We are now spending a lot of our time waiting and convincing. Of course there are tons of other things that we are doing with a five day old baby, but much of it seems to be waiting. Waiting for Jessi Girl to wake up so we can see those eyes. Waiting for her to start to wake up so we can watch the cutest wake up process ever. Waiting for her to go to sleep so we can sleep. Waiting for her to wake up because we know she is ready to eat. Waiting for her to get used to a schedule of some sorts so we can too. Even before she got here we waited for her to arrive. We waited to know what she would look like.

So we wait and wait and wait. Then in the long nights and extended crying periods we do a lot of convincing…at least we try. We walk her all over the house and tell her everything’s ok as if we have a clue why she is still crying. We swaddle her up. We change her diapers. We hold her tight. We do all these things and constantly try to convince her. We tell her we love her. We tell her everything’s ok. We tell her she’s fine. We tell her she will be our favorite over all the other future kids if she will go to sleep. We tell her everything in hopes that we can convince her.

The good thing is that in a while (exact period of time unknown) she will start to catch on to these things. She will know that we love her. She will sleep without us constantly waiting to see if it will ever happen. Makes me think about my life. How many times has God done that for me? How much does He still do it? He waits and waits and waits for me. He waits for me to give myself over to Him every day. He waits for me to obey Him. He waited for me to give Him my heart and mind. He made all of creation trying to convince me of Him. He uses my little baby to convince me that He loves me. He tells me He loves me. He tells me everything’s ok.

I hope that I can live my life responding to Him in the way Jessi Girl is growing to know us.

We just had our baby yesterday.  What did you think I was gona talk about today?  Of course I’m gonna talk about the baby.  But you got a pretty good dose of Jessi yesterday so I’ll hit it from a different angle.

This is our first baby.  We have never done this before.  I had lots of people tell me all kinds of things in preparation.

• Watch the birth.
• Cut the chord.
• Save the placenta (gross).
• Don’t look!
• Don’t watch the epidural.
• Don’t complain about anything.
• Soak it in.
• Take pictures.
• Focus on momma.

But no amount of pep talks from everyone can really prepare you for what you are about to experience.  Yes, the birthing process is amazing (and messy) but there is so much more to it than that.  There is new life!  There is a first breath.  There are fingers and toes!  There is lots of screaming.  And through it all I don’t understand how anyone could miss God in the whole thing.  I can’t in my wildest dreams imagine that what happened yesterday is happening by accident or because of survival of the fittest or whatever other theories one might have.  There is no way that all the insane intricacies of that whole day are chance.

• The baby practices the main skills she needs after birth in the womb.
• The baby’s body temperature is regulated by touching the mother’s skin.
• The mother’s milk changes to fit exactly what the baby needs.

I mean seriously?  I wouldn’t ever think of those things.  To see everything that I did yesterday and walk away not KNOWING there is a Designer and Creator just seems crazy.  I’m just still amazed that I get to see these things.  And I’m just through day 1!

Throughout a pregnancy there are many different aches, pains, and discomforts most of which I have no room to talk about and will not pretend I even kind of understand.  But as a husband of a pregnant wife the worst thing is watching her hurt and not be able to do anything.  Yeah, I can go get food and water.  I can help her up.  I can rub her back.  But I still can’t fix the problem.

As a man, that is a major issue.  I want so desperately to fix her pain.  I wanna make it better now.  I want to see her sleep comfortably without the tiniest hint of discomfort written on her forehead.  Now that we are 11 days past our due date the discomfort and pains seem to have worsened and also seem to be sharpening by the day.  With those aches and pains comes more desire and want in me to fix her problems.

I bet that this is a little bit of how God feels when we are in pain because we are trying to run our own lives.  He wants so bad to make it all better for us (not in the money and security and happiness sort of way but the contentment and joy and relational way).  We just have to allow Him to take care of us.  I wish it was that way for husbands too.

It’s a new week and still no baby so let’s focus on something a little different.  This week for Video Of The Week we have a song called I Will Go by Starfield.  I love this band and have been known to use several of their songs.  This song in particular is an amazing attitude that I want my heart to be like.  It is to go share the love of Christ with the dirty people, the homeless people, the broken, hungry, poor people and not just the people that tithe well or have nice cars or have vacation homes I can borrow.  My prayer is that I can get past my comforts and follow Him.

I wanna live for You, go where You lead me.
I wanna follow You.

One way that my family is extremely blessed is through prayer.  I’m not talking about me being an excellent pray-er, but rather the numerous people all over the place that are always praying for us.  People that we talk to often and people that I probably don’t remember their names.  But, they know us or are connected to us and love us enough to pray for us.  Many of you are part of that group as well.  We are IMMENSELY grateful for that.

But today, I would love for you to pray for a family close to us.  I don’t know that the issues are public so I’m gonna keep it on the DL, but I know that God is bigger than that.  This family is pregnant with a little boy and he is having some issues with his heart developing correctly and needs our prayers.  They are going in tomorrow to meet with a doctor about it.  I don’t know all of the medical stuff or the details surrounding it, but I know that they are an amazing, godly family and that they would absolutely appreciate being lifted up through this.

