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Monday, August 21, 2006

Clarity

Sometimes in life, it seems that the Lord brings you to a point of clarity. In the last couple of weeks, the last 12 hours in particularly, He has made obvious some things that I was unsure of. Now, I'm not talking about little things, I'm talking about big, life changing things. It's scary, but the one thing that keeps me from losing my mind (what's left of it) is that I know that He has spoken.

I will share more later. Right now, just help me pray that I will know what the Lord is saying and act immediately on His directions.

Saturday, August 19, 2006

Running Fool

Today was our church's yearly Sugarloaf 5k. The weather was GREAT! Last year, the temp and humidity were almost unbearable and my official time was 26:12. This year, I beat my time by a whopping 2 seconds: 26:10, not bad for a 37 year old.

The really cool thing is that Jamie (my wife) and I ran as a husband/wife team and placed 3rd with a combined time of 56:49. We didn't get at trophy, what's up with that!?

My next race is the Lightning 10k in Sandy Springs. Should be fun!

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Ceiling Tiles and Beans

I don't know exactly what my malfunction was today. I walked out of my office twice and left my keys inside. Luckily, our facility manager was around for my first brain lapse. The second time, I wasn't so lucky.

So, there I stood. No key to my office within 10 miles or more, other than the one within a few inches, separated from me by a barrier of drywall. I looked things over and decided if I could find a ladder I could go over the wall, and through the drop ceiling. One of our youth (lately we call him Beans) made the mistake of saying, "You won't do that."

Is that a fact?

I found an 8-foot ladder in the furnace room; just tall enough to reach the bottom of the drop ceiling. Once I finally got the ceiling tile out of the way, avoiding the large metal pipe and fiberglass insulation, I determined that I had enough space to squeeze into the ceiling and stand on the top of the wall. All the while, my audience is growing. By this time, there are four folks standing below me in the hallway with eyes wide wondering if I was that insane. I figured they would know me by now, for Heaven's sake. Beans was still taunting me: "You won't do that." Dude, don't you see me with my head in covered in ceiling tile rubble and fiberglass insulation?

Finally, I was able to sit on the top of the wall with my legs on the hall side. Over my shoulder I could see my keys. That kind of ticked me off, so I had the fleeting thought of someone holding my legs while I dangled down to get them, but it didn't take me long to rethink that one. I'm not completely insane, after all.

I stood up on the wall's edge, grabbed a fortuitously placed 2x4 above my head with both hands, dangled over one of my padded visitor's chairs, thought "Lord don't let me die", and let go. With a loud thud, I came to safe rest on the chair's seat.

As I opened my door from the inside, the crowd that had gathered stood and stared for a second. Their eyes seemed to be saying, "I can't believe you just did that." Then Beans said, "Man, I wish I had a video camera so I could have recorded that". Thank goodness he didn't. Then I certainly would have mangled at least one important body part. You know, Murphy's law. (By the way, Murphy needs a beat-down.)

Just another day at the office.

Friday, August 11, 2006

Milestone

I could tell that I was approaching a crossroads in my life and ministry. The Lord just gives me a sense of these things for whatever reason. Sometimes the changes are good, sometimes not. This time, as it turns out, the changes are incredible! God is opening up some unbelieveable opportunities for me. More on this later, so stay tuned!

I ask myself so often, why in the world does the God of the universe care to take personal interest in my life. It certainly isn't because I deserve it.

Thursday, August 10, 2006

His Strength

I just can't understand what would possess someone to want to kill themselves and 300 more people with them on an airplane. It's a good thing that I don't understand. What deep hatred must be in their souls. The strange thing is that they would think themselves quite religious individuals. I'm not into religion, I'm into a relationship with Jesus. Thank the Lord for His protection, and great job to the hard working folks that caught these psychos.

Today I attended the Willow Leadership Summit. I've only heard Bill Hybels speak a couple of times, but his talk this morning really hit home. He spoke on the life cycle of a leader. Towards the end, he told a story of what he called a 'defining moment' in his life. He was in Zambia helping to hand out large bags of food grade 'mealy meal'. A young woman whose husband had died of AIDS, and who had two children of her own, had taken in an additional two children who had been orphaned by AIDS. She was a small woman, and couldn't pick up the bag of food so she started to drag the bag down the road. He decided to help her carry it to her house (which turned out to be 2 miles away). As he walked along the path talking to the woman, he said that the importance of succeeding as a leader in the church hit him hard. He felt the Lord saying to him, "Bill, if your leadership fails, people die." Man, what a responsibility we have. The rest of the day, that same statement has echoed in my mind, "Bill, if your leadership fails, people die."

Lord, give us as leaders of your church the strength to succeed.

Wednesday, August 02, 2006

Not Too Smart

Here's a good lesson for you: Never run a 7 miler outside during a heatwave.

Somehow, I missed the fact that we have had temperatures in the mid 90's lately. I'm just so darn tired of running on the treadmill!

When I finished my 90+ degree 7 miler, my only thought was, "You idiot."

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Friends

Just a thought: How boring and tedious would life be without friends?

I have been blessed with some truly great friends. I consider them a direct blessing of God. I don't know specifically why, but I was thinking about that a lot today.

I'm even thankful for Bo.