Pastor's Blog

I begin by giving props to our college/young professionals Bible study group for lending a helping hand last night in getting some more uniforms for Casa Aleluya off the container and packed for shipping.  Five boxes of those uniforms will be shipped to Dave & Donna Westhouse in Moline, MI today and their team will take the uniforms via suitcases to Guatemala one week from today.  Don & Ruth Nederhood and their team from Byron Center, MI are doing likewise on their upcoming trip, 1/25 – 2/1.  We have also had teams from GA & TN lend a helping hand in this process.  So, thanks to all who are willing to help as the container situation remains unchanged. 

Jim Sciple did well during his surgery yesterday.  I will visit him and Winston Etheredge this morning.  Ted Ezell is recovering at home. 

One of the news outlets is reporting this morning about the man in Idaho who literally used a circular saw this past Saturday to cut one of his hands off.  He believed that he had seen the “mark of the beast” on his hand so he cut it off and cooked it in the microwave.  He called 911 and the police arrived to find his hand in the microwave.  They have placed him in a mental facility for the time being. 

I want to remind our senior high students that we are having “game night” this Friday, 1/11, from 6:00PM – 10:00PM.  Y’all come! 

I also want to remind our folks going on one of our GRACE mission trips this summer that their $100 non-refundable deposit is due by the 30th of this month.  Folks wanting to be a part of our November 18 – 25, 2008 GRACE trip need to sign up this month. 

Bret, I did call Ryan yesterday so I am making progress.  E-mail me your phone numbers please! 

I hope that you will have a great Thursday!   

As I write this entry, Jim Sciple is having double by-pass surgery.  One of these is from his quadruple surgery of ten years ago and the other is a main artery on the front of his heart.  I visited with Jim & Jeannie early this morning and he is at perfect peace with the surgery and all it involves.  Pray for the doctor is performing this surgery, for Jim, and for Jeannie as she waits on the surgery to end.  Bro. Jerry is there with her as the surgery progresses. 

Wow!  Last night I heard the news reports of the father throwing his four children from the bridge leading to Dauphin Island.  It is the headline of today’s Mobile Press-Register which reports that he confessed to throwing his four children, ages 3, 2, 1, and 4 months old from the bridge at some point Monday morning.  He will be charged with four counts of capital murder but that doesn’t even seem sufficient if he in fact committed these terrible murders.  (Personally, I will not be surprise to hear him recant his confession in the near future)  My real hope is that he has told a lie regarding this and it proves to be false but that doesn’t appear likely.  We live in a dark world! 

We are on our regular schedule today with a service this morning at 10:00AM and then the usual evening activities. 

I hope you will have a great Wednesday with the Lord. 

P.S. – Our out of town blog readers can go to www.al.com and read the Press-Register story on the four children. 

This entry is really late today but sometimes things happen for a reason.  I just received a call from Jeannie Sciple informing me that her husband, Jim Sciple, had a heart catheterization this morning and didn’t do so well.  They have scheduled him for by-pass surgery first thing tomorrow morning.  According to Jeannie, a front artery is 99% blocked and the doctor says it has to be by-passed now or it could prove to be fatal.  He has a couple of other blockages too.  Pray for Jim as he prepares mentally, emotionally, spiritually, etc. for this procedure. 

Ted Ezell & Winston Etheredge are undergoing surgery today.  Bro. Kerry & Bro. Jerry are with these guys and/or their families during this time.  Pray that all will go well. 

I just finished a very informative meeting with Terry Stephan who coordinates mission work for Dauphin Way Baptist Church.  He led a team to Guatemala in November and will be leading another one in April.  These teams are basically made up of folks from within churches of the Mobile Baptist Association.  Terry is doing a great job of introducing folks to mission trips.  He has trips scheduled for Athens, Greece; London, England; and Mexico in the coming months.  If interested, please contact me and I will put you in touch with Terry. 

Well the SEC once again proved to be the dominant conference in college football as LSWho won it all last night against another one of those Little Eleven Conference teams.  (Why would you have eleven teams in a league and call it the Big Ten?)  I told Ross Genzink earlier today that we have teams like those in the Little Eleven – we call ’em high school teams! 

Lisa arrived home safely last night and it only took her about six hours to clean the house!  (Can you say, “Happy Camper?”)  They had a great time in Chicago and I appreciate Mark Mast giving them the heads up on where to go, what to do, et cetera.  It is unbelievable but that trip actually saved me money! 

