Summer

I'm looking at what the summer includes.  I really sense in my spirit a few things need to adjust for the next month or so.  Weekly "Friday Thoughts" is one of them.  

"Friday Thoughts" is often a good unloading for me of some of the overflow thoughts and questions that run through my head like 5th graders fighting over a gallon of Mt. Dew.  

Thanks for your feedback and for spending a few moments with me each week.  What started a few years ago as silly has really grown to a sometimes less silly branch of my investing in people.

I'm going to take July (and maybe some of August) to focus on some other projects and clear my head for a new season of thoughts and challenges.

Be watching - I have a feeling I will be much more holy and wiser and taller and thiner and younger and awesomeer and abunchofotherthingser come August.

Please be in the Word this summer!
Please risk godly relationships this summer!
Please listen for the Lord this summer!
Please grow in your faith this summer!

Following,

Dave  

Why I’m excited about summer

It’s time for a Dave list.

Why I’m excited about summer:

1. Some people, including me, will grow in the Lord.

It’s not about a building, a vacation, or a celebration - I’m thinking about being closer to God.

I’m thinking about the kind of thing that will not change with a Presidents pen or politicians promise.

What makes me smile right now has nothing to do with “success” or comfort.

This is not about the right person doing the right thing so that I will be happier.

Knowing who to blame for an oil spill or it’s clean up isn’t registering on my “wow-o-meter.”

I am excited about those of us who will:
Cross lines with the Lord that He has been asking us to cross,
Stand for something that matters for eternity,
Let go of what has held us captive,
“Taste and see that the Lord is good,”
Swim in the refreshing pool of anointing,
Put away arguments that weaken our impact,
Say “forgive me,”
and follow Christ with abandon.

Ya, that’s it. That’s my list of one. Right now I’m excited about supernatural transactions that are taking place, and will take place, this summer.

Oh, how I want to be one of those growing people - will be be one with me?

Excited,

Pastor Dave

Almost Finding

I didn't have it so I thought it best to do some searching.

I looked inside money and couldn’t seem to see any reflection of it at all. With money there is always more, and always someone who has more. And besides, there were too many external factors that determine money’s value.

I looked in success and found what I thought was it, but it kept changing no matter how much I pushed and climbed. I soon grew tired and disillusioned from grasping what looked like it until it was in my hand - then it wasn’t it.

I was sure it was in relationships, so I looked there. They were very close but I still couldn’t find it there. Mostly because there seems to be an inherent selfishness that I bring into most relationships. Between selfishness and insecurity I knew that was not the place to find it.

I jumped into religion, suspecting that it was formed there. Surely I would find it inside the walls of being and doing the “right things.” But, the more I looked the more I found nothing that even resembled what I was looking for. It often seemed close, but wasn’t there.

I spent time looking inside me. Bad idea. I didn’t have what I couldn’t find - that was just silly.

My soul was exhausted from looking and confused from repeatedly almost finding.

One day I walked through a park looking under benches and behind random trees and saw a man watching me. He asked me what I was looking for. I told him, annoyed that it wasn’t obvious, “I’m looking for the right container... isn’t everyone.”

The “it” that I was looking for was the right container and I found it no where. I wandered away from the stranger hoping he would stare at someone else - he didn’t.

“What is it you need to contain?” he continued to press.

I reached in the worn bag I had carried on my journey, it was far from a worthy container for such important cargo, and I showed him my soul passion. “I can’t find the right container for my passions and I have looked everywhere! Every one I have found is shaped wrong, or cheap, or too small, or has holes. I can’t waste such a valuable part of me!”

He looked at what was cupped in my hands and grinned, “I agree. That is very valuable cargo. You need a container that will allow it to grow.”

He and I walked and talked for quite a while. “Passions must be held in a place that is safe enough to grow and accessible enough to be spent,” he said. I found out he was a carpenter and in the days that followed he talked to me about his passion costing him everything. He built the perfect container for my passion.

We spend a lot of time together. He taught me to find others who need a container for passion. He showed me how he mends them. Did you know most containers do more damage than they do good? Some people give up and waste their passions by placing them in the easiest or most popular container. He said the right container lasts forever, is priceless, and is free.

He’s an amazing man - turns out he’s a shepherd too.

Spending and Growing,

Pastor Dave

Friday Thoughts...

July 10th, 1861 - "Yesterday afternoon I preached on 'Being led by the Spirit.'  God assisted me and shed light on many minds, and especially on mine.  At the close we had a prayer meeting for the baptism of the Holy Spirit.  It was a gracious time.  The Lord held me to a fuller consecration to Him than I had ever made.  I was led to consecrate myself (1st) to deny self, (2nd) to redeem the time, (3rd) to go forward in the work of God as much as I feel I ought to.  The Lord accepted and blessed me, and gave me His Holy Spirit."

From the journal of B.T. Roberts founder of the Free Methodist Church about one year after it was started.

The seeds have been planted.

Consecrated,

Pastor Dave