MyJournal — 7/19/05 9:36 pm
Today has been a good day.
This morning, we woke up pretty early to take the kids to go see Bob and Larry from the Veggie Tales show. They were making a guest appearance at the NBC news show downtown. So, not only did we get to see the two characters, but Jen, Charlie, and Katie were on TV. Somehow, the cameraman never got more than a small portion of my side each. Not that I was trying for anything more, though.
Charlie even had his first TV interview when the anchorwoman asked him what he liked most about the Veggie Tales shows and he said the silly songs. We got it all recorded on our computer.
This is my third day to do this journalling/praying/fasting thing, and it hasn’t been too bad. I’m debating whether or not I should use any of these articles for my blog…
Well, God has been good today. Nothing really earth shattering took place, but I was able to configure the Leadership Team Wiki to be a little more user friendly and a lot more secure, so I got that done. I was able to write up a pastor’s report, even though I did put that off until about 5:30!
I also met with Mary for lunch at Moody. That was pretty good because she is dealing with a lot of fears and questions about what’s going to happen with the church when Jen and I leave and what will happen when the next pastor comes.
Of course, she is very afraid of all that, but I had the chance to show her that her fears are based on not trusting God to be in charge of her spiritual growth and believing the lie from Satan that the church somehow belongs to her—that whole ownership thing.
In the conversation with her, I realized that that is a major way Satan tempts leaders. Satan will tempt leaders by taking their natural and desirable sense of responsibility and turning it into a sense of ownership.
I know that’s what I experienced in this church. For a while, I had allowed the sense that I was responsible for what happened in the church to make me believe that I had to somehow take control and be in charge of everything that happened. Of course, the big problem was that I am not that good of a manager or delegater to actually maintain that kind of control.
Now, I don’t believe that is really the big problem or even really a big problem. I still think the main problem in our church is a lack of spiritual vitality, and I’m still seeking God on that one. I’m not going to give up on this thing.
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God, you have been so good to me all the time. I want to thank you also for helping Jen and Charlie and Katie to find the lightsaber toys they did so they could wish me a happy Father’s day today (in July!). Charlie was really excited about finally being able to give them to me. That was pretty cool, and Katie did a really good job with them too. Neither of them was too violent or anything.
Thank you for our kids.
I continue to pray for Charlie. Lord, please help him to grow up to be strong in you. Help him to develop a sense of confidence in you that can’t be shaken by anything the world throws at him. Of course, I would want him to become a physically strong boy who competes well at athletics and such, but really, I just want him to be strong in you and to find a great deal of confidence in you.
Please help him to find his niche and his passions. Develop his musical ability and his creativity, and even his speech patterns. More than anything, take charge of his life and help me to trust you in that.
Lord, I also pray for Katie. You know that she is a very strong-willed girl. I pray that you would claim that for your own. Grab her heart at a very early age and help her to grow up loving you more than herself. Help her to develop a strong will that is strongly connected to you, that finds its strength in you and in you alone. Help her to become just what you want her to be.
Lord, I also pray for Jen. Thank you so much that you are enabling her to find more and more of her ministry niche in our church and in our conference of churches. You are giving her the opportunity to be an assessor at the Assessment Center this August. Continue to bring growth to her life, and continue to help me see all the beauty that you have placed in her.
Lord, I pray for Lafayette and the people of Lafayette. You know their needs better than I do. You know what they really want in the depth of their hearts. I pray that you would begin to open them up to you. I pray that you would begin to reveal to them their needs and mostly their need for you. Help them to see all the ways they are hurting and broken, but help them to see those things not to discourage them, but to motivate them to seek you more fully with their lives. You know what they need, and you know that they need you more than anything.
Touch their lives and prepare the way for us to move down there.
Finally, Lord, I do pray that you would enable us to finish the support raising quickly so that we could be on our way to Lafayette as soon as possible. You have quickly brought us to 35%, but there is a long way left to go. Please take us the rest of the way soon, and give us the wisdom we need to do the work we should do for the fundraising efforts.
Lord, you are Awesome and Mighty and Powerful beyond compare. Take charge of your world. Take charge of my life. Take charge of your church, and do the miraculous wonders that are needed to reveal the God of the Universe to a world that desperately needs to know you.
J
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