One Person at a Time...

What Women Really Want....a Belated Valentine

Yesterday morning as I was driving, I tuned into KDKA to catch the weather forecast.  After the forecast an "expert" came on the air to tell us all what women really want for Valentine's Day.  Here it is:  1) flowers; 2) diamonds and; 3) spa treatments.  As I reflected on the list, it occurred to me that none of the items is what women REALLY want for Valentine's Day.  I know I'm a man, and I might be going out on a limb here, but what I think women really want for Valentine's Day--or ANY day for that matter--is meaningful relationships.  I'd go so far as to say that's what both women and men want deep down.  We may have buried those desires under mounds of "stuff," but our hearts' desire is to know and love God, and to know and love others.  Due to the way our schedule worked out yesterday, I had the opportunity to take all three of my girls--Nancy, Abby and Emmy to dinner after Abby's basketball game.  As I sat there with them, I thanked God for who each of them is in Him, and as part of my life.  We laughed together, and caught up with each other on what's happening in our lives.  As we drove home after the dinner, Emmy went on and on about her life in minute detail.  Again we laughed, and drew closer.  Nancy and I had our time at the end of the day to reflect on the day and we agreed that it had been a great Valentine's Day.  She didn't get what the "expert" said women really want yesterday, but she wouldn't trade what we experienced for a truck load of it.  During our ride home we took a moment to realize that the best "things" in life aren't things, and we wouldn't trade our love for God and each other for anyTHING.  I pray you enjoyed your Valentine's Day, and even more that you had the opportunity to share in at least some of the things that money can't buy!

This Sunday at New Life!

We start a new "Back to Basics" Series titled PRAYER this Sunday at New Life!  The four week series covers the classic "ACTS--Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication" aspects of prayer.  This Sunday Brad French, our Worship and Youth Leader, will address the prayer of adoration.  His message is titled AWESOME! and the text of the day is Psalm 8.  You'll want to be there for sure as we continue to go back to basics in seeking to be ever more faithful followers of Jesus, and to provide those of you who may be wondering about Jesus a starting point for getting to know Him!  We'll also be welcoming new covenanting disciples to our church family, and you'll want to take the opportunity to get to know them, too!

Remembering Dad

February 13 is my Dad's birthday.  It is his 87th.  He has spent the last twelve of them in heaven.  He lived all but two of his 75 years here on earth as a non-believer.  I don't have a lot of great memories of my dad. He was what Robert Lewis calls and "absent" dad, in his Men's Fraternity materials.  This Saturday, the title of the session of the Men's Fraternity I'm attending is "Remembering Dad."  Lewis tells us that in 1960, 82.5% of American children lived in families where the biological father was "present."  In 2,000 that number was 60%.  That means then, and more so now, many of us grew up or are growing up with "absent" dads.  My Dad was actually part of the biological family, but because of his work was absent most of the time.  When he was home, he didn't do that much with us.  While many of my memories of Dad are hard, the last years of my Dad's life, left me with many good memories, particularly good memories of him interacting with our daughters.  One of the things I've realized about Dad is that while I would change many things about my time of growing up with him (or mostly without him), he did the best he could as a dad.  His dad hadn't been there for him (biologically present, but absent due to work), and his dad's dad was an ornery cuss, by the accounts I've heard.  The absence of Jesus in his life for most of his life, also left him without the spiritual Father who could have made so much difference.  Thankfully, that turned around, and my daughters have only fond memories of "Papa Clyde."  On this day, I honor my Dad for being a man of integrity, a man who was always as good as his word, who worked hard, and taught us to give an honest day's work for an honest day's pay.  I honor him because he finally submitted his will to God's will near the end of his life, realizing that he couldn't ultimately make it on his own. 

I thank God today, for being the Heavenly Father I could depend on when my earthly dad was either absent or not being the dad I needed, and for providing the kind of role model that is worthy of following 24/7.  I thank Him, too, for providing Clyde Marshall to be my earthly dad.  With all his short-coming's he loved us, and provided for us the best he could, and that's a blessing many folks never have the opportunity to know.  Happy Birthday, Dad! 

Are You Listening to God?

One of the components of my daily times with God is reading from the classic devotiaonal book My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Champbers.  Today's entry was titled, "Are You Listening to God?"  The reading included these statements:

     We show how little love we have for God by preferring to listen to His servants rather

     than to Him. We like to listen to personal testimonies, but we don’t want God Himself to   

     speak to us. Why are we so terrified for God to speak to us? It is because we know that   

     when God speaks we must either do what He asks or tell Him we will not obey. But if it

     is simply one of God’s servants speaking to us, we feel obedience is optional, not

     imperative. We respond by saying, “Well, that’s only your own idea, even though I don’t

     deny that what you said is probably God’s truth.”

When we read God's word--the Bible, we're hearing God speak.  Sometimes we'd rather let others read the book to us and interpret it for us.  Then, if we don't like what we're told, we can dismiss it.  But God's truth IS God's truth and only when we obey it do we enjoy the blessings He promises!

