Here is the Truth: I miss my Daughter

I've really missed her this week. i think it was Monday when I was out of work that it hit me so hard. It's been over six months and it just really sunk in. Man, why is this so hard. I know that in order for her relationship to be what it needs and should be with her husband that our relationship must change. He must become greater and I must decrease. That is hard. you see christie was truly "Daddy's Little Girl" I am so glad that David loves her as she deserves. If you look in the picture below Christie's hand you will see a necklace hanging from her finger. This was something i gave her when she was 18 and I held the key that was missing from the heart until her wedding day. She made this part of the service and for that i am so thankful.






Pray for Chad Thursday and Friday as he is taking two test that are really important. i will let everyone know how de did when we get the results. this weekend, Tc and I will work up at the river at the lodge. We will be cleaning bathrooms and Brother Tim from Forest city will come by and check the water heater. Should be a good weekend. We will end with church on Sunday at kings Mtn State Park. The Churches new website is www.wellspringcommunitychurch.us

It's Official

I return from the doctor a bit ago and she told me that I have cracked my tail bone. Thank God is not broken, just cracked. So, I will lay around a couple of days and will return to work on Wednesday. I am glad that I have a job with great benefits and a supervisor that cares about his people. The Doc told me I could get a child's ring float for driving on Wednesday. I guess I'll look pretty stupid driving with that thing in a Mack truck, but if it works, it works.
So many wonderful things have been happening lately. New people have visited the church, and relationships are growing stronger. It is wonderful to be doing what God wants and not Wade. My main concern is that I know these things change and I want to be ready to change with Him on a daily basis. I am currently reading John Eldredge's book " The Journey of Desire". I think it was one of his first books. Anyway, I am understanding a little about desire. It is that one thing that will not go away. A tugging if you will that draws you to a certain position, attitude or a decision. As with anything, desire can be bad or good. It is up to us to create that "good desire" to do Kingdom Work. I have a few prayer request:

• My tail bone
  

• My Mothers foot. (She got her last shot today and if that don't work she will have to have surgery.
• Wellspring Community Church
• Employment for friend in California.(He has interview tomorrow)

Listen to Hebrews 11: 16 KJV-

But now they desire a better [country], that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.

Now listen to the whole story from the New Living Translation.

13 All these faithful ones died without receiving what God had promised them, but they saw it all from a distance and welcomed the promises of God. They agreed that they were no more than foreigners and nomads here on earth. 14 And obviously people who talk like that are looking forward to a country they can call their own. 15 If they had meant the country they came from, they would have found a way to go back. 16 But they were looking for a better place, a heavenly homeland. That is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a heavenly city for them.
Man is that awesome or what. I love America, but you just wait. The day is coming. Call me a Nomad man cause I am just passing through. But, while we are here, we need to be doing the Kingdom work. Finally, look again at verse 16. Looking for a better place, a heavenly homeland. Amen

Pain in the butt

This weekend Tc and I went to a pool party at her sisters house. After playing withmy nephew for about an hour in the pool, I slipped and hit my tail bone on the diving board. Well, lets just say ouch. I can still walk but I cannot sit down. I think I will go to the doctor today. Will advise to status. It prevented me from going to church Sunday and also from seeing my kids. I could not bear the thought of riding in a car for two hours there and two hours back. I am not working today so I think I should have it checked out because it still hurts. BTW, I am on my knees writing this, so I think I will sign off and pray, Have a good one.

Giving Thanks For Our freedom

Just happened to find this while surfing. It is cool that the President Bush invited these men into our official Whitehouse. These men and thousands like them are fighting the good fight and their faith is being challenged everyday. Thankk God we can celebrate our faith and not even think about the results. Would we still share if we ere in danger of arrest? I too wonder even for myself. I would like to think I would and I really do believe I would, but what if? Today, I will again pray the prayer of Jabez and also pray for the underground church in china. Following is the report posted for the picture.

Bush hosts 3 Chinese rights activists in independent house church movement

By WILLIAM C. MANN ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON, May 11 — President Bush welcomed to the White House three human rights activists from China, including one whose Internet blog was blocked by Chinese authorities after it was nominated for two top international awards.

