Archive for the ‘General’ Category

FFD Video

I still can’t believe I get to be part of what God is doing in Pittsburgh.  One of the highlights thus far has been our Family Fun Day, held at the end of August when we were able to connect with a ton of people from the community and see what can happen when many churches come together just to love on people. If you haven’t seen it already, this highlight video is well worth the four-and-a-half minutes or so it takes to watch — it does a great job of giving you a little sense of what it was like to be there.  (Thanks again to Ken Depeal and the Sandy Lake Wesleyan crew for shooting, editing, and sharing this video.)

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Day One

Yesterday marked a serious step into bi-vocational ministry for me.  I was able to get a four-to-six week temp position as a ‘personal care aide’ in a local facility for transitioning special needs students from high school to the ‘real world’ and yesterday was day-one for me assigned to a specific (and awesome!) student. There are a number of reasons why this could be tough: I’m not sure I have the ‘makeup’ of someone who can successfully work a number of jobs, especially when one of them is of the consuming nature of church planting; I have a couple of health issues that mean exhaustion sets in easily; I’m going to be a new dad very soon and need to/want to be present with my family.  I may get to the end of this first stint at bi-vocationalism and realize I need to find a different, creative solution to our need, and I don’t think that would be shameful or (more…)

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Women!

As stated yesterday, now that I’ve been married for three years (and a few days), I can be seen as something of an expert when it comes to marriage… and, I believe, women in general. Here’s everything I’ve learned about women: – – – – – Love them. – – – – – – – – – – That is all.

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Marital Counsel

Now that I’ve had three ‘successful’ years as a husband, I feel justified in sharing unsolicited advice with the world about marriage. Ready? Here it goes: Every marriage is different. While there are certain principles within Scripture and common sense ground rules that should inform our marriages, people are different and every individual marriage is unique. That doesn’t mean we should never seek coaching and counsel, but I think it helps us understand the kind of coaching and counsel we should seek.  If our marriage mentors or counselors are sharing ‘what works’ only from personal experience it should cause us to pause—what ‘worked’ for them may not work for everybody… but someone who helps to see the joy of Christ as the foundation of marriage and who can help work through the tough stuff of life without saying, “This is exactly what you need to do.” is someone who understands the unique nature of individual relationships. And that’s my unsolicited (more…)

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Wait for it…

“Good things come in small packages.” “Fish and guests both stink after three days.” “Subprime mortgages are evil.” “Patience is a virtue.” Each of these expressions has some level of truth–some more than others (and some are more ‘old addages’ than others), but the sentiments expressed within them have an air of “I-learned-this-the-hard-way-so-pay-attention.”  But the one that has always irritated me most is ‘Patience is a virtue.’  Admittedly, that’s because patience is a virtue that can only be learned by waiting… by trusting… by hoping… Sarah and I have been waiting. We’ve cried out to heaven for some sense of ‘what’s next?’ and the answer seems to have been, ‘Wait for it.’ Sunday will be my last day as pastor at Carlisle Wesleyan.  And after that?  We dunno.  We’re waiting. I wish patience was a gift given at the beginning of life.  But my guess is: it’s a virtue earned throughout life. Great.

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Dead.

I thought I had killed it. Totally ruined.  Destroyed. I had well completed a myriad of tasks during the many, many childhood summers spent in southeastern Arizona with my grandparents and the twenty acres of desert land they cared for.  We had dug ditches, run irrigation, kept the field grasses short (so snakes would be kept at bay), cared for animals of varying types, tore old buildings down, painted the ones still standing, and trimmed a lot of mesquite trees. Have you ever trimmed a mesquite tree?  For those of you who haven’t, a brief word of explanation:  Mesquite trees aren’t really ‘trees’ at all, they’re bushes.  In order to make them look like trees, they need constant attention.  They are thorny… really thorny—huge, long, deep-penetrating thorns (see inset)—and gnarly.  After years of practice, though, I felt I had become a master mesquite tree trimmer. On this particular day, the one tree I had to get done was the lone (more…)

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