THE JOY OF THE LORD IN THE UNEXPECTED!

The Joy of Lord is my Strength.

    It's been a good while since my entire family ( all 7 of us) went on a family vacation away.  Just a little over a month ago we took a week off to go to our oldest daughters college graduation and to move her home, but that did not have the feeling of a vacation even though it took a week off to go and return.  But this week is different.  It's been a plan in the making for many months to celebrate my moms 94th birthday off the coast of Maine. Had it not been for being an elected delegate for our General Church we would have been able to stay even longer in Maine then the 5 days planned before we need to leave to General Assembly.

 

         So here i am in a hotel room at 5 a.m. not able to sleep reflecting on family life vacations as a pastor while the rest of my family sleeps all around me. When we first did these kinds of trips they were all little ones, but now 4 of them are adult size with one of them flying home early to go back to work.  The days, months and years certainly do whisk by fast. Im so grateful we have unity and joy in our family. We have already laughed a lot on this trip and had one stop along the way of this 3500 hundred plus mile adventure. 

  

       In order to get away this time we had to have someone cover preaching in two different churches for me and for someone to do a funeral on my behalf in a few days while we are still in Maine. It takes a lot of preparation for us to leave town for this long and the Joy of serving The Lord helps us do that.

      Every time we prepare to leave we have to prepare the house and arrange for the feeding, caring of loving of 4 pets. This time it was 3 pets as our sons turtle winkie died the day before we left. We had to have a funeral in the back yard before we could leave. The Joy of The Lord helped us through those moments. 

      Before we could leave ALL the laundry has to be washed and dried before we can pack and go and like most trips the drier could not keep up and Becky asked me to take a few loads downtown to dry so we could leave on time. So at 6:30 am I am driving around looking for a Laundromat that is open. Again the Joy of The Lord is my strength. 

  Early that morning just two mornings ago I was sitting in the truck waiting on the laundry while preparing to read a devotional when a young girl at about 6:45 am rides up on a bicycle to ask me to borrow my phone to call her dad. A little hesitant to do such, but i agree and listen to the voice message left of a daughter asking her dad for help with money for her and her mom.   

        After she shared a little of her story she rides away on her bike and crosses the road when The Lord said help her.  So I yell the girls name from across the street just before she goes out of sight down the road. She returns and I offer her a job watching and doing my laundry while i take off for a few minutes.  When I return with a spiritual booklet and some money for her she helps me fold laundry as we talk about her life and challenges. I sense her need for a Savior and share the Gospel with her. By the time I need to leave she had prayed with me to trust In Jesus as her savior and was handed info on where she  could go to follow up with her new found faith along with some cash for her short seasoned job of laundry girl. The Joy of The Lord is my strength and as well this now this 21 year old young women has the Joy of the Lord  as she was looking for answers in a broken world of circumstances.  

       Vacations for me/us are never void of opportunity and challenges. But in the midst of it is all from the untimely death of a young turtle to the demands of the life and season of a local congregation and preparing to leave town,  the Joy of The Lord is our strength. 

I am blessed to have a great and fun family to love and do life with as we trust The Lord in the great adventure of the unexpected along the vacation journey to Maine and back. 

Be A Dream Trader!

           People nearing mid-life often crash into some startling and unexpected observations. For instance, we all dreamed big dreams when we were younger. I did and I trust you did as well if you are over 50 and reading this. But as we move at a break-neck pace through our twenties, thirties, and forties, we eventually slam head on into the realization that “some” of our dreams will never be realized. 

     Eight years ago I dreamed of having our own home in hills of Virginia where we pastored. After many years of not being able to realize that dream I can see that God knew better than what I was dreaming. In was soon before we moved to Deland that the real estate industry crashed and we moved to Florida. Had we owned the “dream” then we might have regretted it around 2008-9.  God always knows best and has our best interests in mind even above our grand dreams.

