I love Christmas but what I don't like is cleaning up after it is all said and done. I think I broke down over 100 boxes this weekend. All and all it was a great time of celebration. I feel our Christmas Eve services went really well. I love the feel of a Christmas Eve night services. I love the candles and the carols. It was a little different this year as we had candles representing each person in the Christmas story. We blew out all the candles except for Jesus and lit our candles through His. The point was that Christ's light lives within each of us as we carry His light to others.

Our kids had a great Christmas as well as Ethan was really cute trying to open the presents for the first time. Olivia and Caleb were fun as well. I had a blast putting together toys and it gives me an excuse to be a kid. I hope everyone else had a great Christmas as well and I'm looking forward to the New Year and all that God has in store.

Angel Tree Presents

All day yesterday we had families coming into the church to receive their angel tree presents. What a blessing it was to see their faces as they saw all the presents that were given. One family had five kids and the mother was very thankful for the help. I was reading in Philippians 2 yesterday that says, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests but also to the the interests of others." Christmas can easily become about our own interests but Paul says look to the interests of others. In other words, when you see someone in need, help them out. Because of so many people in our church that looked to the interests of others, 13 children will have a good Christmas this year. That's what it is all about!

Salvation Army Update

Just heard word this morning that we took in over $1000 on Saturday for Salvation Army. Praise God! Thanks to everyone who volunteered their time. For those that do not know, the Salvation Army gives back the money that was donated to our Ministers Asscoation for the community. The monies are used to help needy people in our area.

This years Kids Christmas play is all finished! The kids did a wonderful job singing and Pastor Keaton did a great job preparing them this year. Pastor Keaton did a great job on his message as well teaching us that we all need to become like little children. The coolest thing of all was we got to eat happy birthday Jesus cake!

Salvation Army

This past Saturday the church rang the bell for Salvation Army. Our kids had a great time ringing the bell. Olivia decided to sing most of the time while we there and it was amazing how many people got her attention. One man stopped and sang with her for about ten minutes. The coolest thing of all was as we were about to leave a lady stopped Olivia and told her that she made her day by her singing and then she pulled out a Barbie doll that she bought just for her. That truly made Olivia's day. Lesson learned was that God blesses us back when we serve Him with joy.

Tis the Season

Looking forward to the coming two Sunday as we focus in on the birth of Christ. This Sunday the children will be doing their musical. I know Pastor Keaton has been working hard with kids and last Sunday they sounded great as you could hear them practicing through the wall. I'm also looking forward to our Christmas Eve services. We are having one at 9 a.m. and the other at 5 p.m. They will be two different services as the first will be a short worship service and the second will be carols and candles. This is a great time to invest in those that normally do not go to church. Take this opportunity to invite someone you know to one of these services. We have people today that attend Community Hope because they attended a Christmas service last year. People's hearts are open to the message of God's love this time of year.

Prayer and Planning

Spent the day yesterday with Keaton as we geared up for 2007. It was a good day of prayer, vision casting and calendar planning. Thanks to Pastor Glen at Christian Life in Des Moines for the use of his facility. I was reminded once again of the importance of staying focused. I believe that God has called the church to four non-negotiable purposes:

Include-We must find ways to bridge people from the community to the church.
Instruct- Jesus told us to go make disciples. The Word of God is our foundation!
Involve- Every member is a minister. Every person has a ministry!
Invest- We must invest our lives to evangelism and reaching the lost.

As we plan the year, we must remember these purposes for the church. Many churches can become busy but not focused. We must remain focused on what God has called us to do. We are in the business of building the kingdom. Every program, ministry and activity must fulfill those purposes. If we do this, I believe we are headed in the right direction.

Got done reading Mark Batterson's book "In a pit with a Lion on a snowy day." (I know it's a long title but a great read.) I got the chance to meet Batterson at his "Buzz Conference" in Washington DC last May. What an incredible time it was. Mark is on the creative edge when it comes to ministry.

