Men, Sunday is Valentine’s day and the special woman in your life wants you to do something special for them. This special thing will make their heart feel warm and fuzzy and gushy. Just in case that special woman in your life is reading this I will not give much direction on what to give her, other than to say you need communicate how you value and appreciate her. (although it is my calling to make marriages stronger is if you need help, email me).

Why should we show our appreciation for the special women in our wives?  I’m glad you asked.  God tells us in Proverbs that a virtuous woman’s “price is far above rubies.”  (Proverbs 31:10)

This verse came alive for me recently when I had to watch our children for a few hours one night.  I became, for just a few hours, their primary caregiver, which meant I “made” them a pizza from Dominos and we watched cartoons all night.  My wife came home to a wreck of a house and asked me, “What would you do without me?”  I don’t even want to think about it.  There is no amount of money that could replace her in our lives.  There is no gadget, or gizmo, or widget that would even come close to filling any of the void that would in my family’s life if she were not there.

So on Valentine’s Day, I want to show my wife how much I value her.  And I pray, that I don’t just communicate this to her on Valentine’s Day alone, but everyday that I am blessed to have her in my life.  And it’s my hope that everyone who has a special someone in their lives, but let them always know that their value “is far above rubies.”

I was in the process of scrubbing the carpet a second time when I noticed the spot started to move. Like an idiot, I kept scrubbing the spot and after about another 2 minutes of scrubbing I finally realized that the red spot was a ray of sun coming through the blinds. I felt stupid, but I didn’t feel bad about it until my guest showed up and talked about how beautiful and rare the “red sunset” was that day.

I missed out on a beautiful sunset because I was busy paying attention to the wrong things. During this Christmas season, I’m even more embarrassed to admit the times I miss out on God’s Son. I can get so caught up in making sure I have bought all the right presents, preparing for company, parties, and food that I sometimes miss out on what the season is really about-the birth of Jesus into this world.

In the midst of whatever business you find yourself in, I pray that you might not miss out on the celebrating the birth of our Savior, the birth of God’s Son!

Let me posit this sin-o-meter concept and get your feedback. Your feedback can be almost anything as long as it’s clean and on topic.

The question is: How do you think God rates our sin? For instance, does He get really upset if we hold up a convenience store at gun point and perhaps a little less concerned when we over indulge with food? Maybe you think He doesn’t care one way or the other, as in, maybe you believe that God considers all sin detestable and that’s okay too, just let me know.

Consider the 10 commandments of the Old Testament. Are they the most detestable sins and if so, are they also in the order Moses Brought them down from the mountain. What about the New testament? Jesus was asked about this and only indicated 2 things. Do you remember that and if so are they more relevant since they are part of the New Testament?

Lastly, what about that pesky little unforgivable sin? What is that? does it still exist? Is it possible that God would not grant us forgiveness when requested if we violated the unforgivable?

So, what do you say? can we kick this can down the road a bit? Tell me what you think. Ask me if you have some questions. Let’s be interactive and fruitful. In truth the overall answer may be considered simple, simple, simple. However, along the way and if given ample thought it may indeed prove a bit perplexing.

MCL,

Al

We don’t go all out for Christmas, but if the one thing my son wanted was a $30 wooden train station I was determined to do everything I could to make sure he got that. We looked in big toy stores, smaller local boutiques, museums and hobby shops. We drove to cities and towns all over looking for this wooden train station. We got outbid at the last moment over a dozen times on eBay. It was a frantic search. We finally found a store in England that was willing to ship us the very train station our son wanted for a price that was over three times the $30 price tag that it was originally sold for. He opened it Christmas day and played with it right away. It was great to see him so happy.

The next day he didn’t play with it at all.

Nor the next.

Nor the day after that.

After a couple of weeks it was hidden in the bottom of his closet.

By February he put it in the Goodwill box in our garage to be given away the next time we were out.

The gift he wanted so bad. The gift we spent many hours searching for. Already a “has-been” after 6 weeks.

I rescued the station from the Goodwill box in our garage and I put the train station right next to the Christmas decorations so I can be reminded every Christmas season since that the presents my kids so desperately want will soon be given away. I need to be reminded that the presents I give is just stuff. And I don’t want my kid’s Christmas to be defined by stuff.

It’s my prayer that none of us have a Christmas this year that is defined by toys and trinkets, but by the celebration of the greatest gift we can ever receive-Christ Jesus, our Savior!

The mouse turned to the pig and told him, “There is a mouse trap in the house.”

“I am so very sorry Mr. Mouse,” sympathized the pig, “but there is nothing I can think of to do about it. Surely someone else will step in to help.”

The mouse turned to the cow, who replied, “Like wow, Mr. Mouse, a mouse trap; am I in grave danger, Duh?” So the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected to face the farmer’s mousetrap alone.

That very night a sound was heard throughout the house, like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer’s wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see that it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught.

The snake bit the farmer’s wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital.

She returned home with a fever. Now everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup’s main ingredient.

