Hit the Deck

Okay, it’s a little play on words, please forgive me.   A little after 5:00 this morning I began to hear the rumblings.  Oh, boy, here we go.  I went and got Chrissy from her pen and put her in the garage.  She flat freaks out in thunder storms, though she has a perfectly good dog house.  After I put her up, I got a “wild hair.”  Last night, I had purchased the guttering material to carry water from the down spout to the end of the deck (about 25 feet) because the water had been draining under the deck and contributing to the wood rotting.  However, it got dark and I didn’t get it installed.  So, I got to thinking that I better get it installed before it starts raining.  I got my handy dandy light that straps around my head, the guttering materials, my drill, and few screws and crawled up under the deck.  Boy, was it a good thing I got it all put together because about thirty minutes later, as my mother-in-law would say, “We had a real toad strangler.”  I don’t have a rain gauge, but I’m guessing we received about two inches of rain within about an hour and a half.  The drainage ditch behind our house looked like a raging river for a little bit. 

After I put the guttering together, I had some great time quiet time with God.  In addition to Bible reading, study and prayer time, I read one of Spurgeon’s daily devotionals and it was exactly what I needed today.   Let me first say that I am so thankful we are on a budget (see my post on 10 Key Moves – Budgeting – http://noguff.wordpress.com/2008/05/20/ten-key-moves-budget/) and have stuck to it.  It has helped us to navigate this roaring economic river without turning over and with very little water in the boat.  It has been tight, but all of our needs have been met, including having to put a couple of tires on the van unexpectedly, paying for school books, and paying for all the fees, doctor’s visit, etc. that is required to become a substitute teacher.  Bless my wife’s heart, she is doing a great job at keeping the grocery bill down and finding ways to save money.  Just last week, I asked her if she thought she could cut my hair.  She mentioned it to a friend, who just a few days later found two pairs of hair clippers at a garage sale for $1 each!!  She cut my and our son’s hair and did a great job.  Anyway, last night I was working on our September budget.  We’ve had a few changes this month, such as school starting back and loss of some childcare income that my wife was receiving through the summer.  In addition, I can no longer ride the bike as much because I need to take the kids to school.  I should be able to substitute teach on Fridays as soon as my license comes in, so that should help.  Anyway, I know God will provide – I just need to be patient as I wait for all the pieces to fall into place.  I can tell you story after story of His provision.  In fact, just the other day, we received $25 in the mail anonymously!  In addition, we still have our savings to fall back on if needed.  Anyway, I’m not going to paste the whole devotional here, but here is the part that struck me the most:

The cattle on a thousand hills will suffice for our most hungry feeding, and the granaries of heaven are not likely to be emptied by our eating. If Christ were only a cistern, we might soon exhaust his fulness, but who can drain a fountain?  Myriads of spirits have drawn their supplies from him, and not one of them has murmured at the scantiness of his resources. Away, then, with this lying traitor unbelief, for his only errand is to cut the bonds of communion and make us mourn an absent Saviour.

Spurgeon, C. H.: Morning and Evening : Daily Readings. Oak Harbor, WA : Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1995, S. August 27 AM

No need to fear.  God is our provider.  I will not cut the bonds of communion with Him by not trusting in Him!!

After my time with God, I took the kids to school, spent some time in the office until the rained cleared away, and then went and helped my two friends finish the final repairs that needed to be made on the deck.  My lovely wife primed a board that we needed to replace on the house, so we even got that done, too.  I thought we were going to get the sliding glass door fixed, but the place we took it didn’t have the right wheels.  We got them ordered, though.  It feels good to have the structural work finished on the deck.  With as big of a deck as it is, I’m impressed with how sturdy and stable it is.  These men know what they are doing!  For me, one of the greatest moments was when one of the guys said that the work I had done without them there was “good.”  It’s amazing how far encouragement like that will go toward building a guy’s confidence in trying other stuff.  Even at 36, validation from an older man means a lot, especially one I respect as much as I do these guys.  Of course, my son was right there with us, hammer in hand.  All of a sudden, he has this huge interest in tools, and I think that’s so cool.  On to our next project…

May God take care of your every need, as indicated in His name Jehovah-Jireh (The Lord Will Provide)!