Speaking of Mark, there have been several comments on the debt issue so make sure to go back and read them. 

I hope you have a great Tuesday afternoon with Jesus. 

The Lord blessed and we had a wonderful day yesterday in our three services.  It was a joy to baptize Joey Switzer as a part of our second morning service.  The ordination service for Wes Bates was a special time.  What a blessing to be joined by Pastors, Dr. Robbie Howard and Dr. Henry Cox along with twenty-five other men for the ordination council and then to have a nice crowd in attendance for the actual ordination service.  Seeing Miss Kittie Camp present Pastor L.G. Camp, Jr.’s Bible to Wes was a highlight of the service to me.  The fellowship time after the service was great and, once again, our folks came through in a great way as we had a bounty of food.  

A group from the Foothills Fellowship Bible Church of Quitman, Arkansas arrived at the L.G. Camp, Jr. mission house this past Saturday and will remain there until next Sunday.  This team is being led by Don Tibbett.  The folks from FFBC have been partnering with us in doing missions for several years now and they take two trips each year.  Pray for them as they do ministry in Guatemala this week. 

On the Mr. Mom front – we are now only twelve hours or so away from “mama” being home.  The bulldozer, front end loader and dump truck should be in and out before she returns so it will all be good! 

Ted Ezell and Winston Etheredge are both having surgery tomorrow so please keep these guys in your prayers. 

I was encouraged by the folks who shared with me yesterday that they reading through the Bible this year.  Today’s reading is Genesis 19 – 21.    

Bret Hart, I will contact you via the phone tomorrow! 

I hope you will have a great Monday with Jesus. 

The American society is messed up!  Earlier this morning I read where an inmate in a Colorado jail has filed a federal lawsuit against the former sheriff, the current sheriff, six guards, and the supervisors of the guards.  The basis for the lawsuit – the sheriff, guards, etc. didn’t do enough to prevent the guy from breaking out of jail!  He was actually injured during a fall as he made one of his attempted break outs.  Wow!

The 2008 Iowa caucus is now history.  I was reading last night how is “better” to lose the caucus than to win it.  What, so a candidate can get first pick in next year’s draft?  I didn’t hear any of the candidates asking folks to vote for the others so I think they all wanted to win! 

Ross & Kathy Genzink and team arrived home safely last night from their week in Guatemala.  Ross was very complimentary of our folks in Guatemala and their service to the Lord.  Thank you for praying for this team.  Thanks to the folks from the CPR of the Graafschap Christian Reformed Church for being involved with GRACE Ministries. 

Our church life really gets back into the normal swing this weekend as we have Upward basketball games tomorrow and then the services Sunday.  Again, we will have the ordination service for Wes Bates at 5:00PM followed by a time of fellowship in the CAB.  We need plenty of food for that fellowship and I have every confidence that our folks will respond nicely to this call. 

My personal life will not be normal this weekend as I am playing Mr. Mom!  Lisa, Deidra, and Daphne are spending the weekend in Chicago with my sister, my two sisters-in-law, and my niece.  They all took flights this morning and are scheduled to return home on Monday.  This is a trip that has actually been years in the making and I am glad to see them have this time together.  

Meanwhile, back at the ranch – pizza tonight, Upward concession stand food tomorrow (all three meals), Sunday breakfast in Sunday School, mother-in-law’s cooking Sunday noon, church fellowship Sunday night, we’ll skip breakfast Monday morning as we have been eating too much, school lunch Monday, and then Lisa will be home Monday night so we can have a late supper that she will cook!  This being Mr. Mom is not so hard after all!   (I have already gotten Hien up, dressed, fed (thanks Jimmy Dean), and out the door for school!) 

Thanks to Pastor Travis Northcutt and T. Garrett Wright for their comments yesterday.  I hope you will have a great Friday with Jesus. 

P.S. – The Bible reading for today is Genesis chapters 10 – 12.     

We  had a good first Wednesday of the new year in our services yesterday and last night.  (I have already heard from some that they didn’t know we were having services yesterday/last night thus the reason for their absence – no comment!)  The Lord blessed our time together and I am grateful for His blessings. 

