I am trying to develop Hannah from a young age to be a Daddy’s girl and it seems to be working!  We have a daily ritual now that includes a Route 44 Iced Tea from Sonic, my recliner and a little bit of wet clothes.  Every night, we sit together as she dives her hand into my cup and pulls out ice to feed her and me.  We both wind up a little wet but it is a way that I try to make her like me and teach her the importance of Sonic Iced Tea.

Then tonight, I was ironing my clothes for tomorrow when she wanted to wear my shirt.  In fact, she wore my shirt all over the house and I cannot tell you how proud I was to see her walking in my clothes.  I am training her to be like me!

As I was thinking on training her to be a daddy’s girl it made me think about how I need to train her to be like her Heavenly Father’s girl also.  Children are impressionable and we must instill in them godly values and teach them to be like their Father in Heaven.  The Bible declares that we are to train up a child in the way they should go and we must seek to make them more like Him and not so much like us.

Our Rao’s bakery, just 2 miles from the house, will be opening in February.  Rao’s is a locally owned coffee shop that is alot better than Starbucks. (Sorry to all of you Starbucks fans.)

People swear by Starbucks coffee but I have never aquired a taste for their coffee.  On the other hand, Rao’s has a good blend of coffee as well as a good deal of specialty coffees.  My favorite is their house blend with Splenda and powdered creamer.  Sonya loves their Sugar-free Hazelnut Kona Mocha Frozen Coffee.  Josh likes their Sugar-free Carmello Frozen Coffee drink.  He really doesn’t like sugar free but it is all we will let him get.  Hannah is not allowed to drink coffee yet.  We told her not until she is two.

All in all, Rao’s beats Starbucks.  Coffee is God’s great creation, it has the smell of Heaven. 

If you are wondering, their Mid-County location is in the Old Novrosky’s across from Central Mall on HWY 365.  ENJOY!

Whew! We survived last week. Last week was filled with meetings and preparation for our Sunday School re-launch. School 4 LIFE went off without any glitches and it is good to be back to our schedule. The last four months went by quick but I believe that we have enhanced our minstsry by taking a few months off.

Yesterday we began our ELEVATE series. We talked about Elevating in our relationship with God and looked at the four levels of the spiritual life as seen in the Old Testament story of Moses, Joshua and the children of Israel. I was challenged to go to another level in my spiritual life. In 2008 I want to draw nearer to the Lord and elevate to the place He has for me. All of us should seek to go higher in our walk with God. I encourage you to take time this year to fast and pray. Whether it is a day or 21 days. Set aside a little time to press in closer to Him.

Next, Sunday we are going to look at Elevating Our Church’s Prayer Life. It will be a glance at the early church as well as the Life of Jesus, our great example. The Bible says, “He went a little further to pray.” We need to go a little further also!

Tomorrow, I was going to preach a one part message on our theme for the year, ELEVATE.  As I began to study it out, my first point took 13 pages.  For your sakes I decided to break the whole message up into several parts.  You do not want to miss this message tomorrow, however.  It is about elevating our relationship with God.  Going to another level.  We look at the story of Moses, Joshua, the elders of Israel and the children of Israel.  Each was at a different level in their spirituality.  This message will challenge you to go higher in your relationship with God.

The following weeks we will look at Elevating our Prayer Life especially as a church, Elevating Our Commitment To Ministry, Elevating Our Outreach.  I am excited about these topics.  I pray that you will make an effort to be at our Sunday Morning services.

Tomorrow is the new year. Another year to make a difference for the Kingdom of God.

As we look at another 365 days, have you made any goals (resolutions)?

You can tell there are alot of people who make new year resolutions. The most popular is losing weight and getting into shape. You can tell this by driving by the high school track in the month of January. It is packed! People are everywhere trying to get back into shape. February rolls around and there is a decline in people. Every month after, there seems to be a decline. We start the year off right but do we follow through?

Those who make these resolutions start off good but do not finish well. I think, in a lot of cases, we are all like that. I have goals I set every year and when March rolls around I find myself wavering on my goals. I even forget some of those goals. So I started doing something different. I started writing them down. I put them on a piece of paper that I can print and read over periodically. I even transfer a copy onto my Blackberry so I can read my goals when I get bored.

I challenge each of you to set some goals for 2008. You can set goals for several areas of your life.

Health/Physical
Personal/Spiritual
Family/Relationships
Education/Learning
Ministry/Church
Work/Career

Sit down in the next couple of days and write down your goals and put them in a place that you can refer back to them. It will help you have a great year.

Have you ever had things happen on Tuesday that felt like it should happen on Monday?

Things started off good.  Up at 3:00am, couldn’t sleep so I got up and did some work and had my devotional time.  We had a good men’s breakfast this morning.  It is always enjoyable to have breakfast with the men of the church.  Good conversations and good food. 

I came into the office and I can’t get our New Copier/Network printer to work.  It is one of those things that it works when it wants to…it just doesn’t work like you want it to.  It won’t recognize the paper, it won’t recognize the paper and it won’t recognize the paper.  The moral of the story is it won’t copy or print.  You expect this stuff to happen to old equipment not new equipment.

Now I will tell you that it is probably something that I did to make it act this way.  But it is frustrating.  I feel like I am on a constant test of my patience.  I thought about hitting it with a hammer, but I don’t think the insurance will cover that.  Patience is something that God is trying to work in all of us.  He allows copy machines to act up, people to be rude to us or even a driver to cut us off on the freeway.  Just so we can learn a little more patience.

The lesson I am learning is that if I will be a little more patient in this life, things won’t bother me near as much.  When things crimp my workflow, I am just learning to go with the flow.  Patience is meant to be a virtue, but I have let it become an issue.  I am learning to let God work in me and help me deal with the stress of little things as they come.

Last week I found out about the tragic death of someone very dear to my heart.  Although we hadn’t spoken for 14 years, David Stinnett will always be a part of my life.  He was a man of God.  Well-versed in the Scriptures.  At the age of 32 he had a command on God’s Word like had never heard.  It was under David Stinnett’s ministry that I gave my heart to Christ.  He led me in the sinner’s prayer at the Alethea Christian Fellowship in La Porte, Texas.  He baptized me in a swimming pool on August 3rd, 1991.  He introduced me to the Baptism in the Holy Spirit.  David will always be special to me.  It was him who gave me a hunger to know the Word of God.  I would hear him quote Scripture after Scripture without looking at his Bible.  He was a learned man.

I am not sure what David’s life was like after those years of our relationship, but I know that his life had ups and downs like the rest of us.  My prayer is that he continued to hold fast to the Word of God and to live it until his final days.

A couple of weeks ago, David Stinnett passed away in his sleep at the age of 48.  A young man with a shortened life.  Life is not guaranteed.  Rest in Peace David!  Thanks for sharing Christ with me, I am eternally grateful!

Yesterday, we had a day off for Memorial Day.  (God bless our veterans and all that have given their lives for our freedoms.)  It was an enjoyable day off but it is always good getting back to the office.  I enjoy working.  It is a privilege and I think if I stayed home more I would drive Sonya crazy.

Josh is alot like me.  He likes going to the office.  In fact, he came with me to work this morning.  He has an office here at the church and he is content spending a day here with me.  I pray that God would take his enjoyments and likes and develop them into something great for the Kingdom of God one day. 

He has a fascination with starting his own business.  We encourage him in that.  It might be a God-given passion.  I think the trap we fall into as parents is we want our kids to do what we want them to.  I would love Josh to be in ministry with me one day but if God wants to use him in the business world then it doesn’t matter what I want.  God has implanted giftings in him that are different than mine.  “Lord, help Josh become what you want him to become.”