We Finally Found Our New Home

If you have read or heard anything that I have written or my wife has had to say, we have gotten to a point where we do not feel comfortable in church. Because of that it had become a struggle every week to even make it to church. In fact, we would find excuses to not attend church. I would bet that over the past 6 months we have not attended more than we have attended church. I had forgotten just how much break ups can hurt, and was quickly reminded of it this year.

Since March we have tried various churches. We have visited some really good churches. Some of them were more appealing than others, but something was always missing. None of them felt like home. Maybe there was too much pop psychology for us and not enough Jesus.  Maybe the worship music was not what we needed: either too traditional or they played secular music. Maybe they did not have a recovery program or their children’s program was not what we needed. Something was missing, so my wife and I compiled a list of what we wanted in a home church.

It turns out there are a lot of things that my wife and I wanted to find in our church:

1.       A sermon that was Biblically sound with a lot of meat and little fluff

2.       A great kids program

3.       A worship team that played worship music

4.       A recovery program

5.       Sunday school

6.       An accessible pastor that tended his flock

My wife and I started exploring various churches, looking for ones that met our criteria. She sent me a link for Glendale Christian Church (GCC). I went to their site and read about it. Everything looked good. I then listened to a couple of the sermons they had posted, and the message sounded great. They even had their worship songs listed on the site, and the sets were amazing. So, we decided to give it a shot.

Two Sundays ago we went there for the first time. At most of the churches we had tried something had gone wrong or sounded wrong or simply did not fit our needs. Glendale hit on everything on our list, going above and beyond our expectations on almost all of them. It all began in the daycare when we first came inside.

We walked in and went to the daycare to drop off our daughter, Addison. She normally cries when we hand her over to the daycare workers. I sat her on the floor so I could fill out her sticker, and the door to the daycare opened up as someone else put their kids in and she just walked inside and started playing. We then asked a guy about classes for my son. He said that DJ would go up after worship to his class. He then found us 10 minutes later inside of the congregation and said that he was wrong, and DJ could go to his class now.

I took DJ up to his class and dropped him off. My son knew the song they were worshipping to and took off inside. I went back down and listened to the sermon. I enjoyed the sermon, and the worship music they played really primed me to receive the message it contained. Then we went to get DJ from class. Normally, when I pick DJ up from class and ask him what he learned he tells me he doesn’t remember. This time he was able to list several people from the Bible they had talked about as well as two of the songs they had sang in worship.

We did not stay for Sunday school the first week, as we already had other plans. So we picked up DJ and left. I figured that they would send us a form letter or give us a call during the week. I was wrong. Instead, the senior pastor showed up at the house with fresh baked bread and talked to Julie for a while. He left there headed to several other people’s houses. Not going to lie, that really impressed me a lot.  It might have made a bigger impression on me than anything.

Friday we attended the Celebrate Recovery (CR) group at Glendale. It was everything that a CR should be. Friendly, happy, safe and you feel that you can talk about the things that you need to share and no one will judge you or look at you differently. The Celebrate Recovery Missouri State representative goes to GCC. I was glad they  had a CR over any of the other recovery groups I have ever attended. I love CR in particular because of the change it has made in my life, so I was very happy to go to another one and can envision myself becoming a productive part of it in the future.

We came back and attended GCC again this past Sunday. I heard one of  the best worship services I have sat through (ever) and the sermon focused on fulfilling our Christian commission by going into jails and/or prisons if we felt called to do so as part of their prison ministry. This time we went to Sunday school and it was also really good. After Julie and I left we talked about our experience there. We had each encountered so many positives that we both had reached the same conclusion ……….we had found our new home!