His wife’s sickness continued so that friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig.

The farmer’s wife did not get well, in fact, she died, and so many people came for her funeral the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide meat for all of them to eat.

So the next time you hear that someone is facing a problem and think that it does not concern you, remember that when the least of us is threatened, we are all at risk.

Most people that are followers of Christ do a great job o saying the right thing. A lot of us know how to play the part and know our lines.

When something bad happens, we say, “All we can do is pray.” When something goes right, we say “praise-elujah” (or something similar).

But knowing the right answers isn’t the same as doing the right thing. In Matthew 21:28-31 Jesus speaks of this when he asks a group, which of a man’s two sons did the will of his father? The first son said, “I will not go and work in the vineyard”, but later he did go. The second son said he would go, but did not go. Which son was obedient?

A life of faith isn’t about going through the motions and saying the right things. Christ wants us to live our faith.

Memorizing scripture is great, but what honors God even more is living out His commandments to love and witness.

A few chapters later (Matthew 25:21) Jesus speaks about the time when a follower of Christ will be reunited with the Father in Heaven and if that follower was faithful, that person shall hear, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.” But before we get to hear “well done” from our Father in Heaven, we must first do well.

May we all “do well” in serving Him.

Is it just me or does it seem like nearly everything we undertake in life today is complicated? It’s been like this for a while, hasn’t it? Remember the old VCR’s that were programmable, many still use them and do so successfully…for me however, all I could use them for was to watch a movie. I couldn’t program it to record a show, in fact I couldn’t even set the time. No. My VCR blinked “12:00″ all day and all night long. Clearly however, while still in use, VCR’s are almost from a different era and again, for me at least, things aren’t necessarily less complicated. The designers of more recent gadgets have gotten smarter and made them “Al proof” and as such I have a bit more success. I can actually program most clocks now a days .

However, as you might expect, I don’t really want to talk to you about electronics or modern day miracles. Rather, I’d like to simplify things. I remember being asked one time, “Have you ever noticed that when birds fly in a vee formation that one side of the vee is longer than the other?” I thought about it briefly and answered, “Yes, it does seem as though often one side is longer than the other”. So the person asking the questions said, “Why do you think that is?”. This gave me pause. Surely I thought there must be some scientific reason…maybe something to do with areo-dynamics, or perhaps something innate to nature whereby younger males were forced to fly in the rear. I mean it’s clear that one side of the vee is longer than than the other and everything happens for a reason, so surely there must be a fact unknown to me to explain such a sight. I considered all that and more and then answered my friend, “No, I don’t know why, do you?” He smiled and said, “Because there are more birds on the longer side”. So that was the joke, there was no deep thinking involved, it wasn’t complicated and truthfully couldn’t be simpler.

Again, however, I’m not here to discuss either gizmo’s or bird formations, rather something of significant concern…Salvation. I fear that sometimes we make it complicated and as such perhaps even unattainable. Perhaps in our minds Salvation is blinking 12:00 all the time. I mean surely something that important must be hard and certainly more complicated than a VCR…right?  Wrong.

I was watching the news this morning and they reported that the recently deceased Senator Kennedy had written the Pope a letter. In the letter he told the Pope that he had dedicated a great part of his life to helping those with less. He also asked the Pope to prayer for him. Now, not that it matters, but personally I believe that the Senator did spend much of his life trying to help those less fortunate than himself. I think he was a good man. He sinned like everyone of us and I didn’t see eye to eye with him on many issues, but one thing I for sure don’t want to do is judge him. Because I know that as I judge him so will God judge me and with all my imperfection that’s a thought that doesn’t sit well. Nonetheless, I continue to digress.

As such let me cut to the chase. Will Senator Kennedy, or for that matter, anyone that you can think of who has departed this earthly plane be in Heaven when it’s all over and done with? He will be and so will any one else you can think of who is deceased if he and they had believed in and had faith in Jesus Christ.

That’s why I’m writing today, I want everyone who reads this to know just how simple it is, how terribly uncomplicated it is to achieve Salvation. The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome and in Chapter 4, verse 3, he said ”…Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness”. I highly encourage each of you to find 10 minutes today and read chapters 3 and 4 or Romans.

What you’ll discover is that all this nice things we do (which are good and we should continue to do) are not how we achieve Salvation. To the best of my knowledge, Christianity is the only organized belief system that doesn’t require you to physically perform some duty or tasks or series of obligations. No, Christianity is much simpler…not at all like modern cell phones that I can’t use for anything other than taking and receiving calls.

It truly is that simple friends. Believe in God. Believe that Jesus is the Son of God. I imagine that perhaps some of you may say. “surely, I must do more than believe”. To that, all I can respond is, “show me in the Bible”.

These goods things that Christians do aren’t to prove to God that we believe. That’s backwards. We do those good things because we believe and it’s simply a natural evolution of our belief.

Be blessed and believe and be saved!