However, not realizing our dreams throws some people into a mid-life crisis.  Some don’t make it that far with their aspirations, having already given them up somewhere along the way or not being able to accomplish them in there time.  Some run into conflict that makes them weary and they settle for less.  Still others make bold decisions to trade one dream in for another. 

That’s what Joseph did.  Talk about dreams!  He had some big ones.  At seventeen he dreamed his ten older brothers would bow down to him.  It’s enough he dreamed that dream.  What makes it worse is that he told his brothers about it.

The older brothers already had issues with the younger son.  Their father favored Joseph.  He had even given him a valuable, multi-colored coat.  That’s the modern-day equivalent of a parent of four teenagers giving one an iPhone and the other three a stack of quarters each for a pay phone (assuming they could find one on their travels).  The brothers banded together and tossed the dreamer in a ditch, eventually selling him into slavery at the first opportunity.   The next thing Joseph knew he was waking up in Egypt.

From there his life was a rollercoaster thrill ride.  One minute a slave.  The next in charge of an Egyptian official’s house.  The next in prison.  The next in charge of the prison.  Then he found himself in front of Pharaoh, called upon to interpret the leader’s dreams.  With God’s help he was able to warn Pharaoh he would have seven years of abundant crops that he should be put in storehouses in anticipation of seven years of famine.  Recognizing his wisdom, Pharaoh put Joseph second in command of all of Egypt.

And because of God’s personal involvement in his life, he was was able to save his family.  The same family that God was building into a nation.  Joseph was in position to bring his family to Egypt and give them the most fertile land to work.  And it was definitely fertile.  In the time they were there they were “fruitful and increased greatly” (Exodus 1:7).

Joseph could have lost his life getting caught up in the details of his life, chasing his dreams and desires like anyone of us could do.  Instead, he chose a better story.  God’s story!   

You can do the same.  If your life’s dream has stalled, look to God. If your dream now realized is not all you thought it would be, look to God. He can give you another dream.  A better one, not according to the world’s standard but God’s criteria.  Just like Joseph’s.  Then you’ll have a story to tell. Join us tomorrow at 10:30 at Delandnaz as we explore the life of Joseph from broken dreams to God’s best dreams. www.delandnaz,tv  

A nation fallen away from God

Whenever I think, "I've seen it all", it seems like I see more then what I could ever have imagined. When I became a born again believer in 1981 black was black and white was white. Right was right and wrong was wrong. But as I fast forward to today it's almost upside down. This week the Supreme Court is hearing arguments on why people of the same gender should be allowed to benefit from the commitment of holy matrimony. When I see the equal = sign all over the Internet among those who profess Christ I am shocked.

It is bad enough that the lost culture who does not even know about the power of the Gospel to save and sanctify has been so easily persuaded, but what does this foretell for those who associate and profess Christ? I refuse to digress here and defend what marriage is, because of what its obviously always has been, is and will be: (A permanent covenant between a man and a women instituted by God from the beginning.) If you don't see the simplicity of that institution I truly feel sorry for you. Oh how easily the prince and power of the air has deceived so many as he did Adam and Eve in the garden.

The concern I have today is the challenge this creates for the next generation. Lets just role play this out for a few generations. Imagine 20% of the general population being legally married to the same sex. Imagine how dysfunctional little children's lives and hearts will be? Imagine when men and women get bored with this level of sin? I mean how far away are we from legalizing other sins and abominations?

As I read and even debate with a few people it amazes me how easily the American mindset can be deceived and brainwashed, but it is more apparent in those who are in their 20's and under. This generation has grown up with gay TV stars, teachers in school, literature promoting two daddy's and so much more. This generation sees nothing wrong with immorality on every level. It's probably 20% of this generation that holds on to morals and values passed on, but what will the next generation look like?

If our nations last as it is another 15 years I will be shocked. Regardless of the laws of the land, it's the hearts of the people of the land that concern me most. The laws follow the hearts of the nation. The only hope in this country is the church of Jesus Christ. And even the church has been seduced to embrace so many hideous lies as well. We will either get a divine judgement or a great awakening soon, but I can't imagine that either can be very far away.