Happy Mother's Day

I know that I often write for all audiences, but for this one I am specializing. For starters, it is Mother's Day today. Secondly, my wife Julie has been out of town the last week. She has a cousin that was graduating from medical school in Arizona so she took our daughter and went to Arizona. I miss her terribly and she was not here for me to shower love and affection upon. Instead, I have a list of reasons that I love my wife. This is a very partial list, as there are many reasons I love her. These are just the first 10 that came to my mind:

1. She has always put Christ first in all that she does.
2. She gave birth to my beautiful baby girl, Addison Grace. 
3. She is an amazing step-mother to my son DJ.
4. She makes me want to be a better person, and thanks to her I am becoming one.
5. She sees me for who I am, not the person I used to be. 
6. She has a beautiful voice. Seriously, she sang in Carnegie Hall!
7. She always sees the best in everyone she meets.
8. She supports the ministry that I do, Better Life in Recovery, and helps in every way possible.
9. She is the most beautiful person I have ever met. 
10. Her smile lights up the room.
11. Her compassion is unparalleled. She is the most empathetic person I know.
12. Her love for Christ is unlike few I have ever known! He is the drive behind every choice she makes. 
13. She completes me. When my glass feels half-empty she fills it up, when I am down she comforts me. I am so much more with her by my side than I would every be without her.
14. She has never read 50 Shades of Grey.

Like I said, this is a very partial list and 10 was not enough.  What I want you to do is think about the women in your life. Whether they are your mother, wife, sister or friend and whether or not they have kids is unimportant. Ask yourself this question, "Where would I be without the women in my life?" I know I would not be here!

So to my mom, my son's mother Heidi and my wife Julie; thank you for being pro-life. If not for you, I would not be here and neither would my son or my daughter. Thanks to my step-mother who stepped up and tried the best she could with a kid that at times I am sure she wanted to kill........literally! Thanks to my sister, who at times had to play mom to me when I was in my addiction. I guarantee I would be dead if not for her a long time ago. Thanks also to Becca and her mother Julie. They played a huge role in my turning my life around. 

I could go on and on about the women who have impacted my life, and played a huge role in it but I will not. Instead I ask that you contact the women who have made a difference in your life and let them know how much they have meant to you. If you want to say something about one of them on here, please feel free to share. Have a great Mother's Day!!!!!!

Church in Under 60 Minutes or Your Money Back

I had put up something on Facebook about the Chicago Bears squeaking out a win. A friend commented that it was "almost embarrassing." I told her that I would take embarrassed with a win. I thought about Woody Harrelson's character in White Men Can't Jump when he talks about some people who would rather look good and lose than look bad and win. This reminded me of the world we live in today and how I am supposed to live my life. I should not live to look good and win the approval of those around me. Why don't we want their approval?

We are told that the world would hate us. In John 15:18-21 Jesus says to His disciples, "If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also.

That said, I don't think that we should be after the hate of the world. We are not going out of our way to make the world hate us. That said, wrong is wrong and we are to call those things out when they are IN THE CHURCH. We are not to go around judging those who are outside of the church. Instead, we are to be salt and light. That means we are to stand out and be different from those around us because we are called to a higher purpose.

We are called to act like Jesus. We are called to follow the commands of the Bible. We are to love God and to love our neighbors. Does that mean we will not talk to our neighbors about Christ and our faith? Absolutely not! In fact, we are called to talk to them about Christ and what He has called us to do as Christians. That does not mean we stand in judgement. Instead, we lead by example and inform/teach. I plant the seed, that is it. Only God can make it grow.

Now, back to the movie quote. Would you rather look good and lose, or look bad and win? When it comes to this world, if they cannot accept the way I live my life and the calling I follow than I would rather look bad to them. I don't have to fit in. In fact, I don't want to. Don't forget, the stakes are high. Winners get eternal life. To do that, we need to not follow the ways of the world. We need to look different, because once we accept Christ we are different.

So, how different from the secular world is today's church in America? I am sure that back in the early days of Christianity, church only lasted 45 minutes. There were 2-4 worship songs, a 15-20 minute sermon than two more worship songs. It was probablya  rush to get out the door and leave on your camel first to beat traffic. In fact, I bet that at least one if not two of those songs were not worship songs at all. I bet a couple of the songs they played in the early church were secular songs that were popular at the time so that more of the non-Christians would check the church out. Right?????

The church today is trying so hard to look like and not offend the secular world that we are looking more and more like the world outside of the church. We play secular songs that don't even tie in to the message. We have short sermons and short meeting times. We try not to offend any of the people who come to our church. Why? Because that is the popular thing to do. Because if we don't, then we might have some people who are unhappy stop coming to our church. They will go somewhere else and find a feel good, secular music playing, God loves you as you are why should you change hour or less church were they get dessert but no main course.

