...Christ did not appoint professors, but followers. If Christianity ... is not reduplicated in the life of the person expounding it, then he does not expound Christianity, for Christianity is a message about living and can only be expounded by being realized in men's lives.
From Kierkegaard's Diary, ed. Peter P. Rohde, trans. Gerda M. Anderson (New York: Philosophical Library, 1960), 141 (1848)

THANKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here is a picture of Pastor Derik Durham of Mount Salem (on right) and his Deacon Kyle (on left) who spent all of their Saturday helping us get loaded. Thanks guys!



And, of course, thanks to both our families for all of the amazing support and encouragement; my dad and brother Lee helping unload. Mike and Wendell meeting me at 2 o'clock Saturday morning to unload the first load. Breakfast at Cracker Barrel was a blast!

I especially want to thank all the other brothers and sisters in the Lord who have prayed and reached out in very practical and substantial ways during this difficult time. Your outpouring of love and material support has been a reminder of God's love and concern. God places His Church, His People to be a visible and physical witness to the reality of God's grace in Christ Jesus --- All of you have been just that! May the Lord repay you for all of your kindness.

The Crowded Path To Leadership

"There will always be more people willing to do ‘great’ things for God than there are people willing to do the little things. The race to be a leader is crowded, but the field is wide open for those willing to be servants." - Rick Warren 

Traveling Mercies

Please be praying for us and our families.  They will be driving up from Tennessee to help us move back down.

A Right View of God --- Prayer Guide

Prayer Guide – A Right View Of God – December 10, 2008 “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24, NIV). Thursday, December 11 – Implore the Lord to grant a reviving encounter with Him that would change the way we think about Him and bring back a fear, awe, and reverence for who He is. “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our ‘God is a consuming fire’" (Heb. 12:28-29, NIV). Friday, December 12 – Seek grace to repent of re-imaging God, making Him look less severe and distorting what He is like to make us more comfortable in our sin.Ask God to restore biblical worship in our lives. Beg Him to revive us to form and project a correct image of God to one another and to the world. "You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know . . . The true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers” (John 4:22-23, NASB). Saturday, December 13 – Implore God to grant us a willingness to repent of offering Him worship while we overlook questionable things taking place in our midst that do not follow the scriptures. Beg God to enable us through His Spirit’s guidance to make the changes needed to spend more time getting to know Him through His word. Ask Him to bring us through a repentance that captivates us with His glory. “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to Me [unless they are the offering of the heart]? says the Lord. I have had enough of the burnt offerings . . . [without obedience] . . . Bring no more offerings of vanity (emptiness, falsity, vain glory, and futility) . . . I cannot endure--[it is] iniquity and profanation, even the solemn meeting . . . I am weary of bearing them” (Isa. 1:11-14, AMP). Sunday, December 14 – Plead with the Lord to help us return to the scriptural definition and practice of worship. Ask Him to restore worship that causes us to compare what we do with the scriptures and cleanses us of comparing ourselves with one another. Beg the Lord to empower prophets who will declare to us what God is like from the scriptures. “. . . Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God” (Rom. 12:1-2, KJV). Monday, December 15 – Beg God to help us understand that when Israel profaned His name and gave the world an unbiblical view of Him that He brought severe discipline upon them in front of the nations.   “I will vindicate the holiness of My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned . . . ‘when I prove Myself holy among you in their sight’” (Ezek. 36:22-23, NASB). Tuesday, December 16 – Make haste to beseech the Lord to forgive us for profaning His name by prayer, preaching, and singing that re-images Him. “Moses made haste to bow low toward the earth and worship” (Ex. 34:8, NASB). Wednesday, December 17 – Ask God to bring us back to God-centered, God glorifying worship based on truth, not trends, which produce reverence and awe in us. “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24, NIV).

“I have been so blessed to be here that at times I think I will burst!”

Kissing Retirement Goodbye

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By John EnsorDecember 3, 2008

 

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John Ensor is the Executive Director of Urban Initiatives forHeartbeat International and author of The Great Work of the Gospel.

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I kissed retirement goodbye—at least the kind traditionally planned for in America. My mother has finally persuaded me that there are better things to do when I reach her age.

In August, I wrote about caring for family with end-of-life challenges. My mother, at 78, started to go blind while on a mission trip to Mongolia. Her sight was saved through high-dose steroids, which tripped other health concerns which were compounded by the discovery of breast cancer.

The subsequent surgery left her fragile. She fell and added injury to sickness and disease. We gathered with her in August to discuss how to care for her as she enters what I call “the frowning years.”

Ecclesiastes calls them plainly “the evil days” when

the years draw near of which you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”; before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are darkened and the clouds return after the rain in the day when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those who look through the windows are dimmed, and the doors on the street are shut—when the sound of the grinding is low, and one rises up at the sound of a bird, and all the daughters of song are brought low—they are afraid also of what is high, and terrors are in the way; the almond tree blossoms, the grasshopper drags itself along, and desire fails, because man is going to his eternal home, and the mourners go about the streets. (12:1-5)

The point of this description is to “remember your creator in the days of your youth” (12:1). I take this to mean:

Taste and see the goodness of God while all your senses are in full function, and your strength is still intact.

Savor him while you can—before your teeth fall out (the grinders cease) and your eyes fail (the windows are dimmed) and your bones ache with every move (the grasshopper drags itself along); before the fears of dying assail you and sap your strength and try your faith one last time before they are swallowed up in victory.

Evidently, at 78, my mother is still in the days of her youth. Since August, she has prayed and fought for her health.

Last week she left for Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. She joined a team of trainers for a Leadership Development Conference in which 90 teachers from around the country took their school vacation week to learn to study and teach the Bible through an inductive-study method. Seven more teachers planned on being there.

But my mother writes, “They did not get here because their charter bus was ambushed by robbers and the driver was killed.”

In spite of such things, she writes of the thrill of watching teachers learn to read out of the Bible its unsearchable riches rather than read into it preconceived notions.

She concludes, “I have been so blessed to be here that at times I think I will burst!” Evidently, she intends to die with her mission boots on as she faces down those “frowning years.”

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