So please, today and tomorrow and on, join me and my family in praying for the health of this little man, strength and courage for his wonderful mom, dad and big sister, and above all peace, faith and trust in God throughout the whole ordeal.  Thank you all so much!

Last week my wisdom teeth were chopped out of my head.  Not the most fun I have had for sure, but it could be worse.  Well, the most common complication from the removal of wisdom teeth is dry socket.  That’s when some crap happens to cause the new hole in your head to be unprotected and heal slower.  Oh and there is pain involved.  Well, I was warned ahead of time by my now fellow wisdom teeth removal survivors that dry socket is something that I should do everything I can to avoid.  So, I did.  I didn’t spit.  I tried not to yawn, cough or sneeze.  I still haven’t used a straw.  I didn’t even brush my teeth for 4 days!  Ok, that’s a lie, but I brushed them VERY gently.

And guess what!

I got dry socket.  The bottom left side of my mouth is not agreeing with the other three surgery sites that healing is a good idea.  A few days after the surgery, this wonderful new friend of mine decided to check into Extended Stay Hotel Brook’s Mouth.  Good times.  Frustrated, annoyed and hurting I finally talked to the on call doctor on Friday night and got it as taken care of as possible.

Seriously?  I deprived myself of all those things I have enjoyed for so long (spitting, drinking from a straw, snoughing…you know…sneezing and coughing at the same time) and I still ended up with the evil phantom tooth?!  Well, it happened.  Now I have to deal with it and move on with my life.  But if nothing else (and I highly expect there is nothing else good to come from this) it made me think about some things in life from a different perspective.  We all have our goals, ideas and desires for our lives.  We take steps to reach them.  But sometimes we can do everything right and still end up in pain.

Maybe you have done all the preparation, get dressed up, have a great interview and still didn’t get the job.  Maybe you have conditioned, strengthened and practiced but the other team is still better.  Maybe you have poured yourself into your kids or a friend or a protégé and taught them well, but they still strayed from what they learned.  Life just doesn’t always go the way we planned it.  But in those times we have to learn perseverance, patience, and trust.  Whether you are in pain or just hurting watching someone else fall apart, you must have faith in God and trust that He knows what He is doing and is in control.  Our lives are not always measured by the successes that we see.  Sometimes the success is fighting and learning through the pain.  Sometimes the math just doesn’t add up to the intended goal, but relying on the FACT that God has a plan and knows what He is doing.  Find your success in Him and His understanding, not your own.

Everyone who is working in any church is doing so for one main reason.  We do so to see God made known through changed lives.  It all boils down to changed lives.  If God isn’t changing the lives of the people coming, then I would be willing to be we aren’t following His will in it.  That doesn’t mean that 500 people have to become brand new Christians each week (not counting that one person who always has a hand raised to receive Christ).  It could be just one person.  It could be a couple getting their marriage right.  Or maybe one kid seeing the role model that he doesn’t get at home.  However it is taking place, changed lives are what we hope for.

But is seems to me that sometimes we get caught up in the methods of what we think changed lives look like.  It only happens when someone walks down the aisle or when every head is bowed and every eye closed and someone raises their hand or when the salvation prayer is repeated back out loud.  Right?  Well, it seems to me that those are just methods that we have stamped on to the changing of lives.  I don’t ever remember Jesus asking everyone in the room to close their eyes and then if someone wanted to make a decision that they had to make eye contact or raise their hand.  According to John, it doesn’t take any of that.

“It’s urgent that you listen carefully to this: Anyone here who believes what I am saying right now and aligns himself with the Father, who has in fact put me in charge, has at this very moment the real, lasting life and is no longer condemned to be an outsider. This person has taken a giant step from the world of the dead to the world of the living.

John 5:24

All it takes is believing in Him.  A person doesn’t have to stand up and say the words “I believe”.  They don’t have to go down to the front, be anointed with oil and then transfer their membership/transfer papers/letter of intent/resume to be a member of the church.  They just have to believe in the truth of Jesus Christ and put Him in charge.  Doesn’t mean the other things are wrong.  They may be great for each individual church as it may take more commitment or faith or belief or whatever for someone to make that kind of a bold statement.  But all they have to do is believe!  The rest is all well and good, but regardless of what each church’s process is, changed lives happen in the heart and start with believing.

So as you go about your week or your weekend, remember that all it may take is just showing someone the truth of God’s love for us to really change a life.  Maybe you need to change your direction back toward God again.  All you have to do is believe in Him and His truths.  He is there for you.  You don’t have to wait until the next time you are asked a specific question during the invitation time on Sunday that tugs at the heart.  Believe in Him.  He changes lives.

If you watched TV at any point from 1983 – 1994 you have been blessed.  No, I don’t mean because of Transformers, Smurfs and Thundercats.  While those were equally blessing they are not the subject today.  There was one place in particular that was really a bright star.  PBS.  PBS had some wonderfully educational programs, many of which were actually relatively entertaining to the young mind.  But if you had any artistic streak in you at all, you have seen this guy.  

He was known for his hair.