Al

I passed the mother again in the candy aisle. Of course, the little girl began to shout for candy. When she was told she couldn’t have any, she began to cry. The mother said, “There, there, Ellen, don’t cry. Only two more aisles to go, and then we’ll be checking out.”

I again happened to be behind the pair at the check-out, where the little girl immediately began to clamor for gum and burst into a terrible tantrum upon discovering there would be no gum purchased today. The mother patiently said, “Ellen, we’ll be through this check out stand in five minutes, and then you can go home and have a nice nap.”

After I paid for my groceries, I ran into them in the parking lot and stopped the woman to compliment her. “I couldn’t help noticing how patient you were with little Ellen…”

The mother broke in, “My little girl’s name is Tammy… I’m Ellen.”

I immediately understood and remembered what it was like when my kids were that age. They weren’t much different than this mother’s daughter and my patience was probably even more thin.

I was so focused on getting through those early years that I’m embarrassed by how little time I truly took time to enjoy them. And what’s even more embarrassing is that I find myself making the same mistakes in other areas of my life as well.

I sometimes get so caught up in living everyday life (rushing to the next meeting, or even the next part of my life), that I forget to enjoy the blessings of God that surround me today.

To anyone who has ever made the same mistake I have made in not looking always looking for His blessings in our lives as they presently are, God tells us these comforting words, “Haven’t I commanded you? Be strong and of good courage. Don’t be afraid, neither be dismayed: for Yahweh your God is with you wherever you go. ” (Joshua 1:9)

Wherever we go! As we rush from one meeting to another, God is keeping up with us and He’s there. As we run from errand to errand, God is with us. As we collapse in bed, God is there. As we look forward to the future, God is with us now. It’s my prayer and heart’s desire that we all take a moment, to enjoy His blessings in our everyday lives and may we never forget that He is always with us!

As we were approaching our home we saw a man on the side of the road with a sign asking for food and we took inventory and somehow we all had a lot of leftovers. I was getting ready to give this man some food when the light turned green and a car behind me honked. I didn’t want to cause anyone to miss a light and it didn’t occur to me that to pull over, which means I almost gave this man some food.

He almost had his belly full for the first time in who-knows how long. He almost had enough leftovers to take home to his family. And God almost was happy with what I did.

I have never hated the word “almost” as much as I did that day. Take out the word “almost” from the previous paragraph and it would be describing a completely different scene. I almost did the right thing, which means I failed to feed a hungry man and serve God.

I pray that all of us may live a life without the term “almost” being used in reference to our relationship with God and our service to the world. After giving us His whole Son Christ, God wants our whole hearts, lives, trust and obedience.

Lord, forgive us for the times we almost did what was right in your eyes. Open our eyes to the needs of this world and may we be the whole body of Christ to this world-His hands feeding the hungry, His feet that we might go where He would lead us, and His heart that others might fall head-over-heels in love with our Lord.

Imagine a church without a steeple where the people are really the church

Imagine a church that isn’t defined by its’ building

Imagine a church doesn’t see the unchurched, and dechurched as the enemy, but as the victim of the enemy

Imagine a church that preaches simple truths without dumbing them down

Imagine a church that has made over 20K meals that were distributed to hungry around the world in the name of Christ

Imagine a church that is just as passionate about feeding those in the local community as well

Imagine a church that is sponsoring a formerly homeless family by providing, shelter, food and education

Imagine a church that will be sending 15 of it’s on a mission trip to Jamaica to build a roof and lead a VBS

Imagine a church with a vibrant children’s church where the kids are falling head over heels in love with Jesus

Imagine a church where you never hear the phrase, “It’s never been done that way before”

Imagine a church where both the affluent and poor are rich in the Spirit

Imagine a church where this past Easter Sunday we had a large stage two rows deep full of adults being baptized

Imagine a church offering the unconditional love of Christ without judgment, guilt or shame (mad, crazy love)

Imagine a church the Gospel is never watered down

Imagine a church that is helping abused women escape life-threatening situations, former inmates getting adjusted to life outside of prison, and enabling and empowering the poor in the community to reach a place of being self-sustained

Imagine a church where the most important thing heard on Sunday morning doesn’t come from the pastor or the music, but what God says through it all

Imagine a church clothes the naked, visits the sick, feeds the hungry, and goes to the prisons

Imagine a church where “church” isn’t a place you go, but something you are and do

Imagine a church that is unapologetic about preaching salvation through faith in Christ alone

Imagine a church that stands with those on margins of society

Imagine a church where Jesus is more than a get out of hell card

Imagine a church that isn’t concerned about where you have been but where you are going

Imagine a church that is an Acts 2 congregation (radical hospitality, passionate worship, intentional discipleship, extravagant generosity, and risk-taking ministries-awarded by NC Annual Conference) in spite of its pastor

Imagine a church where worship isn’t described as traditional and contemporary, but as relevant and passionate

Imagine a church that has a partnership with other healthy, local congregations

When you imagine those things, you are getting a small glimpse of what Greater Heights United Methodist Church looks like.