leaving, praying and loving

We had our last Sunday here in Boonville at Firm Foundation today. Class tonight was good, talking about Galatians 5 and my life verse, the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love (Galatians 5:6). We also talked about people trying to control others in the church by the imposition of their ideas as gospel.

Paul’s comments in Galatians 5 was that people try hard to make others do what they want in order to be holy. Pentecostals have been bad at that in the past, as have others. Sometimes people have such a strong picture of what they want that it is hard to imagine others not having that same picture. It is always wrong to mandate your ideas on someone else and call them God’s commandments.

After class, the group prayed for us. It was a moving experience and it was great. We will truly miss this group.

Next week, Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, we will be in Lincoln. In two weeks, we meet with the district representatives to talk about whether or not I am a wacko. If they decide that I am okay, then we will be appointed to Lincoln. We do not intend to retire, so we may be there for a long time. we certainly do not intend to ever leave there. We intend to make that our home until we die. I am so tired of moving. I want to set down roots, to have a place that when they think of a pastor, they think of me. We don’t have much time left – 25 years at the most, prob more like maybe 15.


I think I will always love these people. They are fine people and they accepted and loved me when I was beaten and rejected and alone. We have carved out a place here that I never expected to find, and I love them. Mel is the closest thing to a pastor I have ever had, and I love him.

going to church

Sunday morning. I love going to church, and rarely have I felt worse after church than I did before. There have been times, I suppose. Some churches seem to go out of their way to make their members feel bad. But, even so, I like going.

The psalmist said I rejoiced with those who said to me, "Let us go to the house of the LORD." (Psalm 122:1). I agree. I just like going to church. As a pastor, I love the whole process and tend to be very disappointed when others do not share my joy at it all.

I have always had such a picture of the joyous celebration that worship should be, and cannot for the life of me figure out why others do not share it. why go to church to be somber, or miserable? It is so worthless. We go to worship the Lord of creation. If he is truly out God and if we truly love him, why be somber. Of course, I do not advocate leaping around without meaning, anarchy or bedlam in the church building. Joyous worship and chaos are not the same thing. But still.

And, of course, I love preaching and teaching and praising and praying and communion. I just like the whole thing. Fortunately, so does my wife. There are times when we just like to go to the church and play guitar and sing.

Through the past few years as the Assembly of God was making it plain to me that I was not welcome, we have fallen off on a lot of this. But I intend to do it more when we get settled in our new church.

Coffee’s good this morning.

fathers and daughters

This evening I took my daughter Abby to a Father/Daughter dinner at her church. It was a very well done evening and was Mexican themed. We ate nachos and played some games. The pastor, Jamie Page, did a good job in putting everything together. It was really good seeing the fathers there with their little girls. If more churches would make that emphasis on father/daughter bonding, better thing would happen. TD Jakes did some good work in that in some of his books.

I love my daughter, but I see so many ways in which I could have done better in giving her more self-esteem. I am not sure she felt loved enough growing up. We were so busy at times in just plain survival, I suppose I let some of that go. If I cold I would do it right. Of course, I can’t go back and change anything, but if I could, two things for certain:

1. I would marry my wife again. There is no better companion that a man could have than her. And

2. I would work harder on my children.

Oh, well, too bad doodad. Will not happen. It, however, probably one of the most thought about things by fathers: that certain sense of failure with their children.

moving and dwelling

We are moving to Lincoln, NE, in a few weeks to accept a pastorate there and I had to go get boxes. Banana boxes are the best as they are double walled when the top is on. You can stack a box of anvils on top of a box of feathers, they are so strong.

We are looking forward to our coming in to a pastorate of a Foursquare church. Our brief sojourn in the Assembly of God was a bad scene, as we used to say. There are some places I just do not fit. I suppose it is the mindset. I am not traditional nor old-fashioned. I also tend to read too much and make friends outside the church. AG tends to be introspective, even to the point at times of being exclusionary. I had enough of exclusionary when I left the Church of Christ, non-instrumental, and realized that I had gone right back into a church that felt deep down that they were the only true recipients of God’s grace. That is a little harsh, I suppose, and I do not mean for it to be. But I found out several years ago that I am a kingdom man. I believe in the church universal, not just in a denomination. The Foursquare church seems to agree with me in that. They see themselves as a unity movement, part of the whole, rather than most of the whole. I like that.
I suppose that with my mindset, I will never fit into any denomination fully. And at my age, I doubt that I will try real hard.

