Prayer for 2009

For the past 4 years I've been doing the One Year Bible.  I try to read the passages selected for each and every day.  Sure... some days I miss... It's not about being legalistic or anything... just wanting to draw closer to God through the regular reading of the Bible.  I also like to kick start that reading time with a very short prayer that I repeat each time so that God will really work on my heart as I spend that quiet time with him.

This year was a pretty crazy, roller coaster ride as it came to my walk.  I have felt both incredibly close and incredibly far from God at different times.  I was blown away by his mercies and grace in some areas of ministry, and frustrated and hurt by his apparent lack of involvement in others.  I've both loved seminary and been overwhelmed by it.

It's very interesting to go back and look at the short prayer that I put together for each year.  I can see how God moved in each one of those years...

2005 - Passion for God's word, his people, his world and his service

2006 - Hear God clearly, direction in career and family

2007 - Build a stronger servants heart and use me to build your kingdom

2008 - Use me to do what I could never do without you

In 2009 I want to get back to basics... loving God, and loving others.  Ministry can get crazy and I don't want to be one of those guys that start strong but don't finish well.  My prayer for this year is taken from the book IT by Craig Groeschel.  This book has impacted me more then anything else I read this year.  He concluded with a simple prayer that I will pray each day this year as I seek to hear and follow God.

2009 - Stretch me.  Ruin me.  Heal me.

Sounds simple... but I'm expect God will just completely rock everything with those simple six words.  

Looking forward to another awesome and crazy year!

Resolutions

Christmas has come and gone... (Insert sigh of relief here) ... and now I begin my yearly ritual of seeking God's will and direction for my life in the coming year.

Every year around this time I like to look back at the past year, review what God has done in my life. I like to examine where did I listen closely to God and see his blessings, and where did I try to go it alone in my own strength and see things crash and burn :)

Mark Batterson has a great post on his blog on how to go about setting resolutions for the New Year. You can read it here. This is pretty similar to what I've been doing the past few years but I've never broken it down to specific categories. I really like that idea. In fact, I like it so much that as soon as I'm done writing this post I'm going to refill my coffee mug and spend an hour or so in quiet time and prayer and put some of the ideas that come to me down on paper... well... that is if the kids will give me an hour :)

This Sunday I'm speaking at our church. I'll be talking on Resolutions there as well. I have a few ideas of where I would like this to go... Originally I was going to do a big push on Bible reading and getting into a Small Group... but the senior pastor covered that idea great last Sunday so that narrows down my ideas which is great :)

Merry Christmas

Christmas is both a joy and a stress...  I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the world would turn something as beautiful as the birth of the Saviour of all into a time of stress, frustration and hurt.

This year, I don't know, but I'm not as stressed as normal.  Probably has to do with the fact for the first time in 12 years we are doing no driving!  Everyone is visiting us!  Praise God for that one!  

With all the business of the next few days, I just want to rest in the joy and peace in knowing that the Lord of Lords, the prince of peace, and the king of kings has come into the world... and for some bizarro reason, he loves me so much that he allowed himself to be born in a stable surrounded by animals and shepherds.  The creator of the universe loved me so much that he would humble himself like that!  That thought is just MIND BLOWING!  And I want to savour every minute of celebrating that event this year with family and friends who mean so much to me!

The Saviour is born!  Peace on Earth and good will to all people!

Have an awesome Christmas with your loved ones.

Monday Mind Dump

Taking another Monday off to get the house ready for hosting Christmas. Lots to do... but figured it's time for a little mind dump :-)

• We've been continuing the Great Purge in our house. Last week I got rid of about 5 garbage bags of junk that just was taking up space. I was hoping to get to our bedroom closet today... but with so much to do I guess that is going to have to wait till the New Year.
  
  
• Couple of things I REALLY want to be doing better at in 2009... The first is I'm planning on getting on an exercise and diet routine to drop 15 lbs. Not sure exactly if I'll do this with playing more squash or getting back into jogging...
  
  
• The second thing is I need to be much better at taking a Sabbath. I just find that I'm not resting and relaxing nearly as much as I should be... I want to spend a lot less time in front of the TV or computer screen and get back into doing more art.... whether painting Warhammer miniatures or drawing. I just love doing things more creative and need to make more time to do this. I think taking that Sabbath rest will just really help in so many other areas of my life; with my family, at the church, and whatever.
  
  
• I going through David Allen's book, Getting Things Done. I'm just loving this and already seeing an improvement in my productivity at the church.
  
  
• For our Christmas gift exchange with my wife's family we all agreed that we would have to make the gift. I'm making a great gift for my brother-in-law... I gotta get it all painted up and finished today.
  

Do We Really Hate People That Much?

This video is awesome!  I came across this video from another blog I read and just thought this was a great story.



What if every single one of us who confesses to be a follower of Jesus loved people this much to be recognized by an atheist as a nice man! What a testimony to the world that would be!

If you're reading this on Facebook you can find the video at this LINK.

Wolverine Trailer!

Now this gets my geek blood all excited! Check out the trailer for the new Wolverine movie coming out next May. I haven't been this excited about a super hero movie in a while...



If you're reading this on Facebook then click this LINK.

Monday Mind Dump

Today I'm at home using up some of my remaining vacation days before the end of the year. I have a small honey-do list to take care... and I plan on getting to that shortly :-)

Here are some ramblings this morning while the self-cleaning oven is sending nasty small into my computer area...