I say let them go. Why do we care so much what everybody thinks about us. It is sad that the churches today seem to be on a time schedule. What if the Spirit guides the pastor to talk for longer? Then we lose part of the sermon or we end the service with no last worship music. How is that spiritually nourishing? What happened to the church we have today?

We have traded in a sit down dining establishment for a fast food restaurant. We get nothing substantial or healthy. Instead, we get dessert and junk. Just like our physical bodies, our spiritual bodies are obese and out of shape. We are there to worship and let the Holy Spirit work on us and guide us. Who are we to put time constraints on the Holy Spirit? How dare us! I know that I am used to the short and sweet services because that is all that I know. But I am not always satisfied with them.

 I yearn for more! My spiritual batteries get depleted, and my spirit starves for more sometimes. I pray for 20-30 minutes in the morning. I break open my Bible several times a day. I write on the things that I read and learn. I share them with my wife and sometimes my coworkers. I have Jesus frequently in my daily life. That said, I want more!!

I have gone to multiple different churches in the same day, or gone to all of the services in one day to hear the differences in the sermons and see how they spoke to me. All I listen to is worship music. I meet with a weekly men's group. There is something about corporate worship I can't get anywhere else. The church is a locker room, and I need to get that play book down. I need more!

Now, don't get me wrong. There is great secular music out there, but not to be playing from speakers in your parking lot. There is also amazing worship music. I don't believe, as one of my wife's professors did, that drums are tools of the devil. I love contemporary Christian music as well as the old hymns. I love to sing out loud and express my adoration for Christ. Nothing primes my spirit to hear and apply a sermon more than great worship music. How can secular music possibly prime me to receive the message? It can't, period!

I have a novel idea. How about the churches with several services have the last one be a longer service. Let there be more worship and a longer message. That way the people who only care about the fluff, whose lives are so busy they can only take an hour or two (the extra hour is for that one small group they attend) out of their busy weeks, can have their sermon. They can get the fast food version. Those who want to spend more time in worship and listening to the word get to hear it, too. Those who hunger get fed and the truly thirsty get their thirst quenched! How amazing would that be?

Good Friday, Easter and worship music

Today is Good Friday. I worked, then I went on a 20 mile bike ride. During the bicycle ride, which was on the Greenways in Springfield, I enjoyed nature. I looked at God's creation, and it was good. I saw squirrels, rabbits, birds, trees, flowers and a lot of people. How anyone could possibly look at all that I saw today and think it all came from nothing. That there was a time that space, time and matter didn't exist and it all came into being from a "singularity" or that it just all existed just so and now we have life springing from non-living matter without the guidance of a master's hand is beyond me......and totally irrelevant to this blog.

Instead, I want to look at what I did when I got home on Good Friday. I came home and have spent the last 3 hours in front of the computer signing worship songs. I love to worship, and I have listened to my favorites tonight: Brandon Heath, Casting Crowns, Mercy Me, Third Day, Sanctus Real, Tenth Avenue North, Matt Maher, John Waller, David Crowder, Jeremy Camp, Newsboys, Chris and Conrad, Kutless, Chris Tomlin, Finding Favour and Jonny Diaz. Hillsong and Sidewalk Prophets. I am sure that I left some out, and as for the women and rap worship that I listen to.........I just can't hit the notes or rap well enough to sing on a night of worship.

I just want to share a couple of songs with you that really stood out to me. It is not on me to judge anyone, but there are a lot of people that have forgotten what it means to be a Christian. They have forgotten what Good Friday and Easter are about. Christ died for us, and yet we are afraid to look different to the world. We may go to church, we may tithe, we may raise our hands in worship. That does not make a Christian. Are you cussing, fornicating, drinking to inebriation, drugging, lying, stealing, gossiping, etc. I ask you to listen to this Matthew West song and ask if it describes you. Are you going through the motions:

So, are you just going through the motions? If so, you don't have to anymore. You're past sins no longer matter. God is a God of love, and He loves you regardless of what you have done. He loves you anyway:

Jesus loved us so much, that He did not want us to be bound to death. He wanted us to have the opportunity to be forgiven:

How could He possibly remove the debt of sin that we all owe? He paid the ultimate price for us. Jesus paid it all:

