Man, what an awesome day it has been! I got to spend the whole day with my family, we served together pouring love into babies in the nursery at church while their parents attended service and then we got to attend that service which was just plain amazing. Everybody that served in it was just radiating their love for the Lord.

But, a highlight of my day was to spend time with my friend Ryan. He is the son of a woman that works with my wife and fortunately, they got to attend church with us and along with his dad, we got to eat dinner together. You see, Ryan is special in that he has Down’s Syndrome, along with many other ailments. That is not what makes him special though. He is special in the fact that he just is so full of love and hope. When you are with him, he makes YOU feel special. The joy that comes out of the guy is just contagious and it was a special gift to me this Christmas and I will never forget it.

In thinking about dinner with our family and Ryan’s family, it reminded me of how much God loves us. Like Ryan, he makes us all special. He loves us all so much that He gave us His Son. I think we get so wrapped up in the Nativity story on this day that it is easy to forget:

Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. – Ephesians 1:4 (NLT)

“For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. – John 3:16 (NLT)

I feel like when we celebrate this time of year, we tend to focus on the fact that Jesus just erases our sins, but it is so much bigger than that. God came to experience what we deal with because He loves us so much! Really, if you were God, would you put yourself through that? I would have to say that I would probably not, but He did and I am just so thankful that Jesus came this day because God loves us. There is nothing more awesome than that. Simply amazing. Merry Christmas.

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As I sat down to write tonight, I was going to post about something somewhat different, but as will happen, I got to checking my RSS feeds and Twitter before writing and I saw something that I felt I needed to say.

You see, I was going to write about how excited I am to be finishing reading the entire Bible in just 9 days (I read ahead today) and how encouraging it is to have such little pages at the end as it was intimidating to have so little in the front to start out. It’s like seeing the finish line and just wanting to sprint there. It is so exciting.

But, then I read the posts from Gary Lamb and Perry Noble, two guys are doing some pretty remarkable things down in the southeast and are pretty avid bloggers. It was in these posts that I saw the influence of my friend Greg Rohlinger. It is because of him and his initiative with our church to travel “Route 66″ (the 66 books of the Bible. Very clever) that I am able to write this tonight.

The thing is, Greg just brings it. And not just to me, not just to our church body, but to others on the other side of the country to help show the glory of God to those that have not seen it. I just had to take a moment to share my thanks for Greg with others. With blogging, folks come from all over the world to check in. It is my prayer that you can have somebody in your life that inspires you like Greg has in mine. Chances are, he could be helping them! Thanks buddy.

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When I began this blog, it was to keep me on my Bible reading with the help of friends who would stop by to read and comment on what I was reading. It was with the following verse that this was established:

But you, dear friends, must build each other up in your most holy faith, pray in the power of the Holy Spirit, and await the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will bring you eternal life. In this way, you will keep yourselves safe in God’s love. Jude 1:20-21 (NLT)

It has truly been a blessing to write about what I am getting out of the Bible and sharing it with others. And I want to share this blessing with others, but I am a bit stuck. Last night, Carrie was checking out the site and she said, “I love to read it, but I just don’t want to comment.” Without her knowing it, she kind of blew my plan out of the water. But, this was a good thing.

I come to you now. In expanding this site, what do you think would be most helpful to you? Here is what I have come up with so far:

1. Make it a community site, like Facebook or MySpace. You would have a profile and your own blog to join the conversation. This is where I have been leaning, but I am not sure enough people would want to add another profile and password to their lives. Some people just don’t want to write, but they love to read. I totally get it.
2. Make it a magazine site, with others writers other than me to share their observations as we go through the next year reading through the Bible.
3. Keep the way it is.

The bottom line is this:  I feel God is leading me to add more voices and visions from the Word here. The Bible speaks to everybody in different ways to different people. If everybody saw it the same way, we would all go to same church! But we don’t and I love that everybody gets it differently. Let’s discuss, debate and revel in the Word of God. That is the vision for the site and I want to do it in a way that reaches the most people.

So, what do you think? I am ready to start a movement to get everybody reading in 2009 and I want to provide the tools to help everybody continue through the year, but I need your help. Comment below and let me know and let’s see how many people we can get to read the Good News this year. Thanks.

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Now that the Thanksgiving holiday is over and we begin looking to the new year, it is time for me to reflect and nothing struck me more in my reading recently than this verse:

Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through, as if something strange were happening to you. Instead, be very glad – for these trials make you partners with Christ in his suffering, so that you will have the wonderful joy of seeing his glory when it is revealed to all the world. 1 Peter 4:12-13 (NLT)

I put emphasis on “strange”, because there have been a number for instances this year that were totally weird and timed out with some signifigant spiritual events. Before I share I must disclaim that: 1) I am blessed to have my health and that of the family. We are great. 2) I am not complaining and am joyful in these experiences. 3) We are blessed to have problems like this, but you still need to break out the Maylox bottle anyhow. 4) If this is “sharing in Christ’s suffering”, I am totally getting off easy. Nothing compares to that!

