Coming to the Still Waters

     There is an abundance of it this year.  I spent the morning and part of the afternoon snow blowing my driveway and then my neighbor's and then pulling snow off his roof and shed roof and then moving that snow and then home to shovel off my roof and moving that snow.  You can just about walk off the roof and unto the piles of snow.  It is getting hard to see out the windows here.  Then it was onto stocking up the wood pile in the garage from the pole barn and cleaning out one of the wood stoves.  They are getting a work out this year.  I am thinking that I will probably run out of wood before the winter is over.  I was hoping to snowshoe today but after all that, I can barely lift my arms and legs.        I received an email about our community Good Friday service this week, April is coming, don't you know!!!  I have been asked to speak.  I think it was about 16 years ago that I did this before.  I wondered if it was because of my departure in the future but either way,

     First - watching the morning news is sometimes so shocking after having a worship service like we had yesterday.  To see clips of the Grammy's about a whole other world that is so focused on self and on things so opposed to the words of the Bible is sometimes so overwhelming.  The hard part is that so many will have watched that and Christians included that didn't take the time to be in church that morning in worship of the only One who deserves it.  We live in a world that is ever changing and going the route of Romans 1 and the message and life changing power of Jesus is needed so much in this day.  I question sometimes of how we bridge the gap.  It seems so wide.  There has to be a way because Jesus gave us through the Word and through His disciples to "Go and make disciples..."  I need to continue to as Voddie Baucham says, "make more of Jesus..." this day.      On that note some reflections on the scripture passage from Sunday - Matthew 27:1-10,

Chris Beats Cancer recent interview Here is a link to a short 5 minute interview with a man who had colon cancer at the age of 26.  The difference between he and I is that they opted to do surgery first and that gave him time to think about the protocol to follow of chemo and radiation. I of course am older but my route was chemo and radiation first with surgery next and then chemo to follow.  Chris had time with the recovery of surgery to think and investigate if he would do the chemo and radiation and decided not to.  He adopted many different natural ways of dealing with the cancer and is cancer free to this day. My story happened 3 years ago this month.  I was diagnosed with cancer.  I was put right into 4 rounds of pretty heavy doses of chemo.  8+ hours in the infusion center and then another 46 hours with a fanny pack pumping it into me.  After 4 rounds of this I went to radiation 5 days a week for 4 weeks and on a pill form of chemo.  All this time blood tests were taken to

     It really was.  Not because of me but because of the Word.  Our systematic study of the book of Matthew has made it so rich when we come to a passage of Scripture that could have been dealt with all alone, we now come to together with a lot of knowledge from the previous chapters to make the message and meaning so deep and also so relevant.  I was just so overwhelmed by that this week.  What I know because of study opens up the door to what I am reading and studying.  The sermon preached itself, I was just the vocal communicator of it.      Peter's denials was the content but how did he get there?  How did the man who walked and talked with Jesus for 3 years, the one who walked on water, the one who put his foot in his mouth at times but was also there to speak the Words of God, the one who was an eye witness of miracles and teachings get to the point of denying Christ not once, not twice but three times?  So here is the progression that we can follow just as easily as he di

     Last Sunday marked our 2 year journey as a church through the book of Matthew.  We are now in chapter 26 and walking in the trial scene.  I am continuing to learn so much as we slow down and look at each event that Matthew records for us.  This Sunday will be no different with the background material about Jewish trials of the time and how this one did not follow suit.        It got me to the point of anger at those who were twisting the law for their benefit and still standing up looking righteous.  For the followers of Christ, Jesus' actions and words expose the wrong over and over but it doesn't seem penetrate their hearts except for two that are not mentioned until later, Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea.  So there were 71 on the council that "tried" Jesus but only 2 had hearts for Him.  It takes me back to the wide road and narrow road and the four soils and the one leper coming back to say thanks out of the 10.  The numbers are always smaller than we wan

I have been wanting to write a general letter to the church about the new year.  It will be a year of change in many physical ways but there is an ongoing change that needs to happen in the spiritual realm. It would be very easy to make a list of those things that we need to do or improve on in the life of the church and then we could go down the check list and work on them.  I do have that list in my head but I am going to resist the temptation to put them down here.  If I would do that, then we would have this "works" mentality that if we just work in these areas then things would be "better."  That thought just leads to another list and another time to get back on track.  So I am going to try to keep the list in my head and not on the page. I also thought about talking about obedience that is needed but as I investigated this route I knew that the list in my head would come out again because our obedience will be fleshed out in our lives and in