Walking With God

I have the priviledge of teaching chapel two mornings a week at the school that is part of our church.  The children come to school three days per week and then homeschool the other two days.  All three of my girls attend the school, and it works great for our family.  It’s pretty cool to walk down the hall and have lunch with them most days. 

To go along with the Olympics, our theme passage for this school year is Hebrews 12:1-3 – “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.  Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”  The great cloud of witnesses the writer is talking about is those listed in Hebrews 11.  So, I have decided to talk about these Bible heroes and figure out what each one did that was pleasing to God.  By doing this, we are compiling a list of attributes and virtues that we can model in our lives, if we want to become “gold medal” Christians.

Today, we talked about Enoch.  Not many words are said in the Bible about Enoch.  However, what is said is powerful.  At first glance, you might think that he was shortchanged.  His father, Jared, lived 962 years and his son, Methuselah, holds the record for years lived at 969 years.  So sandwiched between the two guys who lived longer than anyone else on record is Enoch with a measly 365 years.  In fact, that’s the shortest amount of time listed in Genesis 5!  He must have really done something wrong, huh?  Nope.  In fact, just the opposite.  Instead of just saying Enoch lived…, the Bible says Enoch walked with God…  It says it not once but twice in this little passage of Scripture.  Verse 24 says, “Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.”  Hebrews 11:5 says, “By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death; he could not be found, because God had taken him away.  For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God.”  Verse 11:6 goes on to say, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.”  Enoch must have been a man of great faith who walked with God, earnestly seeking Him.  He was rewarded by not experiencing death and being removed from this earth to be with God!!  Wow, that gives me chills.  I want to walk with God like that!  I want to live out the kind of faith that pleases God.  Walking with God here indicates that Enoch had fellowship with God and lived a life of obedience.  In God’s Word, we are reminded over and over to walk in His ways.  I think it can be summed up in Deuteronomy 10:12-13:  “Now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require from you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the Lord’s commandments and His statutes which I am commanding today for your good.”

As I was studying this concept further, I came across Proverbs 20:7, “A righteous man who walks in his integrity— How blessed are his sons after him.” Let me leave you with this thought: Enoch is listed in the geneology of David, a man after God’s own heart, and of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, God’s one and only Son!  What kind of legacy are we going to leave behind?  Are we walking in close fellowship with God, loving Him, listening to Him and obeying His commandments, and serving Him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength?

May we all take this to heart and walk with God!

More on Mentoring

Wow, it was another productive weekend.  My friends returned Saturday to help, and now the structural repairs to the deck are almost finished.  I’m going to take some time off Wednesday because that’s the day they can come back for the remaining repairs.  I have really enjoyed working with these guys.  My wife cooked us some hamburgers and we all sat around and visited during lunch.  There is some real bonding that occurs when you work with guys like this.  I have been blessed by their help, by their companionship, and by what I have learned.  Working with these men actually gave me the confidence to go out on my own and do some work on the deck last night.  I got out the Skil saw, measured and cut some boards and installed them under each of the steps for support.  It worked great, and it felt good to be able to do something like that.  Mentoring can be a great thing at any age.

To top it off, all of my children were wanting to “help” last night.  The girls would help for a few minutes and then would be off doing other things.  However, my son never ventured off too far.  He’s in a stage where he wants to do everything I’m doing.  If I’m mowing, he’s pushing his little mower all over the yard with me.  My wife gave him a small ball-peen hammer that had once been my great uncle’s, and he thought he was “the man.”  I gave him several scrap pieces of wood to bang around on.  I had to really watch him that he didn’t bang on other stuff.  He kept saying, “I help you, Daddy.”  Of course, the other thing he kept saying was, “where’s my hammer?”  It runs in the family…  Throughout this project, I often look down and find him standing just like me or like one of the guys who has been helping us or doing something that we are doing.  Last Saturday, I was afraid he was getting in the way, and I didn’t want him annoying the other guys.  I got onto him one time for getting in the middle of stuff and told him to go play on the swing-set.  The wise gentlemen who has orchestrated most of the repairs said, “Don’t discourage him.”  I’m still holding onto those words as golden nuggets.  I want to encourage my children to be helpful, even when it seems like they are “more of a hindrance than help.”  Oh, the things we can learn from those who have been there.  I think my son and I both have benefitted from having these friends helping us.  I need to learn to be more patient and allow for the inconvenience of having him help.

May God bless you today!

