needed. But I think the other stuff begins to cloud our minds not that I don't have the stuff just like you I'm just saying we all have it. Then what happens is with all this stuff we throw in the busy schedule we keep and all of a sudden we have no "extra" time. Within this "extra" time would be our time with God. I find it interesting that the God who we are to devote body, soul, and mind to only gets the "extra" time. Since when is taking a kid to soccer practice more important than time with God, or watching a TV show better then praying with God. I don't know about you but I'm guilty of this. Staying up until late at night waking up late he next day running out of the house without even a look towards heaven. Luckily for me my job depends on spending time with God. But what about giving him our best our first fruits probably doesn't happen enough. So this week let's try to give our first fruits not that you can't get up ad go to the bathroom but after that say a prayer read your Bible start your day with God and see how it ends I bet the difference between it and just a normal day will be crazy.

Great googalie moogalie where is the Fedex guy.

Yo what up people. That's right I said great googalie moogalie it's from Maggie and the Ferocious Beast great cartoon. I'd rather watch 100 episodes of it than watch 1 of The Wonder pets they stink. But that's not what I want to talk about today because today I'm waiting. Waiting for the FedEx dude to come and deliver my Blackberry Storm but the dude doesn't usually come till like 4 0'clock and it's making me crazy. But OK deep breath.....inhale exhale alright calm has come at least till I'm finished writing this then it will be back to staring at my Bible Commentary trying to figure out a bunch of Bible verses on grace all while the clock moves slower than a 99yr old pregnant woman ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! But this waiting brings up some good thinking as well like oh idk like waiting on the Lord.

I have never been accused of being a patient man in fact it's quite the opposite I sort of shoot first ask questions later. For most of my life this was never a problem cause well let's face it I wasn't shooting real bullets and people will forgive you most of the time eventually. But than a funny thing happened I became a Pastor and shooting first in this line of work may mean the difference between a kid being turned towards God or totally away from him. I have learned to wait on the Lord. Meaning this we all go through struggles in our lives you know what I mean ups and downs. We need money, food, clothes, healing, the next chapter of our lives, how do I talk to my friend. All these kinds of things happen to us almost everyday if they don't then your walk with the Lord must be perfect therefore you would be Jesus who by the way struggled some times so I guess this applies to all of us. But when these things happen are initial reaction is to go out and do something right away, like get a job, say the first thing that comes to mind, pray a safe prayer like Dear God I want to know what the next chapter of my life is and I think it's starts by going to college. You know there's nothing quite as dumb as when we tell God our plan. Guilty as charged. I wonder if sometimes he laughs at us....well I know he laughs at me. But how about this when tough times and or good times come we wait on the Lord we say unsafe prayers. Like when we need food Lord I know you can provide for me show me the way I need to go, now this may mean going out and getting a job the difference will be that it will be the job God intended you to have. Or this your senior year in high school everyone and their brother is going to college and you think that sounds pretty good I think I'll do that you go to Akron you for 2 months and realize this sucks. But instead try this God lead me in the direction you want me to go. Now he might not answer right away, and the answer may not be anything that you want to hear but I guarantee that if you follow that path it will lead to incredible things.

My point is this following God is an adventure, one I'm on my self and the trip would suck if I didn't listen to the guide. It's almost like going to climb Everest and stopping 100 yards from the top cause it's to hard. You've made it that far why not just except the challenge and move you butt. This is the adventure if your in a relationship with God and are willing to follow God part way but when the going gets tough or something doesn't go our way, and we have to wait we abandon the guide and trust our own map. When all along the next step might have gotten us to our goal. So follow God on your adventure and learn not to say no to him....and yes that may mean witnessing to the cashier or talking to someone you don't like but that's the challenge except it and have a great time being guided by God.

Tuesday in Ohio man the weather is whacked.

Man o man do I live in a crazy state Ohio they say if you don't like the weather wait 15 minutes and it will change. Yeah snow one day, rain the next, by Friday it will probably be in the 70's. But you know one interesting thing is that God never changes. We had a girl speak at youth group on Sunday night she's home from Bible College and her life has changed a lot since she left so I wanted her to speak. She started in the beginning by saying that she never really wanted to go in the first place she was to worried about things at home etc. the normal stuff kids fear when leaving far from home. But she decided to go and the story that followed was awesome. From the moment she got to the school she could hear God's voice telling her to slow down, but if you knew this girl you would no that there is no way she's slowing down for anything. To make a long story short she does this for like 2 weeks before basically passing out and hyper ventilating on a hiking trip at which point she heard the voice of God say what do I have to do to get your attention. The rest after that is history. The point is this no matter how many times we ignore God and don't do the things he has for us he still pursues us, loves us, and wants his will for us. Many times this means something drastic in our lives has to happen in order to get our attention. So if you've heard the voice of God and ignored it but are worried about never hearing it again remember this God does not give up he will keep pursuing you until you give in to his will. But hear this warning that sometimes to get our attention something drastic has to happen and most of the time it will bring us to the end of ourselves. Because when we are at the end of ourselves we can only turn to God or drugs but I recommend God. God is always the same he wants whats best for us and is willing to do that in anyway he can. So next time you hear the voice of God you had better listen cause you may end up hyperventilating and passing out on the side of a hill.