But that is not enough. It was not enough for Jesus to simply die for us. Many have died for others. What He did was come back from the dead. For us, He is risen:

Jesus died and came back three days later. Today we remember His death. On Sunday we celebrate His resurrection. Because of His sacrifice and resurrection, we are changed once we accept Christ. He gave us amazing grace and our chains are gone:

So in closing, we are created new because of the Grace that was shown to us not only when Christ died, but when He was resurrected. Because of that I am a new person, I'm not who I was:

What I really want you to focus on as we approach Easter Sunday is that we were born into sin. God loved us so much that He sent Christ to die, so that we could have eternal life. The problem is that most of us take the Grace we were given for granted. We continue to live our lives as the world does. Christ said that they would hate us as they hated Him. We are not on Earth to fit in, but to shine like a lamp on a hill. You are no longer who you once were, so live like it! If you truly believe that Christ died for you, show it. Your attitude of gratitude should set you apart from the world. Your life should do one thing, like a beacon in a world of darkness it should shine:

Thank God for Rap

I know that for a lot of traditional Christians, rap is synonymous with everything evil. When I say rap the first thing that you think of is beats overlaid with lyrics about sex, drugs, violence and gangs. At one time I would have agreed with you. In my addiction, that is why I listened to rap. I could relate to what I was listening to. I lived as a drug dealer and a soldier of Satan.

I would listen to gangster rap and heavy metal. That was what I fed myself, and as the saying goes "Garbage In Garbage Out."I was always angry and violent. There was no pleasing me, I was one of the most unhappy people that you would meet, unless I was jacked up on meth (which was all of the time). Then I was pretty happy unless I had been up for several days, which happened every week. For years I stayed up for six days and slept on Sundays. The music contributed to my mood, and I listened to music I could relate to.

THINGS CHANGE!!

Today at the gym I listened to rap once again. I listened to LeCrae, who has songs entitled "Jesus Muzik" and "Prayin for You." I also had Tedashii "I'm a Believer" and Trip Lee "Cash or Christ" playing on my IPhone. Those are a couple of the song titles that I listened to this morning as I worked out. I bumped music that motivated me and at the same time uplifted me.

I left feeling exhausted physically and happy spiritually. I walked out of the gym uplifted and positive with what I can only call an optimistic attitude. This will translate into my having a great day at work and a great meeting after work with one of the guys working on our IT issues for Better Life in Recovery. I am excited to see how the web site is coming along, but that is another blog.

Bottom line: Rap has changed, and it has come a long way from DC Talk. It is better than the secular stuff out there for several reasons.

1. It glorifies and promotes Jesus Christ, not the entertainer
2. It is uplifting 
3. It is about positive situations and choices, not dead end choices and lifestyles
4. I would listen to it with my 4 year old and not worry about him repeating lyrics in school
5. It is music that brings me closer to Christ

PRAYER Pt. 1: Definition of Prayer

I guess that the best way to start off a series on prayer would be to define prayer. After all, it is hard to talk about something if we do not have a good idea what exactly we are talking about. So, what is prayer? Here are the definitions found on dictionary.com:

1. a devout petition to God or an object of worship.
2. a spiritual communion with God or an object of worship, as in supplication, thanksgiving, adoration,  or confession.
3. the act or practice of praying to God or an object of worship.
4. a formula or sequence of words used in or appointed for praying: the Lord's Prayer.
5. prayers, a religious observance, either public or private, consisting wholly or mainly of prayer.

Over the course of this series we are going to talk about the Christian concept of prayer. So we can rule out object of worship. Based on several scriptures we can also rule out formula or sequence of words. Honestly these definitions work, but not well. To learn about the concept of prayer to God, we should see what He says about it in His Living Word. So, what does the Bible say about prayer?

1 John 5:14-15 says, "This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us - whatever we ask - we know that we have what we asked of Him."

1 Thessalonians 5:17 says, "Pray continually."

John 16:23, "In that day you will no longer ask me anything. Very truly I tell you, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name."

We have made prayer much more complicated yet easier than it needs to be. I know that I suffer from this. I have no problem praying on my own, but get really nervous when I am praying outloud in the midst of others. I get nervous when I pray over food if the table has people I do not know at it. It is even more nerve-wracking for me when I am doing intercessory prayer (praying on behalf of someone else) in a group or I am praying with someone else out loud.

