Their newest Campaign – Labels Lie. is the most simple message in a very radical, eye catching form!

This one about Jennifer is great!  What a story of redemption and Second Chances.

(I hate that I have to do this:)

WARNING: This links to the POTSC website has some foul language.

Kind of like writing the wrong things on your blog.

As you can tell, it’s been a while since I have posted anything of significance. There is a reason for that.

I have thought a lot about it and I want to make the blog more focused. It feels too much like a windy road map. So, with that in mind, I’m going to relaunch the site at the beginning of the year with a more focused approached.

I’m wondering, what would you like Me to write more about?

Women of Faith

As you should be aware, I am not a woman, but my wife is.  So, she attended women of faith for me and put together some thoughts below.  I hope you enjoy them:

1. We LOVED our seats!  (Thank you Booksneeze!)
2. We enjoyed the atmosphere – it’s always good to be around like minded women who care about similar things and want to be God fearing
3. The Music was EXTREMELY worshipful – Selah was the group who lead worship.  I have liked them for a long time but this experience was surprisingly worshipful and the music helped us focus on the Word to be delivered.
4. Brenda Warner was BY FAR my favorite speaker of the entire weekend.  Her story about how she has come to a life of following Jesus and learning from her children how to do that was inspiring… People MUST hear her story.

Holly in our AMAZING Seats!

Yes, I love "Friends"

“No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, tfor all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.”  John 15:15

Jesus gives His disciples a new designation and I believe that designation made ALL the difference in the world when it came to the Church’s success and the disciple’s individual success.

I had two interesting conversations about this fact in the last couple of days…

There is something to be said about Friends starting something together.  It’s almost like the secret ingredient to us succeeding in our endeavors.  Look at Steve Jobs & Steve Wozniak and the start of Apple Computer, or Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams & Biz Stone.  These two corporate (technology) examples are examples that people who are of like mind and have similar goals (friends) can do something of significance  by putting in the hard work, together!

It’s obvious that someone can have success without their friends being involved in their endeavor but why would you want to?  I’m personally convicted that if I’m going to succeed I need to surround myself with people who I call Friends and who I can do life with.

What do you think?  Do you think it’s the secret ingredient?

It has appropriately been placed in the “Christian Nightmare” Category.

We are struggling with the fact that we haven’t found a place, mainly because we feel like God has brought us here and we have followed him to this point, now He is being extremely quiet and we are hanging out to dry.  He is testing our faith and our family to see what we are made of, right now, I feel like we are made of jello that is slowing going down the garbage disposal.

Don’t get me wrong, I know that we are dealing with a 1st world problem (looking for a bigger house) when there are people starving and desperate for His help so don’t miss this.

The reason I’m writing this post is because I have to share what the people in our community have done for us so far.

1. One of my best friends in the world called me, out of the blue, just to take our girls off our hands (for HOURS) so that Mary and I could spend some quality time together!
2. We posted a cry out on Facebook because our daughter (she’s 3) is having a VERY hard time with all of the adjustments we’ve made so far.  It’s affected her moods and how she is dealing with even the simplest of things. (New church & new place to live)
3. Our small group leader emailed me today just to ask how we were doing with the transition.
4. I meet with a couple of guys on Monday mornings to walk through the Bible and talk about how to be a Godly dad and husband, they PRAYED for me, that God’s Spirit would play out and speak.
5. I got to pray with my sister-in-law on Sunday morning IN CHURCH and she prayed for us that God would speedily show up and do what we are asking.

One of those friends, my best friend, from College “Ebbs” put together a website for a passion in his life, GUNS.  The website is called Haus of Guns and has some amazing content for experienced, recreational, military AND beginner shooters.  Seriously, the best firearm focused website you will find, hands down.

There he is...

It’s so good that he was recognized by the marketing people for History Channel’s show Top Shot.  He was asked if he would be interested in interviewing the contestants as they were eliminated from the show!  Are you kidding me!?  I love that show!

I had to brag about him.  What he is doing is amazing and it’s being recognized, I’m extremely proud of him.  Oh, and this is a side “hobby” of his…  He’s a Youth Pastor, and one that is extremely passionate and gifted.  Again, why do these people hang out with me?

Here is the most recent interview Ebbs did of a contestant on Top Shot:

Check it out.

I REALLY enjoyed reading this book with my 3 year old.  She has been exposed to Jesus and Heaven a lot so I didn’t expect any major questions or issues with the story.  True to form, she surprised me.  She asked questions about being sick in Heaven and why people get sick to begin with.  She asked me how God and Jesus are sitting next to each other because, “Daddy, Jesus is God.”  So, we got to talk about Jesus’ nature and how he is God’s son.

Then, she asked me about Jesus’ scars and where the cross is in Heaven.  I got to explain to my daughter that Jesus already paid for our sins and he has the “owies” to prove it.  That, by far, was the BEST conversation we have had, EVER (and we [or should I say she] talk(s) a lot).

Finally, the art work in the book is pretty cool.  Macey LOVED the colorful depictions of the events.  She couldn’t get enough of Jesus’ Horse:

Jesus' White Horse

If you have little ones, you need to check out this book, it will definitely be a discussion starter for you.  Check it out.

Bennett sums up being a man, as the same virtues that define military service, “Order, Loyalty & Service” (location 689 on Kindle).  He goes on to say that the highest virtues of a man’s soul are “Honor, Fortitude, Service & Sacrifice” (Location 817 on Kindle).  I would completely agree if these things were better defined in the book.  He gives phenomenal examples throughout the entire book which seem to illustrate these virtues but the issue I take is that the examples seem to be in settings of extraordinary situations.  How often am I at war?  How often am I in a September 11th type situation, or playing in an Indiana State Championship game?  If you don’t know, not very often.

I love the fact that the book compiles a truck load of stories about Men and how they handle certain situations, and how their Virtues are what pull them up through any situation but I was disappointed that there wasn’t more time spent dissecting the scenarios and pointing out why these scenarios are ruled by Manly Men.