But, But, But… Okay, Lord

When will I ever learn?…  For some reason, I just didn’t feel like doing the prayer ride this morning.  However, I pushed through those feelings and met the guys.  We went a little later than normal.  It was a cool, kind of misty morning.  All three of us were quieter than normal, especially me.  I just needed quiet reflective time with God today.  I just kept praying over and over in my heart, “Lord, I need more of you.  You are all I need.”  On the way back, one of the guys needed to get on back so he rode ahead.  As we came upon our final prayer stop, we found that it was occupied.  My friend said, “What do you think, should we go ahead and stop?”  We didn’t have much time to talk about it, but I was all for moving on because it was awkward.  This wasn’t like the guy down by the river.  This guy was right there sitting at the table.  If we stop, there wouldn’t be the option not to talk.  Well, my friend stopped and began to strike up a conversation.  As I’ve said before, that’s not my thing, and especially not on a day where silence is preferred.  I walked away while they talked.  At this part of the creek, it is like a mini-rapids because the water is rushing down a man-made concrete slope.  I really don’t know how to describe it any better than that, but I love the sound of the rushing water.  I prayed for a minute, and then my friend came over to join me.  I knew that this guy was probably a divine appointment, but I wasn’t in the frame of mind to talk.  I asked God to forgive me for my attitude and then I walked over and said the same thing that I had said to the guy a few weeks ago, “Hi, we’re on a prayer ride and this is one of our regular stops along the way.  Is there anything we can be praying for you about?”  After a second, he said, “No, I can’t think of anything.  I talk to the ‘Man Upstairs’ everyday.”  Well, that’s that, I thought.  Let’s go…  Not so fast.  As soon as I asked him if we could pray for him, something seemed to soften and his guard went down.  We had some great small talk.  We found out that he is homeless, and I’m pretty sure it’s by choice.  He goes from town to town on his bicycle and pitches his tent wherever he can find a nice secluded place.  It sounds like he works odd jobs in the winter and travels in the summer.  One day, he said he clocked over 100 miles on the bicycle.  He told us of another time where some ’coons were trying to raid his tent for food.  Anyway, before we left, I asked if we could pray for him to have safe travels, and he said “sure.”  Hopefully, we encouraged him today.  I left feeling blessed, and glad that we stopped.  It makes me want to go home and get rid of all of my unneccesary junk, too.  This man seemed to be quite content with the few possessions he could carry on a bicycle.

May you find joy in the simple things today.

Blessed Day

I left the house before 6:00 this morning for our prayer ride.  This week, there were four of us.  It was a beautiful, cool morning.  Other than going through some water that was deeper than expected and getting my shoes and socks wet, it was a great ride.  At one point, there was a deer that crossed the trail and jumped the creek up ahead of us.  Psalm 42:1-2 came to mind, “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God.  My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.  When can I go and meet with God?”  I want to pant for the living God.  I love spending those early morning hours riding next to the creek and river, seeking the living God.

Then, I came back to the office and cleaned up before going to lead a devotional at one of the area nursing homes.  I always feel blessed when I go and spend time with the elderly.  It probably goes back to my childhood days when we lived with my grandparents.  They ran a nursing home out of their home and always had 3-6 elderly people living with them.  When I moved back to the area to go to college, I was only 15 minutes away.  That made it possible for me to go and help them when needed.  One of my favorite people who lived there was a 90 year old man.  He was full of life, and would often say, “This is just a little piece of Heaven right here on Earth.”  Even today, our family enjoys being part of a ministry led by a dear friend called “Joyful Noise.”  Joyful Noise is a group of people who sing at nursing homes once per month.  I hear over and over again how much the people appreciate us bringing the children.  Our daughters have been given the job of making sure that every single person who attends gets a hug.  We have been doing this for several years now, and it’s one of the highlights of our month.  Through doing this, my children aren’t afraid of people in wheelchairs or who make grunting noises.  They understand when a person tells a story over and over again, and when a person is disoriented.  I think this has been great for them, and we’re looking forward to our son joining in this year…  Anyway, I made some new friends this morning.  I met a gentleman from the Ukraine, who was talking about his great anticipation of being in the presence of Jesus.  I met a lady who had been a captain in “the war.”  I’m assuming she was talking about WWII.  There was also a lady there who was holding a doll.  She was treating the doll as if it were her live baby.  It was so touching to see her holding the doll and kissing it.  I’m sure it brought her comfort and a sense of purpose, even as her mind was no longer functioning properly.  There was another lady who had a notebook full of colorful portraits.  She just kept flipping through the pages over and over.  There was even a lady who gave me a big kiss on the hand.  I’m not sure if many of them got anything from my devotional or not, but I enjoyed ministering to them, anyway. 