Prayer should not be this way. Prayer is not that difficult a thing to do, but in order to do it it must be understood. I fear things that I do not know or understand well. Math and spiders are the two examples I have. One of them I do not understand well, and the other I have never had any reason to learn about. Therefore I am intimidated and scared by them. I no longer want to be intimidated by prayer. 


This series is an opportunity for me to learn more about what prayer is and share that knowledge with you. It is me realizing that not only do I not know enough about prayer, but that I am pretty sure I do not pray often enough and need to pray more. But in order to pray, I should understand what prayer is. So what is my definition of prayer?

Prayers are frequent conversations of meaning and purpose with our Heavenly Father in the name of His Son Jesus Christ that are sincere and filled with an attitude of gratitude, reverence, love, faith, humility and thanksgiving which allows us to let our needs be known while deepening our relationship with God.

The bottom line is this: Prayer IS an ongoing  conversation with God. Plain and simple, prayer is talking to God. Imagine having God on speed dial, "Siri, call Jehovah." Instantly, I have God on the other end and I can have a conversation with him where I pour my heart out. Just like your best friend, you should want to talk to God over the course of the day and share your life with Him. Prayer is showing that you are dependent on God. You are confiding in God, building your relationship and letting Him know that you need Him. Not praying is trying to live independent of God, telling Him that you don't want Him and you don't need Him.

Songs of Recovery - How the Devil Used Music to Control Me

There is something about music that really affects us. It has the ability to impact our lives, it can make life seem more worth living. Even Friedrich Nietzsche had to admit that. He said that, "Without music, life would be a mistake." Music is a great escape. It can save us from our feelings, or it can intensify them. Maya Angelou said, "Music was my refuge.  I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness." 

Music has always affected me in immeasurable ways. Like food is for our physical body, I believe that music is food for our soul. It will nourish us, sustain us, we are what we eat. Junk food is seen through our physical bodies when we have too much of it. That said, if we listen to junk music it can be seen in our actions and how we live our lives. Just like food, music has a manifestation.

I can remember listening to mostly gangster rap and heavy metal when I was in my addiction. I was angry, so I listened to angry music. I was violent, and I listened to music about violence. I was an addict and a drunk, so I listened to music about drug dealing and partying. I reveled in my sin, so I listened to songs about debauchery. I had extreme road rage, and have punched people at red lights and stop signs for cutting me off in traffic. The music encouraged my rage, and discouraged restraint.

Don't get me wrong, I take responsibility for my actions. That said, the music helped. Kind of like smoking cigarettes and cancer. You may not want to get cancer, yet you smoke. You are still responsible for the choice that you made, but the cigarettes led to lung cancer having a higher probability of occurance in you. Music is the same way. I probably would have continued making negative choices in my life without the music, but the music increased the probability of my making the choices that I did.

Even after the addiction, I still kept the music. And I wondered why I stayed angry. I wondered why I still felt such a strong pull to always do the wrong thing, to make the worst possible choice in any given scenario. I feel that music is just another way that the Devil can control us. I heard songs about drugs, money, threesomes and other sins. I sang these songs, and I liked them. Tell me that is not reinforcing the behaviors.

Why would you go to church and hear about Jesus dying to forgive us of our sins, then sing songs that praise the sins that Jesus died to forgive us of when we are not in church. I thank Jesus in church for dying to forgive the very same sins that I praise by singing about outside of church? That is nonsensical at best, and pure sin at its' worst. I believe that it sends mixed messages to those who know that we are Christian, to our family members and especially to our children. This goes back to a past blog that asked if you are a stop or a go Christian that you can find here:  http://spiritualspackle.blogspot.com/2011/05/stop-or-go.html

If we truly believe in the Bible and are trying to represent Christ, we would not sing songs that glorify sin! If you want to change your life, why would you only change one aspect of it and not change it completely? My listening and singing the songs that I did was just one more way for the Devil to control what went into my mind and came out of my mouth. It was also influencing my moods, emotions, how I appeared to those around me and how people look at Christians if I am one that they have close contact with.