He was known for his work.

He was known for his sayings.

That’s right.  Bob Ross.  Mr. White Afro himself.

Mr. Happy Trees.  Mr. Happy Everything.

It didn’t take a very long pause on the PBS channel during one of his shows to get drawn in and hooked waiting to see how the painting would turn out…or how many times he would say “happy”.  Just recently, I was thinking about how I haven’t seen those shows on in a really long time and all of a sudden the other day, one happened to be on.  Needless to say I sat there and watched for the entire painting.  As I watched I realized that there are some really great things to learn from Bob Ross (outside of how to paint).  Here are 5 things every person and organization should learn from Bob Ross.

1. Attitude – Bob Ross had an amazing attitude.  Like I said before he was Mr. Happy Everything.  During one show he told a story about it.  ”I got a letter from somebody here a while back, and they said, ‘Bob, everything in your world seems to be happy.’ That’s for sure. That’s why I paint. It’s because I can create the kind of world that I want, and I can make this world as happy as I want it. Shoot, if you want bad stuff, watch the news.”  He understood that attitude is a decision and obviously he chose to have a happy one.  I have heard him say that you need dark to show the light.  How many times when things are going just perfect do we stop and think about how much we are not in control?  It is a very easy thing to overlook.  When those hard times hit our lives they show us how great the good times are and that we are not in control of them.
2. Hair – He was the king of the white afro.  That’s a big reason we loved him!  I mean seriously, who doesn’t love an awesome white ‘fro?!
3. Vision – Many people want to start something, but just stare at the blank canvas and don’t know where to start or where to go.  Ross was not that way.  He saw mountains, trees, lakes, snow, cabins, bushes, animals and more when he looked at the blank canvas.  He had vision for where he was going.  He didn’t have all the steps planned out, but he was never lacking for vision of what he was creating.  As the leaders of our families, churches and companies, we need vision.  We don’t need to have every single step laid out before us ahead of time, but we must have vision.  Proverbs 29:18 says, “Where there is no vision the people perish.”
4. Decisive – With any project it is far too simple to drag it out because you can’t make up your mind.  Maybe you just talk about solutions or problems but then don’t do anything about them.  Watch one show and you will see how decisive he is.  Should I put a lake here?  Yes.  Done.  He isn’t constantly measuring to make sure his happy trees are going to be best here or over there.  He gathers the information and makes a well educated decision.  I know I could learn from that.
5. Generosity – Ross gave.  He gave his time to teach those of us who are NOT painters.  He gave away his paintings to the PBS stations to help them out.  He gave his time to help animals as well.  He went above what was expected of him.  We should to the same.  We have been blessed.  We would live in a different place if we all generously gave more than the minimum.

Bob Ross was a very interested dude.  One that I would definitely love to have met.  Maybe one of these days I’ll get a Joy Of Painting video and learn how to make happy trees.  But until then, I guess I’ll just have to learn other things from Bob Ross.

I have never really known much of a world with one church.  All my life it has been a Baptist church or Lutheran or Catholic or a whatever church.  It seems that we live in a church world that likes to be divided.  We like to be split up.  We like to have competition.  And we don’t like sharing.

This isn’t the first time I have thought about this or blogged about it.  A while back I wrote about the same idea in One Church, Multiple Locations but last night it hit me again.  As I was reading through John it was hard to miss.  Jesus was praying for the disciples and made it clear that He wanted them to be unified and working as one.

The goal is for all of them to become one heart and mind—Just as you, Father, are in me and I in you, So they might be one heart and mind with us. Then the world might believe that you, in fact, sent me. The same glory you gave me, I gave them, So they’ll be as unified and together as we are—I in them and you in me. Then they’ll be mature in this oneness, And give the godless world evidence That you’ve sent me and loved them In the same way you’ve loved me.

John 17:21-23

It’s kinda hard to miss that, yet somehow our church world seems to have done that.  We don’t team up.  We don’t share resources.  We split over stupid things.  And all the while, Jesus wants us to be a team!  There are lots of churches that understand this and cling to it, but it feels like the majority don’t.  I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have different churches or all just be cookie cutter churches of one.  I’m all for different styles.  That is good.  Reach your community in the way they are reachable!  But when it comes down to we would rather fight over whether you should completely submerge or sprinkle someone in an act of obedience.  We want to get caught up in whether drums are godly.

Seems to me that for the sake of the ultimate cause, we should start learning this lesson.  How are we supposed to show the world the love of Christ if they can’t see it in how we act?  It’s like learning the keys to a strong healthy marriage from someone that has been divorced three times.  Or getting weight loss advice from someone that outweighs you in triple digits.  I’m just saying.

I think it is safe to say that this is probably my favorite song.  I can’t help but get lost in it EVERY time.  I love it.  Hillsong United definitely knows how to sing from the heart.  I love that they understand that sometimes it’s not just about the words you are singing, but that they are ok with singing “nothing” and going all out in that “nothing” part.  I think this song is pretty much the musical embodiment of everything that God has given to me as my ministry and dreams.  Thank you Hillsong United for With Everything.

It’s a pretty good song I guess.