At lunch, our staff went to have lunch with another minister who has had to resign and retire from ministry because of severe back problems.  I went with the intent of encouraging him, but he encouraged me instead.  He had something nice to say about each of us and he was truly speaking from his heart.  He is such a genuine, good-hearted man and we’re going to miss him.

It’s been a full and blessed day.

May you pant for God today as the deer pants for streams of water!!

Manly Stuff

Some of my “retired” friends put together a work day on my deck yesterday, so I took a half day off to “help” them.  Believe me, when it comes to this kind of stuff, I let the experts make the decisions and I do what I’m told.  I warned them that I’m unskilled labor, but would do whatever they needed me to do.  These guys definitely know what they are doing.  Whoever built the deck to begin with did a pretty poor job and didn’t use treated lumber.  So, the first thing we needed to do was go under it and put in some joists and support beams.  I may not be good with knowing what to do, etc…, but I’m still a man, and I enjoy the sound of power tools.  I enjoy pulling out tools that I don’t often use – like the mini-sledge.  It felt good to see it all coming together and working as planned.  Yeah, we had blood and sweat, but no tears.  Most of all, it was good to spend time with and learn from older guys who knew what they were doing.  They were also patient with me, and I appreciate that. 

When they left, I was pretty tired from slinging the sledge, but I wasn’t ready to stop being productive, so I finished mowing the yard (you know, from the other day when I got rained out) and climbed up into a tree and cut a couple of branches out.  I was going to finish weeding the last little bit of the garden, but it was getting close to 9:13, when Michael Phelps was supposed to be going for another gold medal…   It was great.  This time, it was my 2 year old son who was jumping around, hollering, and saying “Go.  You can do it.  Yahoo…”  Wow, the influence we have on them, even at that age.

Needless to say, after riding my bike to the office and back, working on the deck and in the yard, and then watching a little bit of the Olympics, I was exhausted.  It was a good kind of exhausted, though.  I slept very well, with the satisfaction of knowing it had been a productive day.  Today, I’m pretty sore.  The ride to work this morning was a little tougher than usual and the tendinitis in my shoulders is flaring up (nothing Advil and ice packs won’t take care of), but in some kind of sick way, I really feel good.  The more I read and study the Scriptures, the more I realize God created us to work and be productive.  Not all work is physical, but all work can be productive, and there is such a satisfaction that comes with that.  One of the verses that comes to mind is Proverbs 22:29:   ”Do you see a man skilled in his work? He will stand before kings; He will not stand before obscure men.”  Another one is Proverbs 21:25:  “The desire of the sluggard puts him to death, for his hands refuse to work.”  Sluggard has always been one of my least favorite words in the Bible.

Of course, I got my reality check when my youngest daughter noticed that the florescent light had burned out in the basement.  She asked, “Isn’t that the same kind of light that was in my preschool class?”  “Yes, it sure is,” I replied.  “Well, maybe the same guy who fixed that one could come over and fix this one.”  “It’s just a light bulb, honey.  I think I can handle this one.”  “Oh, okay.”  And she ran off to play…

May God bless the work of our hands and make us productive in the time we have on this Earth.

Olympic Maniac

Yes, I am an Olympic Maniac.  Yes, I “closed down” the broadcast with Bob Costas at 11:00 last night.  Yes, it was worth it.  I was on my feet and cheering for the American 400m free style relay team late last night.  Of course I know it doesn’t help to yell from this side of the tv set, but it makes me feel better.  No, I didn’t wake anyone up because we were all watching it together.  School doesn’t start until next week…

Anyway, the announcers were saying the Americans didn’t have a chance.  However, no one told wing man Jason Lezak that.  He was like a monster in the water.  You could just sense the power and determination as he closed the gap on Alaine Bernard of France, who is the world’s fastest swimmer in the 100 m free style.  Lezak made a lunge forward and touched the wall .08 of a second before Bernard, beating the world record, securing the gold medal for the U.S., and thus keeping Michael Phelps’ hopes alive for eight gold medals.  To top it off, Bernard had said earlier that the French team would “smash the Americans.”  To me, stuff like that only serves to fuel the fire for the other team.  When will people ever learn…  So often, these arrogant statements and guarantees are made, and they end up “eating humble pie.”  Something deep down inside of me loves when the underdog wins and when justice is served.  Cocky, arrogant attitudes are one of my pet peaves.  Anyway, there is a reason that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.