 As a dad, I cannot imagine hearing my son sing the lyrics that permeated my life as an addict. Why would I want my son to hear music that is diametrically opposed to how I want him to grow up. He soaks up everything, and I know that what I listened to would have a detrimental effect on him if I still listened to it.........so I do not. I have made the switch to worship music. I no longer listen to secular music except on rare occasions. I no longer go to secular concerts, I only attend worship concerts. This is my choice, and I will get into the reasons for that in another blog. 

The bottom line is, we need to change what we ingest mentally. There is an acronym, GIGO, that come to mind. It stands for garbage in garbage out. If I continue to soak my soul with music that is garbage, then that will encourage me to act in ways that garbage, metaphorically speaking. The blogs that are entitled Songs of Recovery will be blogs that discuss how different songs have positively affected my recovery and strengthened my belief in Christ and will end with a video of the song. They will also discuss how that song can be used by you to encourage and strengthen your walk with Christ, or help you build a stronger recovery.

To end this blog, I do not have a song. Instead, I have a poem from the Passion for Christ Movement, or P4CM. It discusses how the devil loses us when we give up our secular interests and begin focusing on Christ and being Christ-like. How Dynamic Living and being a Lukewarm Christian are the exact opposite. It discusses how we have to make unpopular decisions and separate ourselves from worldly things. Christ did not call us to be comfortable...........

Living Free - And so it begins.....

Hello my name is Scott and I’m a …….. 

You see, this is the paramount difference between Living Free and many other programs that are available for people with Life Consuming Issues ( LCI ).  I have come to believe that I have been transformed and can not be defined by a label.  The reason this is possible? I have been healed by the amazing love and power of Jesus! Sounds cheesy, right? Inside church settings and programs the terms we throw around  lose translation to the rest of the world, especially the secular world.  I really can’t speak for you, a group of people, or anyone in generalizations. I can only speak for me. 

I have been changed by the power of God and now I have the Awesome opportunity to help other people. Not because I have the answers, but because I know who does. I serve only as a simple sign pointing upwards that says, “ hope and healing is possible and available. All you have to do is ask!” 

I have been asked to speak weekly via this blog regarding the beginning of a program my wife and I serve as coordinators for in our church called Living Free.  I admit very candidly that I have never participated in a blog but I am a man who will be honest and open as I proceed with this task.  If it somehow helps someone or serves to point them to a new beginning of hope, it is worth it. 

The journey began January 20^th with the first open facilitator training at our church for Living Free and culminated with the graduation of my team of facilitators. June 21^st we began and I am pleased to report a positive start: 17 adults, 10 children, 8 facilitators and 6 children’s workers.  That results in a total of 41 people involved in Living Free at our church for the first night.  Wow, to God be all the Glory and praise.  This result is right at ½ of what had pre-registered, but I know the best is yet to come.  We are not discouraged. This is amazing!

 

As I close this first Blog let me just say to you what my team has been saying for months

“God’s Got this”

Blessings,

Scott

Still on vacation... I want to love like that/Praise you in this Storm

My son is still surprising me every day on this vacation. He walked all day long once again today. This is the same son who cannot walk from the car to the tram at Silver Dollar City. He walked today from 10:30 - 7 at Walt Disney's Hollywood Studios. Two straight days of walking, running and jumping when he generally just perches on my shoulders.

He asked all of the time for me to bend down, just like he does when he wants to be picked up. The awesome part was, when I would bend down he would give me a kiss and keep walking. He loves me with his whole heart, and that heart is huge.
This vacation has been great, and I have been awed by his affection.

Do not get me wrong, his love overwhelms me often. Everytime that he sees me, when I drop him off at daycare and when I tuck him in at night he gives hugs and kisses and lets me know that he loves me. He even acts that way when I put him in timeout after he gets out of the corner. That is love.

I want to rely on God like my son does me. I want to love Christ the way my son loves me. Don't get me wrong, I try to love God with all that I have and all that I am. I feel that I could do a better job, and my son has shown me what unconditional means.

My son has me there to pick him up when he feels that he cannot make it on his own. He gets tired, and he is confident that all he has to do is look at me and put his arms up and I will swoop down and pop him up on my shoulders, making his day easier.

