"To Save A Life"

Everybody needs to spread the word about this movie and watch it in theaters. This movie will change lives!

21 months...

Well, I try to avoid noticing when "the 13th" rolls around. And I'm usually pretty successful, but not today. I woke up at 4 AM this morning (definitely not planned) and couldn't fall asleep as I laid there listening to K-Love (on my iPhone, because it's the only way to get K-Love in Harrison) for at least 2 hours, I heard somebody mention that it was Friday the 13th and it hit me. Then on comes one of Steven Curtis Chapman's new songs that he wrote after he lost his daughter. 21 months ago, my older sister left this earth. As good as she was at getting on my nerves, I absolutely loved her. As kids, we apparently spoke a language that only we understood. Growing up, we played together: her barbies and my ninja turtles. We would later go to movies together, church together and usually hung out with the same friend group from church/school. In college, we lived together for two years and were teased that neither of us would ever marry and just live together for the rest of our lives (and here I am...still single). I would gladly accept "the call of Paul" to have her back. I think today has hit me hardest since the first one, or God has thrown the most "reminders" my direction; I'm not sure which one it's been. I turn 25 a week from today. Kiley never got the opportunity to be 25. I have lived to be older than she did, but she still saw the age "24" but never experienced "25." Here I am, only a week away, and 21 months after she died and I don't even know what to say, other than I hurt.

Another one of God's reminders today, was a email devotional that I get everyday, only this one addressed this particular day. I'd thought I'd share it with you.

"For you, O God, tested us; you refined us like silver. You brought us into prison and laid burdens on our backs. You let men ride over our heads; we went through fire and water, but you brought us to a place of abundance." (Psalm 66:10-12)

How do you deal with the undeniable reality of painful moments in your past when you are praising God? What's the best approach? Should you pretend like those moments never happened? Is it impolite to bring them up in the middle of praising God for His goodness to you?

Right in the middle of this great psalm of praise to God, David reaches back to a painful time in Israel's history -- and says that God did it to them on purpose. He makes a choice to believe that God was responsible both for bringing them into that terrible season and bringing them out of it again.

Would a good God really "test" His people and use hard times to "refine us like silver"? Yes, He does -- and the fact that He does is evidence that He is good and loving and powerful. David saw that God cared about His people too much not to use terrible circumstances to draw them into the place they would find the most meaningful and satisfying life -- in closer relationship with Him.

Can we praise the God who takes us into and out of life's most difficult times?

Think: Have you noticed that God has used some of the harder times of your life to draw you closer to Him? Do you believe the best life is lived in leaning more closely on God?

Pray: Ask God to help you to praise Him for being your good God even during the most difficult times of your life.

Do: Read Job's shocking statement about this idea in Job 13:15, then listen in Hebrews 12:7-11 says about hard times and our Father's loving discipline.

Soccer

Watching my best buddy nephew play some soccer in Conway. He just scored...again!



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Quarter-life crisis?

So, as I approach my 25th birthday in two weeks, I think I may be going through a quarter life crisis...or else I'm only going to live to 50 and am having my mid-life crisis. I've just recently had these desires to do ridiculous things like get a motorcycle and cruise across the country.... Weird, I know.

Junior

I want to share with you a letter that I received from Junior, a child that I am sponsoring through Compassion International. Junior is 7 years old and is from Honduras. Compassion is an organization set-up for individuals to “sponsor” children living in poverty in other countries. The sponsorship enables these children to receive food, medication, an education, and an opportunity to learn about the love of Christ.

“Dear Sponsor Kirby Martens, I greet you with affection hoping that you are in good health along with the ones around you. Thank you for sponsoring me and I thank God for this means of communication with you. I want to tell you that I’m doing well in school, I can read and write and my classmates are very nice to me. I like going to school. I want to tell you that I have a parrot and she calls me Junior every morning when she is hungry. I also had cute puppies from my dog Blaki but they all died, she had 13 puppies, but they all died during the earthquake here in Honduras. I want to tell you that I had so much fun playing on Easter week, it was so much fun for me. I also had vacation in June and the sister took us to the field and we practiced volleyball, soccer and basketball and I had so much fun. I would like to know if you have children so they can be my friends like you. I received your letter and I was very happy to learn a little more about you. I want to ask you to pray for my family and my country. I say goodbye with many kisses and hugs and I hope we keep in touch.”

I share this letter with the hopes that we will all become more aware of the need to share the love of Christ with the world. I fear that sometimes, as a church, we get so inward focused that we don’t pay any attention to what is going on outside of our church walls. Christ commands us to “go and make disciples of all the nations” (Matthew 28:19). Are we truly doing that? Making disciples of all nations starts in our own community and spreads to every country of the world. Are we focusing our attention and efforts on spreading the Gospel to every corner of the earth? Are we even going out into our community to spread Christ’s love? Or are we so focused on our church building, our worship service, and our Sunday school class that we have completely neglected Christ’s words. The Great Commission doesn’t state to sit in our church building and wait for non-Christians to come to us so we can make them into disciples. It says to GO!

Arkansas Children's Hospital Needs YOUR Help!

You may have seen on the news that Children's Miracle Network is teaming up with Microsoft to award an XBox game room. We all need to vote for Arkansas Children's Hospital. You can go to http://xbox.childrensmiraclenetwork.org/ each day from now until October 16th to vote for Arkansas Children's Hospital. You can vote up to 10 times per day (simply hit the "vote now" button 10 times in a row).

Please pass this information on to everybody you know!

When I first heard about this and voted, ACH was in 3rd place. They are currently in 1st! Let's keep them there! Wouldn't it be great if Arkansas finally won something other than track? Hehe.

CWE is the place to be...

A group of our students just got back from an amazing weekend at Camp War Eagle for Fall Focus 2009. We joined with 190 other students and adults from about 10 different area churches for an amazing retreat. While there, students were able to participate in fun activities like “The Blob,” water slides, and Mission Impossible; Conquer fears and self-doubt on the high-ropes course; practice team-building exercises at the initiative games; and really grow in their relationship with Christ during worship and small group times. The Ryan Fitz Band led worship and Brandon Barnard, of Fellowship Bible – Little Rock, delivered God’s powerful Word.

The theme for the weekend was “Up There, Down Here.” The theme stems from the “Model Prayer” or the “Lord’s Prayer” found in Matthew 6:10. “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” The entire weekend was centered on how, as God’s children, we are called to bring God’s Kingdom here on earth through our lifestyles in areas such as servanthood, lordship, prayer, and missions. It was an incredible weekend and I believe that our students have been challenged and developed a desire to do their part in bringing God’s Kingdom into the world that we live in.