• "Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ." This one little verse has just been ROCKING my world the past few months. If Jesus is the example, and he DIED for me, then just what does that say about how I live my life? Who am I dying for? How am I imitating the life of Christ... so that that's what people are seeing? Jesus loved the poor. Loved the hurting. Loved the outcast. He spend his time with thieves and the least of these. Do I? This simple little verse is just rocking everything that I believe about the institution of the church and is shaking way out of my comfort zone! And, crazy as that sounds, I LOVE IT!
  
  
• I'm having a bunch of computer problems here at home... had a look at it this weekend... turns out the fan on the graphic card is not working and it's getting hotter then a frying pan! That explains everything... guess it's either a new card... or a $2 fan that I just aim at the current card :-) Think I'll go with the cheaper option for a while.
  
  
• Finished my class on Pastoral Leadership Foundations last week. I just LOVED that class! I learned so much that really inspired me and challenged me in this life God has called us to! Even though it can be hard and discouraging I could never imagine myself ever doing anything else!
  
  
• This Saturday I'm speaking at a Christmas banquet for our College and Career groups. I love ministering to young adults. I just love their passion and potential!
  
  
• Now that school is off for a month, I have a number of books that I'd like to finish off. I'm going to try to get through 1 book a week until mid-January. After that, I'm thinking that I'm going to take a 6 month fast from reading any ministry books (besides my school books of course!) I'm just going to take that time to read a couple of biographies and my Bible. And that's it. No Small Group books. No integration books. No pastoring books. Just want to really get into God's story... and a couple of stories of some others who have followed him to do some amazing things in our world.
  
  
• My colleague at church, Lynette, won an iPod Touch from The Sticks conference that we all went to last month! My geeky techno blood is a tad jealous :-)
  

Sam the ROCK STAR!

I think my daughter Samantha is going to be the next Jerry Lee Lewis! Great balls of fire!! This girl just REFUSES to sit down whenever she plays the piano :-)

Way to ROCK that recital sweety!

Hulk Vs

I love these Marvel animated movies! The latest one is coming out this January and features three of my favorite characters: Hulk, Wolverine and Thor.

Check out the trailer!



Or check out www.Marvel.com to see the video there! I LOVE THIS STUFF!

The Great Purge

My wife and I have started something in our house this week... and I'm calling it The Great Purge!

We have just really been overwhelmed with how much stuff we have.  Closets are overflowing.  Kid toys are everywhere.  Every nook and cranny of our house has just filled with stuff.

BUT NO MORE!  

We have been going from room to room and just been purging everything that is of no use and simply taking up space.  On the weekend we completely redid our office space.  I actually want to sit at the computer now :-)  Before you could barely move in there and now it's just so organized, clutter-free and simple!  LOVE IT!!

Last night we tackled our entertainment unit.  We bought a leather binder with sleeves to store our DVDs.  So we threw away all the DVD and CD cases and put them nicely away in the binder.  Guess what?  There were THREE big garbage bags full of cases!  THREE!!!  That was all just completely cluttering the area.  Not only that but we put together a box full of old kid movies and other films to donate to charities that hopefully could be of use to others.

Our next plan of attack is the all the toys in the house.  The reality is our kids only play with about 5% of all the toys that are stacked up in their rooms in and in the basement.  They do not want or need them.  So, another big trip to a local charity will be taking place with those!  This has also encouraged us to try to simplify Christmas as well with the amount of stuff they get.

The Great Purge has been great so far!  Can't wait for the spring when we can finish the purge by cleaning out the garage and the shed!

By the way, that picture is not from my house.  It's not that bad :-)

Monday Mind Dump

As we start a new month I figured I'd dump some of the stuff floating around in my head these days :-)

• This morning I delivered 94 shoe boxes filled with toys and candy to be sent to impoverished children all around the world.  I'm just amazed by these boxes... filled with stuff that we would never give to our own kids for Christmas... yet will be the highlight of the year for most of the children who will receive them.
• Just 2 more weeks of school for this semester.  I've LOVED this class on Pastoral Leadership Foundations.  I learned a TON of great stuff.  Next semester I'm going to try to take two classes, Moral Theology and an Old Testament course.  Hopefully that won't kill me :-)
• Looking forward to having the family visit us this Christmas.  I think this is the first time in 12 years that Danielle and I have been together that we didn't have to spend hours in the car over the holidays!
• I'm working at completely revamping our integration process here at the church.  A big job... but going to be THE key component if we're to grow the size of the congregation.
• Started listening to Christmas music :-)  Third Day's "Christmas Offerings" is an awesome album!
• I'm beginning to wonder if I'm way too hard on myself.  Lately I've been my worst critique and completely dissatisfied with my performance in many areas of my work and life.  Not good and I really need to KNOCK IT OFF!
• I'm speaking at our seniors Christmas lunch this week.  I'm going to show a clip from A Charlie Brown Christmas.  Should be fun... considering a bunch of them are from Menonite backgrounds and have no clue who Charlie Brown is :-)
• The Dark Knight comes out on DVD on the 9th!!  So looking forward to getting that!
• Reading Pagan Christianity.  LOVING IT!  Really brings out the rebelious, anti-church guy that lurks in me though :-)  That's always been my biggest fear... that we become this comfortable church that does it's church thing without ever really reaching the potential in each and every person here... or really having any impact in the community around us.
• Some days I wonder what would my life look like if I was really... and I mean REALLY REALLY... living a life that was fully surrendered to Jesus and the mission that he has for the world?
• Need to get together with my Small Group leaders again and chat about how things have been going... and then need to get planning on January for the next batch of new groups.
• Is it wrong that I REALLY want an iPhone?  :-)  Still love my toys I guess...