daily java

Daily Java: Praise the LORD. Praise, O servants of the LORD, 
         praise the name of the LORD.
Let the name of the LORD be praised, both now and forevermore.
From the rising of the sun to the place where it sets, 
        the name of the LORD is to be praised. (Psalm 113:1-3)

We had a good day at the church yesterday. Morning worship went well, but the afternoon really stood out. It was a pastors’ meeting for the area pastors in our Foursquare District.

We met at church and had a late lunch. I had the chance to meet two pastors I hadn’t known before. One from an urban church in Omaha., and two from an small-town church in Columbus.

We had a short time of praise and worship that I led with my guitar that was really very good. It isn’t often that I get to worship with other pastors. Pastors tend to worship on a different level from their members. No great holiness involved, I don’t thing, but these are people who have given their lives to the pursuit of the kingdom of God and it makes an impact on the way they worship. It is an indefinable quality and one that others may want to argue (which I won’t) but I feel it.

We talked about church growth and a couple of programs that were used by two of the churches. A couple of the pastors gave a short testimony of things that were happening in their churches. We talked and laughed together.

It was just in general, a good meeting.

Afterwards, Doug and Liana, pastors of the Foursquare Church in Columbus, stayed and we talked for 2 ½ hours. It isn’t often that I get to talk to like-minded pastors and it was very good. Since they had to drive an hour and a half back home and get up tomorrow and do stuff, I really appreciated it, as did Ella.

She gets lonely, and we have always been our family unit. Living as far as we do from our kids, we depend on each other a lot. It’s always good when she finds someone she can talk to and that will encourage her.

From the rising of the sun to the place where it sets, the name of the Lord is to be praised. You see God in so many places. In fact, it is hard to not see him, unless you just refuse to do so. He inhabits all our lives.

The word says that everything good comes from God. God doesn’t send bad things. When people say, I don’t know why God sent that death, or that illness or whatever, I always say, God didn’t send it. Satan sent it to demoralize. God may have allowed it to come, but he can also use it to do something great in your life or someone else’s.

Robert Mitchum played a preacher in some western movie. Dean Martin and Inger Stevens were down in a draw and Martin was shooting at something. Mitchum came up on a horse on the top of the hill, pulled his gun and shot whatever it was they were aiming at several times. Ms Stevens said, you shoot well for a preacher. Mitchum said something I will always remember. “Every preacher was something else before he became a preacher.”

That sun of the love of the Lord rises in a person’s life and it sets. When it does, so many things happen. But mostly what happens is that people change. Some become pastors, others other stuff, but in whatever they do, the name of the Lord is praised, both now and forevermore.