My favorite chapter in the book is the chapter on "The importance of looking foolish." Jesus says to enter the kingdom of God, you must become like a little child. As adults we can learn a lot from children. Children are willing to just be themselves and they are not concerned about what others think. This past Sunday I looked pretty foolish as I was talking about Christmas I kept referring to it as Dec. 24th. I looked pretty foolish as the pastor of the church doesn't even know when Christmas is. Oh well! My wife was the one who had to tell me it was December 25th. Anyways, my point is it is good to laugh at yourself and look foolish at times. When was the last time you looked foolish?

Church Planters

Just got back from IA City from another church planters meeting. I'm always encouraged to hear the stories of what is going on around the state as regards to church planting. I blogged a couple weeks ago about Rich Greene from IA City who is giving away bikes to the elementary school there in IA City. God has granted him great favor as already the city newspaper did a feature article on the giveaway and the television stations will be coming out this Saturday to record the actual giveaway. Just the past two weeks the principal of the school has been attending his church. Praise God! Keep Life Church in your prayers this Saturday for them to touch many children and families through this awesome outreach.

Busy, Busy, Busy

Sunday was one of those days! I'm really not for sure what got into me but I let it all go this past week. Talked about the Grinch of busyness. Busyness is a thing that we have come to accept as a society. We think we have to be busy. But what we don't realize is busyness will rob us from the things that are important to us. I really believe that busyness is a tool of the enemy to steal our faith, family and friends. God specifically designed us for these three things yet we don't have the time anymore to really invest in all three. God says slow down and take a Sabbath. The Sabbath is a wonderful thing. God thought the Sabbath was so important that He put it in the Ten Commandments. It was a time to invest in God and invest in others! I want to continue to challenge us to do those two things. Don't let busyness rob you from the things that are most precious in life. Take a breath and slow down.

Computer Crash

Just wanted to let everyone know that my computer crashed on Sunday right after church. Not for sure whats going on exactly. I hope to be up and running by the end of this week as my computer is in the shop. Technology is a weird thing. You really don't know how much you depend on it until its gone.

Christmas Shopping

I had a funny thing happen to me this past weekend as Jen and I went shopping the day after Thanksgiving. We went into the Olive Garden for lunch and the waitor came up to us and said that I was the first man he had waited on all day. I looked around and he was right, I was surrounded by women. Later that day Jen overheard a conversation an older man had with probably his daughter. He said "The only thing I can compare you girls shopping on a crazy day like this is the first day of feasant hunting." Good Comparison! In fact I found a statistic that I will share this Sunday that says that women spend an average of 288 hours of shopping before Christmas. Wow, that's a whole lot of shopping!

Grinch of Stress

We started our new message series yesterday on the Grinch's of Christmas. I love the Grinch story! It was just a couple weeks ago that I was watching it with my kids that I noticed how much meaning is behind just a simple story. The next few weeks we will be talking about the Grinch's that try to steal Christmas away from us.

This past week we talked about the Grinch of Stress. Isn't true that Christmas is a stressful time for some. Just go to the malls and you can see stress written all over people's faces. God wants to teach us a few things about stress.

1. God wants us to see His purpose in stress- When we are stressed, things can get ugly. I remember working at Toys R Us at Christmas time and seeing how mean people get. Maybe God wants to teach us about our character when we are stressed. What do I become when I get stressed. Am I irritable, angry, emotional? Don't ask God why am I going through this stress but ask God, "What do you want to teach me?"

2. God wants us to see His presence in stress- Psalms 23 is a great example of how David when to God in his stress. David said things like, "The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want, He makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me beside still waters, yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you are with me." How could David say such a thing? David has the presence of God in his life. We have a choice in our stress. Will I draw near to God's presence or away from God's presence? It is our choice entirely.

God is not the author of stress, but God may want to work in our stress for an eternal glory. Remember that next time you get stressed out!

Happy Thanksgiving

I will be taking off today and headed to Des Moines for Thanksgiving. I hope everyone has a great weekend and remember to be thankful for all the blessings that God has poured out on your life.

Turkey Sunday

Turkey Sunday was a great success and thanks to everyone who invited people to church. We gave away sixteen turkeys and had 154 in attendance. This is the most for one Sunday besides Easter. God is definately awesome! It is amazing how God can use a turkey to bring people to a life changing experience with Jesus Christ. I am reminded of the words of Paul in 1 Cor 1:27, "For God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty."