Next Step #37

One of the most encouraging and empowering early records of the Holy Spirit’s work in the church, occurs when Peter and John have been imprisoned for performing a miracle of healing in Jesus’ name. After boldly proclaiming that the healing came in the name of Jesus before the Jewish ruling body—the Sanhedrin—and being instructed by the Sanhedrin not to preach again in Jesus’ name, Peter and John return to the other believers and give an account of what took place. At the conclusion of the account the believers offered this prayer to the Lord, ²⁹And now, O Lord, hear their threats, and give us, your servants, great boldness in preaching your word. ³⁰Stretch out your hand with healing power; may miraculous signs and wonders be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”  Obviously, the believers had not intention of stopping their preaching in Jesus’ name. All they asked the Lord is that he would give them GREAT BOLDNESS to continue. Here is God’s response to the prayer:

³¹After this prayer, the meeting place shook, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. Then they preached the word of God with boldness.  The believers had already been filled with the Holy Spirit, but now they were filled again. The result was they were empowered to do what they had asked God—they preached the word of God with boldness. As we go about our lives, loving and serving in the name of Jesus, there will be those who oppose us. In such times, let’s remember the apostles’ prayer for GREAT BOLDNESS, and let’s call on God to fill us with that same boldness. God is always ready to fill and re-fill us with the Holy Spirit, and as we call on Him to do so, we will be made ready in every situation to continue to share the new life of Jesus with boldness and effectiveness to His glory!

40 Day Spiritual Journey Continues!

While this Sunday concludes our "Generous Giving" series at New Life, we'll continue the 40 Day Spiritual Journey to a More Generous Life in our daily readings and LIFE home groups for another several weeks!  I hope you've been taking the time each day to dig into God's word through Brian Kluth's great resource booklet for the journey.  Many of you have been e-mailing and phoning me with questions, testimonies and affirmations of what God is doing in your lives through this resource!

This Sunday at New Life!

This Sunday brings the conclusion of our first "Back to Basics" series of 2008--Generous Giving.  The message title is Where Your Treasure Is... I hope you'll join us as we look at the ETERNAL implications of giving in our lives.  Jesus made it clear that our hearts will follow our treasure--both in this life and for eternity.  Where is your heart leaning?  How do we ensure that it leans toward Jesus?  Be there Sunday at 10:00 a.m. as we find out!

What Do You Want On Your Tombstone?

A long time ago someone asked me, "What do you want on your tomb stone when you do?" (This was long before the Tombstone pizza commercials!)  I thought about it then, and I've thought about since and my answer is still the same:  He served Jesus, and even his wife and daughters loved him.  Sometimes those of us who are in full time service of Jesus, end up ignoring those closest to us.  I've seen it happen in other ministry families.  I've worked hard to see that it doesn't happen in mine.  The investment is more than worth it!  Today, I've had meaningful conversations with both my daughters, and will have one with Nancy before the day ends.  I URGE you, whether you serve Jesus full time for pay, or full time without pay--remember that your first ministry after your own ministry before the Lord, is with your family if you have one.  Our "victories" in serving Jesus are somewhat hollow, if they come at the expense of those God has placed closest to us in life.  Schedule your family into your schedule.  After all, if you put them on the "back burner" long enough, they will rightfully feel like "leftovers."

Small Victories...

Emmy and I were riding home from her piano lesson today, and she commented on my "change" after reading Change Your Heart, Change Your Life by Gary Smalley.  She said, "When you read Deadly Emotions you said you 'changed,' and you did for about two weeks.  Then you went to Mexico and you said that you 'left your anger in Mexico.' That lasted until you started building the new house.  So, when you said that you had 'changed' after reading Change Your Heart, Change Your Life, I said to myself 'give it a couple of weeks.'  Once I saw that the change has continued for more than a month I realized that I believed you could change, but I didn't believe that God would change you, so I had to ask God to forgive me for my lack of faith."  WOW!  The maturity of that coming from a 14 year old is incredible.  The blessing of hearing it is twofold for me:  that she's mature enough to see her need for forgiveness for doubting God, AND her seeing an ongoing change in me that's lasted a month!  If you haven't read Change Your Heart, Change Your Life, and you have any kind of on-going "issue" whether it be anger (as was my main issue), lust, addiction, you owe it to yourself (and those around you!) to get a copy and read it.  The principles are simple, biblical principles, but they really can change your life, when you apply them.  They're changing me!

Some Days Just ROCK!

On paper yesterday was a challenging day.  Nancy was scheduled for some "minor" surgery.  Pat Fecich, our pastor of administration faced knee surgery.  Emmy's BB team had a game versus North Allegheny and we only had six players, including a 7th grader we picked up to make 6!  Abby's been struggling with some kind of illness that the doctors thought was mono, and she had a game as well, but didn't expect to play, since she hasn't been seeing many minutes this year at Seton Hill.  So, the stage was set.

Here's what happened:  Pat's surgery was first.  It went well!  Nancy's surgery went well, too. She felt fine afterward and we got home at 4:30.  She insisted I go to Emmy's game, since I'm the coach, and she was feeling well.  She was going to nap anyway.  So off we went.  The game started out the way every game this season has started out--we were down 9-2.  I switched to man-to-man, even though I knew that it was going to be hard for the girls to keep that up for long, with so few players.  At half time the score was 11-11.  I saw that we were quicker than NA, so I asked the girls if they could keep playing man-to-man AND fast break in the second half?  They said, "Yes!"  The result?  With 2:45 left in the game the score was Knoch 32, NA 23.  It was working...but the girls were running out of gas.  NA got a quick 3, then a 2, then another 2, and it was 32-30 with 10 seconds left.  We had the ball, but NA stole it and went the length of the floor for a tying layup....and MISSED!  Knoch 32--NA 30--final answer!  It was the first win of the year for us, and the first win of the 7th graders basketball career. 

It got better.  Abby called at 8:30 and said, "I got to play, and I had a basket and a blocked shot."  She'd missed two games with the illness, so we didn't think she'd be playing for sure, but she did.  The evening ended with a meeting of our men's group, and reports of God's blessing.  As days go, yesterday was definitely five stars.  Thanks GOD!  Way to go!