All I really want to do is serve God and love his church. Is that really so much?

Psalm 15

LORD, who may dwell in your sanctuary? Who may live on your holy hill?
He whose walk is blameless and who does what is righteous,
who speaks the truth from his heart and has no slander on his tongue,
who does his neighbor no wrong and casts no slur on his fellowman,
who despises a vile man but honors those who fear the LORD,
who keeps his oath even when it hurts,
who lends his money without usury and does not accept a bribe against the innocent.
He who does these things will never be shaken.

This is what I want. To live in his grace and be counted a worthy servant, to hear him say, Well done. I have no real desire to be great or have a large church. My desire is to do his will where I am; to love a church and to have them love me; to show that church the grace that I feel in my life. That’s it.

If I do that, I will dwell in his sanctuary.

watching a movie

My wife was in the mood for a love story tonight, so we are watching You’ve Got Mail, a remake of 2 or 3 earlier movies. It is a cute movie, not a lot of thought involved, but kind of fun. It is about two people who engage in an online affair, only to find out at the end of the movie that they are two people who hate each other. A great movie premise but one which is never real, of course.

listening to jazz

Listening to jazz on the stereo. Placed an assortment of CD’s from Special FX, Fourplay and Acoustic Alchemy and put them on shuffle and it has been so pleasant. We do not have cable right now due to an argument with the satellite company so we have been listening to a lot of music.

Smooth jazz is one of my favorite genres of music. Easy to listen to, easy also to have in the background while you have guests over too. Just in general enjoying to listen to. Acoustic Alchemy’s CD, Natural Elements is playing now.

what do i hope to accomplish

This blog is for some reason, as is everything else, I guess. Rarely does anything non-government related ever spring unbidden from the brow of some guy. It will probably become a theosophical endeavor, with all kinds of weird Bible stuff and philosophy. Since I am a weird preacher anyway, that stands to reason. I am not sure what it will be but what I will do is write around until I figure it out. I think I want to:

1. Silence the voices in my head. I get stuff in there so much and so strong that I have to put things down in order just to make them ease off. Now those aren’t voices like from aliens or the Pope telling me to eat Wheaties or anything like that. I just have a lot of stuff rolling around in my head all the time. I always have. This way, somebody else can worry about it and not me.

2. Give my view of Christianity in general. I read a lot and study a lot and think entirely too much, so this will be my outlet for odd thoughts that I have with my coffee.

3. Since I drink a lot of coffee, I will also talk about various kinds that I like. Right now I am having a glass of ice strong French Roast coffee. I found that if the coffee is good, it is good any temperature. If it is not good, it is only good hot.

Bear with me as I go through all this. I have been writing off and on for the past 30 years but this is the first time I have done blogging. It is going to be a problem with discipline. But anything worth doing (some distant relative said) is worth doing well.

I do not intend to get political or rant about stuff, I hope. I am far more politically inclined than I ever have been before but as my bio blurb says, I am conservatively libertarian. I am also, however, a Christ-follower and I pray for my president, whether I agree with him or not.

Of course, I also follow my God whether I agree with him or not. That, again however, is different. He is my God and I will ever serve him.

Oh and BTW, I have not figured out a lot of stuff on here yet. For instance, the bio at the bottom is weird and I know it. Sooner or later, I will figure out how to make it like I want it and not all caps and centered.

my kind of first post. this time with coffee

I have my coffee close at hand now, so I can get on with the business of blogging. I don’t really know what I intend to do on this blog, except to just talk about stuff I like. The coffee is French Roast made strong and black, no sugar and no room for cream, thank you. My political inclinations are conservative libertarian. I am not a lover of government, or at least of intrusive government. I hate being made to wear a seat belt and a motorcycle helmet. On the other hand (and I have discovered in my life that there always is an other hand), I choose to submit to my God in everything I do.

As a pastor in the Foursquare church, I strive in all I do to love him and to love others, no matter whether or not they deserve it. After all, I do not deserve the love of God anyway, so who am I to judge?

I will feed anyone and help anyone I can. I have promised my Lord that I will not judge and I will proclaim the freedom we as Christians have in Jesus.

My message is freedom. Freedom in Jesus and freedom in his grace.

And coffee. I love the stuff.

I hope I get better as I go along.

something new for me at least

The first comments on my blog and here I am without my coffee.