Anyway, fortunately for me (and those around me) the Summer Games only occur every four years.  I think my oldest daughter and to some degree my other two daughters have caught the Olympic bug and we’re enjoying watching them together. 

Nothing too deep today, just another lesson on humility.  I preached a sermon on the topic of “Goodness” yesterday, but will have to write some thoughts on that later…

May God bless you with His goodness today!

Rainy Day

We decided to sleep in the tent again last night.  The weather is unusually cool and the work on the deck was postponed until Monday.  So… about 4:30 this morning I thought I saw lightning.  I asked my wife and she said, “I don’t know my eyes were closed.”  Oh, yeah, that makes sense.  We are supposed to be sleeping…  Then, I saw it again, and so did she.  We weren’t real big on the idea of having to move our four sleeping children and all of our bedding into the house.  I rationalized that the storm must not be close because the dog wasn’t freaking out.  Then, we began to hear thunder in the distance.  More lightning.  Dog getting restless sliding her metal food bowl all over the place.  More thunder.  RATS!!  We formed our plan and got up.  After we had moved two of the girls in, it began to sprinkle.  By the time I woke up our oldest, it was coming down a little harder.  She said, “It will be okay, it’s not coming in…”  Let’s just say that the corner where she was sleeping ended up with about 3 inches of water.  I carried our son last while my wife put the dog in the garage.  By that point it had started pouring.  It rained off and on all day, so I didn’t “get to” finish mowing the yard.

Since I couldn’t do anything outside, it gave me the perfect chance to focus on the final touches to my sermon for tomorrow.  Well, it should have been the perfect chance.  If only the Olympics had not started today!  I have had a lot of memories flooding back today from 1984.  The ‘84 Olympics in L.A. were the first ones I remember, and I was glued to the t.v. for two weeks.  We had just moved to Abilene, TX, and I didn’t have any friends yet.  Not to mention it was the hottest place I had ever been in my life.  Anyway, names like Mary Lou Retton, Carl Lewis, Edwin Moses, and others still bring back memories of those days.  I don’t watch a lot of t.v. until the Summer Games are on, then I become a junky.   They just seem to bring out the best in people.  I especially like to hear the stories of how they got there.  Like tonight, I learned that Michael Phelps (7 time gold medalist in swimming after tonight) was a rowdy boy being raised by a single mom.  His coach instilled discipline and work ethic in him, and turned him into a gold medalist.  There we go… the importance of a mentor.

Tonight, I finally installed our digital converter box, and I can’t believe the improvement in clarity.  What was once our fuzziest channel, is now crystal clear just in time for the games!  Then, we ate pizza and stuffed jalapenos while watching the Olympics.  Our youngest daughter decided to try a little of the jalapeno and thought she was going to die.  Now, my children are in the living room floor re-enacting the gymnastics.  Earlier today my middle daughter told me that she wants to “sign up” for diving.  I told her she would have to train and become among the best in the world.  She told me that she’s already there.  I love her confidence, even if she’s young and a little bit clueless…

It’s been a good day.  By the way, with a little self-discipline I did get the sermon ready.

May God bless you with good family time!

Boys

Happy 8/8/08!!  I just have some random thoughts I would like to share from my morning.

First of all, the kids have been begging to sleep in the backyard in the tent for awhile.  Things worked out for us to do that last night.  All six of us slept in the tent, and enjoyed it.  The only bad part was when the kids woke up needing to go to the bathroom…  Even our two year old finally settled sown and actually slept well.  I tried telling them some goofy story that I made up, but they were laughing and it didn’t serve to calm them down.  Hopefully, it was a good memory maker, anyway.