Hope it's not a bill!

My son Caleb sometimes says the craziest things. Just yesterday he got a Thanksgiving card in the mail from Jen's parents. Jennifer told Caleb he had some mail and out of the blue Caleb says with all seriousness, "I sure hope it's not a bill!" Where did that come from? I didn't know four year olds had to worry about bills. I guess he may have heard that out of our mouths one time or another.

Thou shall not judge

We wrapped up our dirty laundry series this past week. I hope it was encouraging to all and a good reminder to think before we speak. Sunday we talked about judging. Two things to remember about judging:

1. God holds me accountable when I judge- Romans 2 and Matthew 7:1 tells us that the measure we judge will be the measure that comes back to us. OUCH!

2. When I am tempted to judge, I will show mercy instead of judgment- The women caught in adultery is a great example. The Pharisees were ready to stone her on the spot but Jesus stopped them in their tracks by telling them if any one of them were without sin to go ahead and cast the first stone. Problem was, no one could do it. Mercy had been showed to them and now it was their turn to show mercy.

One more thought: Why is it that Christians easily put people on a pedestal but when someone messes up, we easily throw them down and allow them to be run over by a bus? Shouldn't our first response be mercy and forgiveness? I'm so glad that God has shown me mercy time and time again. Jesus Christ came to give us mercy. I'm not excusing sin by no means but by God's standards, we all have sinned. Over the years we have ranked some sins higher then others but in God's eyes it is all sin. Let us leave the judging to God and let our response be prayer and mercy.

Youth Convention

It was another full weekend as the kids headed to Youth Convention Friday and Saturday. It was exciting to hear their testimonies on Sunday morning on how God touched them. The main speaker talked about the need for change and how this generation is looking for change. What the world wants to see is not religion but they want to see people living out what they believe. I know it challenged many of our teens and they came back excited to see change in their own lives and in their schools.

It was at a Youth Convention that I was called to the ministry at the age of 16. I will never forget being at the altar and having a deep passion and burden to do anything I could for God. I wasn't for sure what it was going to be at the time but I knew that I had to surrender my life completely to Him and do whatever He wanted. Camps and Youth Conventions are so important and I want to encourage everybody to support our camps and Youth Conventions. If you have kids, do whatever you can to send them. There is something about getting away and allowing God to speak into your life. Thanks to Pastor Keaton and all our great leaders that took our teens this past weekend. YOUR ARE AWESOME!

Unexpected Phone Call

So I was sitting in my office this week working away when the phone calls rings and I hear this familiar voice on the other end. It was Pastor Dennis Niles, my former pastor at Glad Tidings who is now leading Trinity Bible College in North Dakota. Pastor Niles wanted to know if he could come speak to us the week of District Council. (April 22nd) Many of you may not know but Pastor Niles was the Pastor in New Sharon before he was my pastor in Des Moines. It was Pastor Niles' vision to plant a church in Montezuma years ago. I even believe the New Sharon church voted on it but it was turned down. It is amazing how God works. Here we are fifteen years or so later, a church has been planted in Montezuma and I am the pastor of it. God has a sense a humor doesn't he? Who would of thought that the young teen that was in Pastor Niles church in Des Moines was going to be a part of the vision that he had years ago. I am reminded of the verse that says in 1 Cor 3:66," I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase." (NKJV) God always has a way of seeing His plans accomplished. It may not be in our time and our ways but God will see that it gets done. I thank God for Pastor Niles' vision and I 'm looking forward to having him come April 22nd.

I am really excited about November 19th and our Turkey Giveaway Sunday. It is a great chance to invite those that you know to come to church and experience what a loving Christ-like community is really like. That Sunday we will be talking about "Living in the Dash." I know it maybe a little confusing but the dash represents our lives. On our tombstone we will have a birth date and the date that we died. The dash is what we did in-between. So many people waste their lives and live their lives with no purpose. God's plan is filled with purpose for each of us.

Please pick up your invite cards this week and start handing them out. Jen and I already have four families that we know that we are going to invite and give cards too. It is a great tool and a good reminder for everyone plus they get a free turkey. You can't beat that! GOBBLE, GOBBLE!