Well.....it's Friday

Well it's Friday and our senior pastor is out of town. I'm thinking about knocking a wall out and making a coffee shop. Hmmmm wonder if I would get fired? Anyways last blog for this week and not to much is on my mind today, seems like the hyperactive pastor who most of the time is hyper with thought is more hyper for action today. Yes that's right I'm going crazy maybe it's the coffee but I really need to just bounce off a couple walls for awhile. Well tonight is Wii and pizza night, my bro and sis-in-law are coming over along with their crazy kids so I'm jacked up about that too.

Have you ever had one of those darn it moments in your life? The kind where you think you know something but then afterwards find out that the pastor whose mini-sermon you used as an illustration is nuts. Well that happened to me this week no names will be mentioned cause that's really not right but the emerging church is crazy with trying to redefine the Bible. The guy actually had the nerve to say that the reason Peter sank when he tried to walk on water was cause he doubted himself.....ahhhh no it was cause he doubted that God/Jesus would allow him to do it he didn't have the faith good grief. This is just one example of many that I discovered after using a video by this guy as a object lesson. Just goes to show that you really got to know the other person and what they believe before using their stuff. So for all you people who read this be careful what you listen to just cause it sounds Biblical doesn't mean it is. The best way to tell if something is Biblical is to read it stop letting your pastor do all the work for you, read, challenge the things you don't agree with, and ask questions about the things you don't understand.......learn for the love of Pete. Who's Pete doesn't matter he's a nice guy and we should learn cause he wants us to. Anyways see yah next week and have a Blessed weekend.

Another Day In The Hood.

Well its another day in the hood and you youth pastor is up to well.........good. I had to clean my office yesterday cause I put a couch in it. I realized that I had way to much junk in my office. You know things I was to lazy to put back where they belonged so I just stacked them on top of each other, articles I printed out like 2 years ago and never read and now have nothing to do with anything, and old sound equipment what's it doing in my office idk it's just there. So anyhow it was a day of cleansing. This got my thinking, today as I sit in my clean office with my new 30yr old couch with a sheet on top of it cause it's so faded and it's been in some one's basement for like the last decade. Why do we have so much stuff? Our Senior Pastor reads a guys blog who is trying to get his life down to 100 essential things. That's awesome what do you have like 2 pairs of socks and would that be 2 things or four idk. Anyways we have a lot of stuff and I think that because we got so much stuff we aren't as thankful to God for what we have. I hope that makes sense I know it does in my head but you could get lost in there even with GPS. But to much stuff, yeah that's right all the ipods, tv's, xbox's, and whatever other crap we have puts us sort of in a thankful coma. Meaning this the easy and more crap we have the less we rely on God for the things we really need. Like love, direction in our lives, and oh yeah the stuff we really need food, shelter, etc. Think about it you know the times in our lives when you really praise God or thank him for that matter it's always something big or a time when you couldn't have possibly done it yourself never the ordinary. The stuff clouds our minds until we realize we have the stuff because God gave us other things like money in order to get the stuff. But perhaps our money would have been best spent elsewhere, on a family whose parents just lost both their jobs, or for a missionary who feeding kids in the downtown area of your city. Whatever it is maybe our stuff is preventing things in our lives from happening including studying the Bible, praying, and just flat out worshiping God. I tell you what after reading this make a list of the 100 things you would keep in your life if that's all you were aloud to have. Then look at the list and evaluate your life from there. I'll do the same and try to have it posted by friday God Bless.

Back To Work

You know this time of year is awesome. The holidays, seeing family you hardly ever see, oh yeah and feeding your face until you can hardly breathe. Well at least that's what I do. I have done this for awhile because I was gone with my family in nowheresville PA, no cell service, no t.v., and best of all fun in the snow. Unless you count when my kid got a bloody lip sledding that wasn't fun. But it brings something to mind right now that is cool so I'm going to tell the story. So here goes we were sledding with my extended family. The snow was in that melting stage when it gets real slick and fast, my 12 year old cousin and my daughter were on the sled when it started heading for a tree, so like any dad I took off to stop it. I did stop it but in the process my little one hit her lip on my shin, it puffed up and also bruised her gums and there was blood. So my wife and I took her back to the cabin to get her fixed up and make sure all teeth were in the proper place. But a funny thing happened on the way back my daughter stopped crying and asked if she could go back and watch the rest of the kids finish sledding, of course she couldn't because we still needed to clean her up. By the way she's fine in fact you would never know that anything even happened. But this got me thinking about perseverance. Here was a little 4yr old girl with a busted lip and bruised gums stopping crying and wanting to go watch everyone else. She didn't whine, pout, or even complain she just wanted to get back to life. Now shouldn't this be who we are as Christians, yeah bad things happen maybe our families don't support us or someone says something bad about us that's not true whatever curve life throws at you on any given day. We should bounce back right, get cleaned up rely on God and move on. But many times unlike my daughter we just whine and cry until all we do is whine and cry. Last time I checked us Christians in the USA weren't getting drug out of our houses and being shot we seem to be doing pretty well and besides that doesn't the Bible say things like blessed our the persecuted. Anyways all I'm saying is take it from a 4 yr old quit crying rely on God walk the walk and get back to life.