A number of things happened to me over the last year that have been crazy. They include:

• We had a blow out on the freeway coming home from California. Happens all the time, right? We were racing home to serve at church at the time! Funny how that happens! Evil has its ways. The girls still made in time to serve. YAY GOD!
• The day before I was to leave to go to High School Church camp our air conditioning went out. Oh yeah, it was 105 degrees outside. Thank you God for such wonderful parents who could come help out financially and emotionally. They are a true blessing to our family.
• I got laid off from a job that I loved. A blessing in disguise, but still a hard pill to swallow at the time.
• My laptop fried recently. Just as I am getting ready to take this website to a God-sized vision. Again, it’s mysterious timing to me.

I have to reiterate, I am not trying to whine and complain about these things, which is why it took me so long to actually write about them. That is the last thing that I want to do. I just found it interesting how this came about when I am getting ready to read through the entire Bible, from start to finish, for the first time and I am more connected to the Church body than ever before. It has been so exciting to connect with the Living Word online and off and this verse from 1 Peter really kind of summed it up. Like it says, strange…

So there you have it, major spiritual growth. I know there is more on the way and I can’t wait. Thanks for taking the journey with me.

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Not High School Musical or Camp Rock! Seriously, there has been way too much Disney Channel in this home. But, my chance to escape was with High School students enjoying the wonder of God’s Creation in the Durango, Colorado area and learning in His Word. It was awesome and I have yet to fully recover. In fact, I debated posting because I am still wiped out. It was full of activity at 12,000 feet up and I have been reflecting on how He worked on me with those students, so I have not gotten the rest that I need. And although I was able to help Greg with his posting (you can read the play by play at his blog), I didn’t have the opportunity to blog while I was there. But here is some stuff that I took away from camp:

• My friend Fred and I were in charge of team building activities. We made a good team taking a couple of each to make our own and it was so cool. I really enjoyed Fred’s Blind Faith Obstacle Course and Self Control Gum activities. It was fun to work on those with him.
• Speaking of which, Fred is a total Levite. Dude is strong! He could put the giant grill together in about 5 minutes and I marveled at his abilities. It was such an honor to serve along with him.
• It was awesome to serve along with my daughter who was babysitting Greg’s daughter. I was so proud of her.
• The students were stellar. They were digging all the messages that they were taught and got along so well. God was pouring into them and they were loving it.
• I love my guys from Two Days Til Tomorrow. One of the highlights for me was when they got together in front of the condos and just started playing worship songs with a bunch of the students singing along. It was an incredible site that was made even better when a woman who was also staying there walked by and asked me, “Are you a part of this?” When I told her that I was she said, “That is so wonderful, good for you guys.” Man, was my heart filled with joy.

Finally, I got to get up in front of the group and present a couple of our team building activities and it was awesome! I hate to overuse that word “awesome”, but there is really no other word to describe it. On the day of our hike, I reminded the students how it represented our walk with Christ and how we should support each other the entire way. I dug into the book of Romans for this:

We who are strong must be consderate of those who are sensitive about things like this. We must not just please ourselves. We should help others do what is right and build them up in the Lord. Romans 15:1-2 (NLT)

Being in the advertising business, my favorite activitiy that I got to lead was the “Commercial for God”. We gave the students up to 2 minutes to do a commercial that would sell God to somebody who had never heard about His glory and the students nailed it. They had a blast, but more importantly, they brainstormed ideas that would help them in conversations with their friends that don’t yet know Christ. Again, awesome.

And although we had a blast with the activites at the ski resort, hiking in the mountains and white river rafting, it was very spiritual and reminded me of the believers in the book of Acts:

All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer. Acts 2:42 (NLT)

God is working in me BIG TIME and I just have to thank all the students, pastors and adults that were there. I think everybody had pretty much the same take away and I makes me even more anxious for each Sunday and next summer. What a way to start the new school year. Big things are coming. I will keep you posted.

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What a vacation! It was such a joy to spend such quality time with my family. Which is why you take vacations, right? We had a blast! We even got to have Zoe the dog with us which made it even better. But, you know what happens after vacation. Work. You have to go back and no matter how much you love your job, which I do, it is an adjustment. I got back and it was a good week, which made it easier, but it was still getting back to work.

With that being said, I have been thinking about my career recently. God has put me in a great place where I am at, but I look for signs. I have been volunteering in ministry and it has been awesome. But is that where he really wants me? I see where I am at and I truly believe He wants me in the secular business place to show my love of Christ. I just keep getting that feeling from Him. It is frustrating though. It has been a while since I have not been in management or running my own business, so I know that I am capable of so much more. It is times like this that something jumps out at you in Scripture. The last couple of days have led me to 1 Chronicles and this about David:

In the past, even when Saul was king, you were the one who really led the forces of Israel. And the Lord your God told you, ‘You will be the shepherd of my people Israel. You will be the leader of my people Israel.’” 1 Chronicles 11:2 (NLT)

David was doing all this work and the people were taking notice. Even though Saul was the king, the people were led to David. So when I read this it just jumped out. Just because I am not in management right now, I might be making a difference with the people I am around and God is working where I can’t immediately see to pave the way so that I can shine an even greater light on His Glory.

We see it so much in the Bible where God tests our patience. Can you imagine being Moses and waiting 40 years? Jonah spent 3 days in the belly of whale praying that he wouldn’t be digested! Waiting a few months for things to change at work really shouldn’t be that difficult. But it is. Thankfully I have these examples and many others to look to. That is how I can really shine the light on His Glory. Who said this isn’t practical?

Read on…

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