Best of Times, Worst of Times
Okay... I'll start off with the worst of times, so that I can end on a positive note. The Cowboys, my favorite pro football team, got blasted last night!! I mean, totally demolished!! It wasn't even funny... they had no answer for the Saints, who kicked their tails, 42-17. We definitely can't look like that going into the playoffs! Hope we can bounce back next week against Michael Vick and the Falcons...
Best of times now...
My family and I visited Zion Church yesterday, since we hadn't been there in awhile... Pastor Keith Battle wasn't there, but my buddy, Jumaine Jones (who has been on staff there since 2000 as their Teaching Pastor) spoke... a powerful message, on "Prioritizing Your Gifts"!! Of course, I can't cover everything he talked about on this post, but here's a couple of highlights:
He said that sometimes Christ-followers do "Sympathy Serving"... that is, they serve in a ministry that they don't like, are not seeing much fruit in, and hate every minute of... yet they keep on going because they don't want to say no... or, they're afraid to step down because the ministry might fold... or they do it because no one else will. So, they're serving - not out of a pure heart and passion for what they're doing, but from a false sense of guilt... out of sympathy... that doesn't please the heart of God. Ju also said something pretty profound: sometimes those same people are in God's way, because He wants to "kill" that ministry off, but the person won't get out of the way and let it die!!! Yikes!! TRUE, THAT!! Funny how we'll keep something running that is deader than a beached whale... in the name of Jesus, of course! And we'll be super-spiritual about it, too: "Until Jesus speaks to me personally and tells me to step down, I'm here!"
Yeah... okay... you keep on listening for that "still, small voice" that has shouted to everybody else.
Anyway, Ju did an incredible job... keep him in your prayers: he'll be launching a new church sometime in 2007... more info on that later!!
Also, I just found out that another good friend of mine, Larry Paige, is launching Oasis Church somewhere in the Bowie/Lanham/Glendale area... It's an awesome thing to see young men of God starting churches!!! Larry's going to do a marvelous job... he has an awesome testimony... and I can attest to how God has amazingly changed his life.
Can't wait to see what God's going to do with these guys!!!
Until next time,
PD
