The weekend is over and to be honest, it happened too quickly! Like many of you, Dawn and I are pretty convinced that we are basically just taxi drivers. Five days a week we seem to have baseball or softball practices or games. Saturday we spent about six hours at the Red Bluff baseball/softball fields. We love it, of course, but it sure seems busy!
Thankfully, yesterday I had space in my week to gather with you all and to sing some songs to Jesus. I can’t even put into words how blessed I was during the music. Our music team sang three songs (“Break Every Chain” w/ “One Thing Remains [Your Love Never Fails]”, “God with Us,” and “Your Great Name”) and my sense of God’s presence, love, and encouragement was strong. Thank you, music team! The musicians and singers were just… such a blessing to me. Jamie Muir and Dan Ackley… off the chain!
The space where we worship continues to fascinate me. As I look around the room, it’s so obvious that God’s doing so many different things. Some people are excited and are in celebration mode. Others are being deeply ministered to by God’s presence and love. I love that and appreciate that about this community.
The Father’s Love
Yesterday’s message, “Becoming, Being, & Birthing God’s Children,” included a story about my good friend Kenny Burchard (he blogs @ ThinkTheology.org and MetaStory.org) and his experience learning about God’s heart of adoption.
For the past 24 hours, I’ve received a lot of feedback from people sharing how the message impacted them. Lots of encouraging words and great stories of experiencing God’s love, etc.
As I indicated last week, one of the reasons I’m doing these Monday Musings is because I think it’s healthy to evaluate and think about things out loud. Every week at our staff meeting, we do this and part of how I tend to process things is through writing.
With that in mind, I think I should have done something different yesterday. I think I’d really have pressed more into ministry time by waiting for the Holy Spirit a bit more. It seems like the Spirit was doing some pretty powerful things in people yesterday and the “soft” invitation didn’t really acknowledge the value and importance of receiving prayer that we have in the Vineyard. I’d like to have really encourage people to respond to what God was doing and receive prayer and create space in their lives to experience healing and encouragement.
Anyway… overall it seemed like a great weekend. I got to meet a bunch of new people and I hear the kids had a great time too!
For those of you looking for a great resource on the subject of Adoption, I can’t recommend Clark Pinnock’s Flame of Love enough. One of the most influential books I have ever read on the Holy Spirit. The section on Adoption is stellar!
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- Got any questions?
- What are your thoughts?
- How were you impacted?
