Morning After
Wednesday night was a killer for me. Ever have one of those nights where you wake up and you can't get back to sleep? That was me, around 12:30 and then I could not get back to sleep so I got up and read for a while and then tried again – I remember 2:30 was the last time I looked at the clock until a train seemed to rumble through the house at 4:15 and then my alarm went off at 5:20 for Men's Fraternity – good thing I am running it or I would have rolled over and hit the snooze. I say all of that because by the time I was driving down to Family Night at the Buffalo Christian Center I was running on "E" the light was on and I was thinking – I gotta go, I am bringing the pizza and oh yea, I'm the pastor sooo – I got there and of course we had a blast! What a great night out for everybody. We had about 80 show up and the thing I love is watching all the kids playing having a great time, people meeting people – relationships deeping – a culture of fun, love, acceptance being developed at Elmwood. So I got my second wind till I walked in the house, then I got kidnapped by old Mr. Sandman himself. It was like 9:30 and I told Gloria I was just going to lay down for just a "second" Carlee came in and laughed at me and the next thing I hear was BOOONG that nasty alarm clock going off this morning! But I feel muuuch better!
I have been reading out of the Old Testament Book called Joshua. It is one of my favorite books because I love to read about the life of Joshua. What an inspiring account of God doing some amazing things in and through this man and through the nation of Israel. In fact in Joshua 3 is the account of Joshua leading the Hebrew nation across the Jordan river to take the land that God had promised them. I love verse 5 in light of what we are talking about in our T-Live series: Where Amazing Happens, …Joshua told the people, "Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do AMAZING things amoung YOU."
I really think that that is the message for us at Elmwood for 08. That we should "consecrate" – meaning – dedicated to a sacred purpose – to realign our mission, our life purpose from being about us to a Kingdom Cause and Purpose. We will be talking more about that on Sunday!
Be blessed today and ECHO LOUD!