The three — author Yu Jie, law professor and blogger Wang Yi and legal scholar Li Baiguang — are active in China's underground Protestant churches, which have been hit for months by a government crackdown in which many movement leaders have been arrested. Such underground Chinese churches, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, are known as house churches, a reference to their use of private homes for services instead of government-monitored churches. Bush raised the fate of the house movement with Chinese President Hu Jintao when he visited Beijing in November. He said afterward, ''A society which recognizes religious freedom is a society which will recognize political freedom as well.'' The subject was expected to have come up during Hu's return visit to Washington last month, and Bush said beforehand that the rights of the Chinese people would be a major topic for him. Thursday's meeting was low-keyed, with little fanfare. The White House released a photograph depicting Bush and the three Chinese, all smiling, standing in the second-floor ''Yellow Oval Office'' with Bush's arm draped across Li's shoulder. An administration official said Bush praised the courage of his guests and their colleagues in advocating for their freedom to worship. Both Li and Yu have spent time in Chinese prisons for their activism. Li was a founding member of the Association of Human Rights Attorneys for Chinese Christians and was chosen by Asia Newsweek among the magazine's ''persons of the year.'' He was detained in 1998 for organizing student ''salons'' to discuss political change for China. Yu, the author of several books and a founding member of the Chinese PEN center, was arrested and held briefly in 2004 during a crackdown on independent intellectuals. PEN is an international organization for writers. Wang's Web log, Wang Yi's Microphone, was nominated for the ''Best Blogger'' top prize in the annual Best of the Blogs competition, sponsored by the German radio service Deutsche Welle. He also was nominated by the Reporters Without Borders organization for its annual award, presented in conjunction with the Deutsche Welle awards. Wang Yi's Microphone finished fourth in both categories. In writing about his nominations, Wang said, ''I joked that this guarantees that my blog will be closed down. Indeed, even before the list of nominees was published, the Hainan Internet Monitoring Office ordered the blog 'Wang Yi's Microphone' to be shut down.'' He appealed for support for his by-then nonexistent blog to win and wrote: ''This is not about me winning a prize; this is about a slap in their face.'

Wellspring Website

For those who are looking for Wellsprings website is has been involved in an accident. The doctors says there are little chance for recovery. So, I will be building a new one. It may take about two weeks. I will post and link when it is ready.

Simply amazed at our Awesome God

Yesterday I was so surprised that I recieved two replys from the blog. I really did'nt think anyone except a few freinds and family read this. One person said that they have read it quite alot. although I should not be surprised, I am amazed at how God works. One person was connected to my blog by my friend Keith Giles in southern california who started a house church caled "The Mission". Keith and I on a regular basis swap emails and discuss what each of us are doing and how God is working in our areas. That is just amazing! I do hope that we can get everyone together some day and meet for worship. It is encouraging to me that there are other people in our area that may be interested in some of the same things.
I wanted to make sure everyone knew how I felt about a subject. I am not down on traditional church. I just feel led in new directions. Many people who start or attend a new church, does so for reasons that are really not healthy. We desire to network with other believers. LifeSong, we hope, will one day be a network of "Wellspring Community church" and have a bi-weekly presence in the cherryville area.
In other news, chad got back to Job corps where he found out that they will no longer allow the students to have cell phones. Too many kids were abusing the priveledge. I am upset with this because this was our communication tool. To prove the point, today is Thursday and i have only talked to Chad one time this week. I guess there is not much i can do about it, but it still makes me upset. Tonight I will stay the night up at SMBC with TC and then Friday night we are going back to the Lodge and do some mission work Saturday morning. Part of the vision for the Lodge is to get the campground back on tract. We will begin by cleaning and fixing up the bath house. It needs to be painted, a new water heater and just a good ole cleaning. It is so peaceful there I can hardly wait until TC and I are relaxing Friday night. God bless everyone.

Some Pics from The Lodge

These Pictures represent a great time had the Lodge. Wellspring Community Church hosted this event and this weekend connected the physical and spiritual life. Held July 14,15,16, 2006. The Lodge is located on the edge of Polk County.

A Weekend Camping

Chad and I stayed up at South Mountain thursday and enjoyed the last day of youth camp. 7-Miles was playing and it was there last concert with the current band members. Benton and all the guys are just awesome. www.7-miles.com
Friday we went to the Lodge on the Green River in Polk County. this plaace is awesome. We set up the camper and then went tubing. The river was up so it was tons of fun. On Saturday we went tubing again, watched about 20 guys play paintball, sat around a camp fire and sung praises to our FAther in heaven. I intently focused on the smoke rising and pictured God inhabiting my praise. It was awesome! We had church sunday morning at the lodge and offered to god our sacrifice of something we could give him. We offered our camper and better habits. TC offered her time. Neither TC and I wanted to leave. We are going back next Friday and try and do some mission work. Perhaps work on the bath house. Hopefully some time this week I can post some pictures. Thanks to all the good cooks, our host (terry and Dawn) and to her dad, Bill who had this vision and followed the Lord to make this such a special place.

It was tough to take Chad back to job corps. We really enjoyed having him around. Christie and David came down on Saturday and went tubing with us. A total package weekend.

