Howdy

Wow, it's tough to keep up with blogging... not for lack of material, but lack of time. It seems like life has been extra busy lately.. probably not the case, but it does seem that way. So... "what's going on?" you may ask.

This past week was a tough one for me emotionally. I had a couple of difficult conversations, and some difficult experiences that were hard. I've also been pretty stressed with work. We're very busy, but the reality is that being very busy doesn't neccessarily translate into providing more financially.

My time with the Lord has been good, but has been more difficult to get the past few weeks. Merit has settled into waking up around 7:00 every morning, which with my current schedule is usually when I try to start my prayer walk. As a result, I end up trying to pray while making Merit breakfast and getting her started, which is good, but I do miss my prayer walks. I'm going to try to switch up my sleep schedule to get up earlier to get more time with the Lord.

Let's see... here's a quick snapshot of the weekend: Saturday morning Merit woke up around 5:30 for some reason. I got up with her at 6:15 to let Debi sleep and made some breakfast taco's for us all. We went to Merit's freind Archer's birthday party, he turned two. We got to see our friends Ramona and Austin and Fred and Cynthia there. Merit got a baloon, a kite and some other nice party favors. I worked on worship in the afternoon, and then went with Cody at 4:00 to watch the Mavericks game at the Movie Tavern. It was fun to watch on the big screen, with a lot of other mavs fans. Great game too. We ate dinner at my parents house and then cleaned their kitchen and went home to go to bed. Today I got up a little before 7:00. Merit woke up at 7:00 and had "blanket time" while I read the Word. Debi dropped me off for set up and worship practice, and then came to church at 10:30. I broke three strings, 1 in practice, 2 in the service. Good teaching from Baron. After church we came home and had lunch and napped. Went early to the church office to get the books finished up for the month. Wasn't a horrible month, but still very tight, mainly due to tax payments. Left early from the staff meeting to go the Jazz fest. We met Gina and Pat and Fred and Cynthia there and listend to Brave Combo play. Glen's HG was there too. Merit was a little overwhelmed by the crowd and noise, and was getting tired, so we left around 8:30. Debi just finished putting Merit to sleep, so I should sign off here and start getting ready for bed. That's it.

Ol' fashion Texas beat-down

David, my dad and I were discussing this moment in sports history the other day. I tried to find a video of it out there but couldn't come up with one. This was one awesome fight though, Nolan was 46 at the time and Ventura 26...

Humility

These are some thoughts I shared in HG two weeks ago on humility...

James 4:1-10
these verses discuss the outward signs of lack of humility in people's lives... conflict, quarrels, lust, envy, wrong motives, friendship with the world... The main thought I had from this passage is that lack of humility really comes out when two things are present in your life. The first is conflict, and the second is wanting something and not getting it. (verses 1 - 3)
The passage ends with this exhortation: "Humble yourselves in the prescence of the Lord, and He will exalt you."

The trouble I've had is always wondering what it means to "humble myself" before the Lord. Is it just acknowledging Him? Is it expressing repentance? In the past I've thought that humility was really expressed through feeling. i.e. if I'm humbling myself before the Lord, it means feeling emotionally down and low. In looking at the Word though, God gave me the following on humility that show what it really means to humble yourself:

1. True humility involves public repentance: Luke 18:9-14
- this is the passage where Jesus compares the prayers of the pharisee and the tax collector. Without going into this extensivley, notice that the pharisee prayed to himself, the tax collector on the other hand was perfectly willing to publicly show his repentance and need of forgiveness before the Lord. My thought: if I'm growing in humility I will continue to be willing to publicly show repentance and a need for forgiveness before others. If I lack the ability to show my need for the Lord before others, I'm not humble.

2. True humility involves submission
1 Peter 5:5-6
This passage ties your humility before God to your willingness to submit to elders, and to others. The way in which you humble yourself before God is seen in your relationships to other people. My thought: if I'm growing in humility I will constantly be submitting to elders and to others. If I lack submission in my life, I'm not humble.

3. True humility results in obedience
Philippians 2:1-13
This is a common passage on humility talking about taking on the character of Christ, who humbled himself to become a man. The key point of the passage though is that Christ obeyed, and became obedient to the point of death. My thought: If I'm growing in humility, I will always be growing in obedience. If I lack obedience in my life, I'm not humble.

that's it... Next up, WORK!

Time, or the lack thereof

Well, I think I may be on the downside of the mountain of business I've had the past couple of weeks. I've got some jobs pushed out, and mostly smaller one's the next few weeks, so hopefully that means less stress. The men's retreat this past weekend was awesome, and very refreshing emotionally and spiritually. I love the brothers in Hope, and it was awesome to spend time with them. All in one day I played softball, football, paintball, shot skeet, wrestled, and got thrown in a pond. It was awesome.

I've had a couple of people ask for notes from some recent talks I've given, so I'll try to post those next. One thing I've discovered about blogging is that it's hard to keep up with sometimes...