Our adults continue to study through the book of Romans and yesterday we focused on chapter 13, verses 8 – 10, with most of the focus on 8A – “owe no man anything” as we considered what that means to us.  Warren Wiersbe writes that J. Hudson Taylor, missionary to China, and Charles H. Spurgeon, great preacher of yester year, both took this verse to mean that we should not have any debt so they personally carried no debt.  I think it is a great thing when a person/family/church can be debt free.  As a matter of fact, one of the first things to happen when I became Pastor of the Friendship family was for us to promote “Debt Free By ’93” and it became a reality.  The Lord has honored that and we have been able to perhaps be more involved financially in doing ministry and missions.  The Friendship family presently maintains that debt free standing and we are thankful that God has made this possible for us. 

Our college students/young adults had a lively discussion about this matter.  Basically, they stated that without loans i.e. student, auto, mortgage then they would not have an education, vehicle, or a place to live.  Many of them indicated a strong desire to eventually be debt free but the present circumstances do not make that a reality.

My focus was really on credit card debt and encouraging folks to be wise in this area.  I also realize that when you consistently spend more than you make then you are going to have financial problems.  Credit cards can help that to happen.  The reported credit card debt in America today is 920 billion dollars and that figure is expected to rise to $965 billion by year’s end. 

In your opinion, does “owe no man anything” mean that a person is wrong to incur a debt?  Or does it mean to be timely when paying your debts?  Perhaps some sage i.e. T. Garrett, Mark Mast, Bret Hart, out there in cyberspace can enlighten us. 

FYI – our young adults also discussed the importance of giving to the Lord through the local church.  It didn’t seem to be just “church talk” but was coming from the heart.  I was blessed! 

In our Bible study for the adults we ended by discussing the “but to love one another” and how that fulfills the law.  Love is a verb.  Tom Brady recently said “well done is always better than well said” (I am told that quote originated with Ben Franklin but don’t know that for certain) and is true in our love for one another too.  I pray that they will see our love one for another and then they will know we are disciples of Jesus. 

Scott Older was in our late Bible study last night and asked us to pray for his younger sister, Taylor, who is eight years old.  She is presently in Cincinnati, Ohio at the children’s hospital for some tests. 

Happy birthday wishes go out to Stephanie Guidry today!  She’ll probably get a cake from Anderson’s Bakery!  (It is hard to believe that Diane Bryant has a daughter who is 27 as I was thinking Diane was only 37 or 38 herself) 

Sorry for the extended length of this post.  I hope you will have a great day with Jesus! 

Happy New Year as we begin this second day of 2008!  I was very lazy yesterday as I watched three or four of the bowl games.  No offense to Rick Bradley, Senior or Junior, but I was happy to see Lloyd Carr get a win in his final game as Michigan’s coach.  (I would have also been happy to see Tim Tebow win!) The coaching situation in college athletics has gotten crazy so it was good to see one of the “nice” guys finish first!  I was also glad to see Georgia win last night as I am a fan of Coach Mark Richt.  Did Arkansas win? 

For many of us, today marks the return of “normal” life as work and school resume.  Cottage Hill Academy returns to class today, Faith Academy tomorrow, and the public schools on Monday.  We are back on a regular schedule today with a service this morning at 10:00AM, senior high Bible at 6:00PM, junior high Bible, classes, and prayer meeting at 7:00PM, and our college/young professionals Bible study at 8:00PM. 

Chris Taylor has been looking into some ways to change our blog.  I have been checking out some other blogs in recent weeks and he is trying to incorporate some of those ideas.  I appreciate his efforts.  Hopefully, our entire website design will be changing in the near future.  Stay tuned!

The two brothers who survived the tiger attack in the San Fran zoo on Christmas Day are now reported to be saying their initial calls for help were not taken seriously.  I wonder how many lost folks around us are feeling the same way?  I pray that in 2008 we will take seriously the command to make disciples of all nations and, for us, that begins in South Mobile County. 

I hope a number of you are planning on reading through the Bible in 2008.  If so, chapters 4 – 6 in Genesis would be today’s reading. 

Members of the Friendship family are asked to please note that the ordination service for Wes Bates scheduled for this Sunday, 1/6, will begin at 5:00PM.  We will be joined by the members of the Durant Chapel Baptist Church and we will host a fellowship immediately following that service so we need lots of food! 

I pray that you will have a great Wednesday with Jesus!