I had my time with God a little later this morning than usual.  As I was sitting on the patio (my garden has been overtaken with weeds, but I’ve declared war on them this week), the neighbor boy rode his bike into our backyard.  He just stopped and stared at me while eating his “Popice”.  I was reading in 1 Cor. 3 about carefully building on the foundation of others, and that our work would be tested.  It hit me that God wanted me to help lay this boy’s foundation in Jesus Christ, and then build on it.  He has a dad at home, but I don’t see them doing much together.  In other words his dad is there but not engaged.  This eight year old pretty much runs all over the neighborhood doing what he wants to do.  He annoys and upsets me more than a lot of kids, so I’m asking God to give me what I need to reach out to him.  I’ve had to “ban” him from our house on occasion because of his mouth and his actions.  Anyway, I asked him if he knows who Jesus is, and he said “yes”.  I told him that was good because Jesus is the most important person he’ll ever know.  I told him to always feel free to ask questions if he had any.  I felt like that was as far as I should take it today.  I asked him about his plans for the day and stuff like that.  He eventually took off.  I was left with a real burden for helping to build this boy’s spiritual foundation.  Hmmm… discipleship opportunity…

Later, as I was weeding the garden (yes this is the third day of weeding), my own 2 year old son came to the edge of the garden and said, “Can we talk?”  I thought that was pretty cool.  The day before, to try to get him to stay within my view, I said, “Come over here and talk to me for awhile,” so he did.  He must have thought that was pretty fun because he wanted to do it again.  He talked non-stop, most of it I could understand, but some of it sounded like jibberish.  He kept saying something about “fifty dollars.”  I have no idea where that came from…  No matter, I enjoyed every minute of it, and I hope our relationship is always like that.

Last week at VBS, I became aware of a group that was really having some challenges.  Our preschool group was going well, so I moved to the other group.  I believe God wanted me there for a purpose.  There was a boy who was giving us a run for our money.  However, when it was time to sit and do something, he would seek me out and sit as close as possible.  I have a feeling that he needs a father or father figure in his life.  Anyway, I’ve been really reflecting on these things today and praying that God will help me to make a difference and raise up other guys to stand in the gap, not only for the boys, but also the girls.

Well, I better get back to the garden and then mow the yard.  Just stopped for a little break.

May God use you to build on the foundation of others in a way that your work will stand the test of fire!

Home Project Woes

Why do I get myself involved in home projects?  I always seem to run into problems and mess things up.  Even the projects that should be simple often turn into a mess.  I was in the process of weeding my garden last night (way overdue, by the way), and thought I better clean out my A/C unit of the cotton from the cottonwoods.  There didn’t seem to be an easy way to do it, so I began to unscrew the top and then the side panels.  That was easy enough.  I got right in there and peeled off the “blankets” of cotton that had collected.  I even somehow avoided getting stung by some wasps that had built a nest on the inside of the unit.  Then I began to try to put it all back together.  I quickly learned that I had probably taken it further apart than I should have.  Nothing was fitting back together easily and the screw holes weren’t lining up properly.  If that wasn’t bad enough, it began to rain and then began to get dark.  I got it back together enough to be able to run the unit, but it is definitely not the way it should be.  I’m not sure where I went wrong, but I’ll probably have to call someone in to help me.  I have always wanted to learn how to fix things around the house.  I would also like to have the ability to build stuff.  I try, but I seem to run into more problems than the average guy.  When we were in college, my wife even ordered me the Time Life Home Improvement book set as a Christmas gift.  We received one about every six weeks until we had all 36 books.  Even with those, I still have my share of difficulties.  You have to have some kind of basic knowledge to even use those.  Guys who can just pick up their tools and materials and begin to build things totally amaze me.  I never really learned those kinds of things growing up.  Of course, I don’t know that it would have done any good, because I’ve determined it’s just not my gift.  Oh, well.  I commend you folks who can fix or build anything. 

It would be easy to sit and dwell on what I’m not good at, but I don’t think that would be honoring to God, who created me.  I need to be thankful for the gifts he has given me and use those to glorify Him.  I also need to be thankful for the friends who come alongside me and help me with my with projects around the house.  When we got back from Texas a few weeks ago, a good friend had repaired some broken steps and boards on our deck.  On Saturday, some more friends are coming over to help complete the work that he started on our deck to make it safe and usable again.  God didn’t intend for us to do life alone, but to use our gifts to help others. 

Well, I don’t know if I’m gifted at it or not, but I’m preaching on Sunday and better get back to work on that sermon…  

May God help you determine your gifts and may you use them to glorify and honor Him today!