Man, what a week

It was tough for an old man to recover from Carowinds. The next morning we had a working fully involved house fire (Cherryville Fire Dept.) After that it has been up hill since. I think I am about caught up now. Last Saturday Tc and I looked at some new campers, but we decided to just fix our older one up. It's a money thing. We would rather save it for now opposed to spending it now. Anyway, Chad had a date Monday night and didn't get home until 11:30 PM. That's hard on a working man, but it was pretty much a one time thing for Monday, so I didn't mind. Chad is almost 18 and this was his first real date. I am quite pleased that he has not been girl crazy all these years like I see some. We will stay at camp again this Thursday and I will get to see Christie and 7-miles. Christie and David have a group from Turkey Creek Church. Wellspring is hosting a family retreat this weekend at the Lodge in Polk County so we are planning taking our camper and spending the whole weekend there. More updates later

A Day at Carowinds

Chad and I are preparing for a wonderful day at Carowinds. It is going to be 95 degree and very muggy today and we are gong where there are probably 9 billion people. Perhaps no that many, but tons. Our plan is to ride as much as we can in the morning and go to about 1:00, then break for lunch. Afterwards we will go to the waterpark and spend the rest of the day. We may go back and ride some more late in the evening. I plan on staying all day! Tomorrow we celebrate the 4th and for me it is also a day to recover. I will take Chad up to camp so he can volunteer the rest of this week. Things are going well with his summer break. The rest of the week is for work. Wedesday to the mountains, Thursday I deliver steel pipe to Raleigh and Friday I should be going to Knoxville TN.



Happy Birthday America!

Looking ahead, thinking back

I love this picture. It makes me think, "what is over the horizon for me" I reckon this cowboy is just mozing along, taking his time and reflecting on the day past. What a good idea. As you can see, he is still prepared. The Bible says in the parable of the ten virgins for us to be prepared, because we do not know when the bride-groom will come. It could be today!

Yesterday was TC's day off so we did what she wanted to do. We spent the day at South Mountain State park. We packed a picnic of roast beef sandwiches, ham and bacon, chips and good ole watermelon with sweet tea. YUMMY! We spent the day eating, talking and laying around on warm rocks after getting in the freezing water. It was a good day for sure. TC has to be back at camp today for coed week and she will get back home on Thursday this week.

A Prayer Request

Last night I had a simple dream and coupled with that is my conversations recently with my wife and some others. For some time now I have tried to focus on my gifts and being able to use them for God. Not that I am worthy, but I do have a desire to do this. My dream is to play in a band that utilizing both contemporary Praise and Worship music and some upbeat Southern gospel with some hymns thrown in as well. You see the body of Christ that I was exposed to for years have become somewhat stale and in need of Revival. My dream is to bring that in Song, Scripture and a Sermon Pratical Bible lessons with emphasis on evangelism. I can vision this band being made up of both young and old alike, ministering in diverse places, traditional churches and almost any venue. A total package if you will. Humor, perhaps some drama, with testimonies, some simple praise and worship, some hymns and a sermon.
You see my gifts are organization, teaching and some administration. In my dream I am the manager of the band, yet my leadership is of the gentle type. Jesus would be the leader. I am going to pray about this for a while and perhaps mention it to two or three other people that I know will pray about it on my behalf. To God be all Gory forever and forever, Amen!

Added to my List

Open Range. I do not why I have bought this movie yet, but now I have it. Cool! Robert and Kevin make great partners. When I was watching this you could'nt not help but think of Dances with wolves and Wyatt Earp. Kevin really is a good actor. Anyway, another one in my arsenal.

Church these days

I have friends on both sides of the road. Many who swear by traditional church, while others are traveling down the emergent road. I guess I am somewhere in between. I have grave concerns with traditionalists, while others seem to jump plum off the edge. If it is worship, it is for me. I just don't like boring and routine. I can jam with Amazing Grace just like Lifesong, but make it interesting. I am leaning toward what we are sharing at WellSpring Community Church. Everyone has an opportunity to share what is on their heart. What's interesting is the fellowship, openness and all around desire to follow Christ. It is not perfect, but I've never enjoyed church like this before. To be completely honest, there are some things that I miss about traditional church, yet what is great in the right setting, we can add those to our worship now. I believe we are open the the Holy spirit and what He would like done. It is not the way you hear some talk about. We do not sit around just waiting for the Holy spirit to move. We come fully expecting Him to move, yet we prepare. While anyone can share, the pastor or someone he appoints usually brings a message. It has been a long time since I have enjoyed church like this, Thank you God! Prayers and blessings go to our pastor, Terry Jordan.