I know that all I have to do is turn things over to God when they get to overwhelm me. I know it, but it is sometimes hard to do. I pray for his will to be done, but I sometimes forget that his will and mine are not always the same. If I do what He wants me to, I find that my life is easier. When I try to do His will, he pops me up on His shoulders and insures that I suceed. But I sometimes forget to do that.

My son shows me that he loves me no matter what. If he is having fun or in trouble, if it is just me or it is in front of his friends he is unafraid to show me how much he loves me. He will scream "I love you whole wide world" across his daycare with it full of kids.

I want to continue building my relationship with Christ to the point that I am unafraid to vocally claim my love. I will be unafraid to pray no matter who is around. I will tell others of the changes that the Holy Spirit has wrought in me regardless of who might judge me. I will raise my hands in worship no matter who is next to me or watching, even if I am the only one in the room who worships that way.

I spent my whole life in agony denying there was a God. I will spend the rest of my life in love with the force that recreated me and gave me a life that I can be proud of. I will praise God in the peaks and valleys, the feasts and the famines, the sunny days and in the storms. I know how miserable my life was without Christ, and I know how blessed I am now with Christ.

What My Son Taught Me on Vacation About Being a Christian

My son has gotten into a habit that I thoroughly enjoy now, but would be annoying if he were to continue it into his teenage years. He never wants to walk anywhere. As soon as we get out of the car, he will turn and look at me with arms uplifted and say," Daddy, carry me" to which I now reply, "You will look really funny riding on my shoulders when you are 16" as I pick him up.

He rides on my shoulders regardless of where we go. He wants me to carry him when we go to the supermarket, the park, Silver Dollar city, the mall, McDonald's or church. He may walk, but he never walks more than 2 or 3 minutes. Every time he asks, I stoop down and pick him up. I simply cannot tell him no.

The reason for refusing to tell him no is the memories I have of my father carrying me on his shoulders. I remember how connected I felt to my dad when I was perched right by his ear, whispering questions and telling him I loved him. I thought I could see everything, and I knew that my dad loved me. That is why I do not tell him no when he asks me, and he never walks more than a couple of minutes.

This all changed yesterday at Walt Disney World Animal Kingdom. He walked, which on occasion he does. What was different this time is that he never asked me to pick him up. We were at Animal Kingdom from 9 AM to 6:30 PM and he walked the entire time. I was surprised, but not truly amazed.

The reason for his walking yesterday is quite simple. He thoroughly enjoyed everything he saw and everything he did while at Disney. There was not a minute that his enthusiasm or curiosity was not piqued. Walking was no longer a chore, it was a path to fulfilling his desires.

As I reflected on the day I was reminded of Matthew 18:3, which says, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."

When it comes to our faith, a lot of us are like my son. We expect those around us to do all of the work for us. We expect our pastor and our small group leader to do all the research, and explain everything to us. We do not want to spend time doing anything for ourselves. We lack both enthusiasm and curiosity when it comes to God. Why is this?

The problem is that we do simple math, and think we have the equation worked out: Church + tithe + small group = saved. That is all that we think that we have to do. We may know that we need to do more, but we think that we can coast. We choose to forget the first of what Christ told us are the 2 commandments to live by in Matthew 22, Mark 12 and Luke 10. It was also mentioned in Deuteronomy 6:5.

This command is to love God with our whole heart, mind, strength and soul. When you love something or someone that deeply it never leaves your mind. It is your first thought in the morning, and the last thing in your head as you go to sleep. It is something you enjoy, and it is not a chore.

Part of the issue here is that we are no longer curious when it comes to learning about Christ. I think most of us feel that after we get baptized everything is easy from here. We think, "I am saved, and that is all that I need to do. Why should I have to put time into a relationship?" I think that this is why a lot of marriages fail, too. Once the vows are exchanged and we put the ring on, we feel that we no longer need to work on building the relationship. That is probably a good subject for another blog.

We also lack enthusiasm, because worshiping God is not that the cool or hip thing to do. When your friends ask you why you did not come out last night, it is pretty lame to tell them it was because you were reading the Bible\meditating\praying. Why don't we stay home and do that. What is really so cool about hanging out with her friends.