Tourist or Servant?

When I came to Christ I sensed within a year a call to the ministry. Through my young 20's as I prepared for ministry I experienced a walk of faith through the American church model. In 1992 I took my first ever trip out of the country and went to Russia. God truly transformed me in more ways then I can even begin to express. Of many of those experienced I was apprehended by a police officer and detained for sharing the Gospel. Not the kind of experience one would use to encourage others they should go on a missions trip too.

Then in 1998 I went on another missions trip to Kenya, Africa. It was transforming in a completely different way. The culture, the climate, the people and of course the safari and gospel of transformation in my life and certainly in many other lives as well.

In the year 2000 I went on a Holy Land trip to Israel. This was not work and witness, but it was truly transformational. I will not soon forget that we were the only tourist in the city of Bethlehem the day after the Israeli military blew up a Palestine owner car in the streets. We were the ONLY ones touring in what felt like a ghost town that next day.

between 2006 and 2008 I went on two different trips to Jamaica and another one to minister among the Arizona Navajo Indians. In these trips (beyond constructions and work) we as well experienced cultural differences, the gospel transforming other lives and some other assortment of adventures. I recall when in Kingston, Jamaica we were on the roof of the church building enjoying the cool of the evening when a shot out started in the street below. Our team took cover and nobody truly knew what was going on. We never did see what happened and nobody got hurt among our team, but it sure was interesting.

In 2012 I went on another trip to Ghana West Africa on a Jesus film trip. Now that took on a different spin of all the other trips in previous years. Riding a motorcycle took the cake for adventure for me in a foreign country. Truly it was an amazing team and adventure in every move. From a wild and crazy experience with motorcycle breakdowns and hundreds coming to Christ. It was wild, fun and high adventure every step of the way. Getting into a van wreck with a bad driver on a deserted road in the back woods of Africa was breathe taking as well. That trip was absolutely the best ever. Until this past one.

Then in 2013 I returned to Africa with the smallest team yet, but a totally harmonious and fun group of guysl. I started off that trip by flying into an unexpected country of Holland to ride a metro and a boat ride in the freezing European winter to the hot edge of the Sierra Desert of Senegal West Africa. We rode in a completely outdated and unsafe 70's slapped together cab held together with only God knows what. Then we rode in a carved out log boat to a remote disappearing island off the coast. I got choked up one morning and couldn't breath and thought I might suffocate to within hours still being able to share Christ to a group of missionaries on retreat.
We rode motorcycles on 60 miles of deserted beaches while avoiding the waves of the Atlantic. We passed donkey carts on roads, beaches and once took a double take when I passed a camel on a dirt road. I wiped out in a small village on an oil slick with a motorcycle and hurt my leg. Got to visit a foreign medical doctor in a high rise and so much more.

In Senegal I kept thinking I was doing the things I had done before until we spent two days digging out a well for water to no success. I also got to finally visit the inside of a village hut after to seeing pictures of them for decades. I witnessed people oppressed by witchcraft delivered by the grace of God and witnessed demons manifesting through animals in angry opposition to the showing of the Jesus film.

Getting to drive a truck for 4 hours from the remote villages to the massive congested city of Dakar will not soon be forgotten. It was as if I was driving in the Daytona 500 with interesting competitors on the roads. Seeing our missionary on his motorcycle in front me not able to over take a massive truck on the highway to being passed myself in traffic by a forklift was a contrast in what should have been the opposite. Truly the mission fields of the world are full of adventures. I've learned so many wonderful things over these past 21 years exploring the world through work and witness trips.

Just the thought of a regular vacation in any of these foreign countries sounds completely boring. When I think about going to a country of the world I would much rather go to serve The Lord and his kingdom and experience the land, culture and people as a servant then as a tourist.

The adventures of missions through the Jesus Film partnerships or work and witness expeditions is the most amazing way to see and explore the world. You can do it in America or anywhere. To serve others is a holy luxury reserved for the saints of the living God.

Anyway ready to serve through a missions trip in 2014?