I don't know about you, but I would much rather have eternal life than the friendship of some drunks and hedonists. That may sound harsh, but sometimes we have to be. Christ said he did not come to bring peace, but a sword that would divide households.

If we're to be divided from our own family, it would stand to reason that we would also be divided from our friends. We need to once again make reading the Bible, praying, meditating and reading books to assist us in living a Christian life a huge part of our life. We need to start enjoying building our relationship with Christ. If we are truly infused with the Holy Spirit we should be. If we are not enthused, than we need to look at what we are not doing right. I will write about how we can make Christ a major part of our lives in the future.

Tithing Part 2

Let me tell you a very interesting story about tithing. I had began tithing after I got saved. I made it a point to round up my tithing, because when it comes to tithing I want God to round up for me (figuratively speaking, of course). I had trouble tithing when I first decided to. There was no possible way that I could, but God had given me a life again so I owed it to Him to step out in faith. So I put my trust in Him, and tithed 10%. It worked out in the end.

I will tell that story in another blog entitled Tithing Part 1. I know that it probably should have came before a blog entitled Tithing Part 2, but it will not. I guess that I am not very good at chronological order, nor am I able to do simple addition very well. That for me would be true to form, because I have never been that great at history or math. Math was actually the only non-A grade on my transcript for my Associates Degree. Segue over, now on to the story.

After I got saved, the song "I'm Not Who I Was" impacted me. You could say that it was my anthem as a drug addicted convict who found hope and changed my life completely. I no longer was who I used to be. I found out that Brandon Heath, Francesca Battistelli and Leeland were performing in Springfield. The tickets were $10 for general admission, or $50 for VIP tickets. I wanted to get the VIP tickets, because with them came a meet and greet. I wanted the opportunity to give my testimony to Brandon Heath and let him know how much his song had impacted my life.

So when my paycheck came, I payed my bills and then set aside my tithe. After doing that I discovered that after my car and insurance payments came out the following week and after I tithed on Sunday I would not have the $100 to get the VIP tickets for my fiance and me. I would have the $20 for regular tickets, but not the extra $80 for the ones that I wanted.

I made a promise to myself and to God when I had gotten saved about tithing, and I was not about to backslide. The last thing that I wanted to do was lie to the one that I owed my new life to. I lied in my addiction, not in my recovery. I was not about to begin lying again. I refuse to give the Devil a place to start getting back in to my life. I worked for two decades to get him out of it. At least, that is how I see it.

So I went to church and tithed and tithed on Sunday. It was one of the hardest decisions that I had made in my early recovery, other than tithing at all. It did not make sense to me to give my money to God and the church at first. In Tithing I I will look at the Biblical reasons that I began tithing when I first got saved.

I just decided that seeing Brandon Heath would be amazing enough without meeting him, and that is what I was going to do. I loved his music, and really enjoyed the other two performers that he was touring with. I would tithe, and the following week I was going to see the concert with my fiance. I would buy the tickets the following day after I got off of work.

The next day I went home after work, changed and grabbed my mail before going to get my tickets. In the mail was a letter from my car company. I was in the middle of filing bankruptcy, and my car company wanted to give me the option to finish paying off  my car instead of writing it off. The letter said that the automatic payment that they would normally be taking out in two days was not coming out. I needed to fill out papers that stated I still wanted to buy the car. They were willing to allow me to miss a car payment and were dropping the percentage rate of my car loan if I completed the paperwork and called them. Not only was I able to not pay my car payment for that month, but the drop in the interest rate they were giving me dropped my car payment almost $100 a month.

To this day, I do not know why I went home and changed, or why I got my mail and opened it immediately. I never went home and changed, nor did I ever get the mail. I always let my roommate get the mail out of the mailbox and would grab it off of the end table where he put my mail. On that day I did not. To me, this was all a God thing. This was God showing me that if I put my trust in Him, He would provide for not only my needs but some of my wants.

Needless to say, I got to go to the Brandon Heath concert. It was amazing, and so was telling him my testimony. That too is another blog that I will write someday in the future. Cannot wait to share with you tomorrow morning. Hope that this week is a blessing for all of you!

Carmen Burgess

Buy this CD and sample a few of her other songs at her site: www.carmenburgess.com