House Update

Didn’t get it.

And we’re fine with that.  We offered what our Realtor suggested, which was a little over asking, and still didn’t get it.  So we’re putting the house hunting on hold.  Maybe pay off some bills.  Focus on some other things in our life.  Just take a break.  I honestly believe we’ll look back at this and think, "Thank God we didn’t get that house!"

House Hunting

January began with excitement as started looking for a house.

It’s March and I now hate looking at houses.  HATE.  We’ve made 2 offers, 1 accepted, which we pulled because it was a piece a crap.  Thank you mister inspector.  Now we have made our 2nd offer.  And I’m already aggravated about this one.  It’s been on the market forever.  We finally decide to look at it, and that day they dropped the price.  Great right?  Nope.  Its a VA owned home and they have to accept all offers within a 10 day window after a price change.  Meaning lots of people have looked at it and now there are multiple offers…including ours.  At this point I don’t have the intestinal fortitude to put up with a bidding war.  We just made the offer we would have originally and we’ll let it play out.

We do like the house.  Its in Lake Wilderness, which is farther than we originally wanted to be.  But it has an amazing deck.  Backs up to the National Forest, or park, or whatever that battlefield is.  It’s a split foyer, which again we’d rather not have, but you can’t beat the space.  It has 3 beds, 2 baths, hardwoods, fireplace, and its in good shape.  Just needs paint and carpet.

So here is how we need you to pray:

  • If this is a mistake we want God to slam the door shut!  Trust me, we’ll be fine.  Last thing we want to do is fork out more money for inspections and crap for it to fall through.  We’d rather not get to that point.
  • If God does shut the door, we need him to open one up!  I really want to see God do something big in our life in this area!
  • We simply need wisdom.  Lots of wisdom.  Like big neon signs hanging in the sky kinda wisdom.

Thank you for your prayers!

Sunday Night Mind Dump

  • I preached today.  Thank God I don’t have to do that every week!
  • Really proud of our band today.  Excellent music, and spirit-filled worship!
  • Setup crew really went beyond the call of duty today.  They stayed as long as needed to make sure we were set to go.
  • Oh – yeah, school had no power this morning.  Got the call at 6:15.  Made a few phone calls and had tow-behind generators there within the hour.  Our people are amazing!
  • God answers prayer!  Power company showed up and fixed the problem!
  • Talked about the power of one today.  What could God do with you if you let him take your ordinary and make it extraordinary?
  • Looked like a great turnout for the newcomers lunch!
  • We’re getting office space!  We’ll be in April 1st!
  • I love our church!
  • My in-laws are in to visit!  They are a hoot.  And boy do they love their grandbaby!  Please!  No more toys!
  • Got to go on a date with my wife – movie and Wawa coffee!
  • I love spending time with my wife!  She’s hot!
  • Wyatt looked like a little man today.  Sharp cord jacket.  He’s a lady’s man.
  • Why does every toy Wyatt gets make noise?
  • Actually played "Kind-Hearted Woman Blues" by Clapton this morning as part of my message….you’ll just have to listen to the podcast to understand.
  • We have the best volunteers in the world!
  • New Quake bumper is rockn’  Love me some POD.
  • I’m always looking for a reason to go to the nursery to see Wyatt.  I love his smile!
  • My dad is coming Wednesday.  Can’t wait!
  • My brother and sis-n-law are coming Easter weekend!  March is family month!
  • Easter is right around the corner!  It’s going to be off the hook!
  • Can’t wait to hear from my pastor next week.  It’ll feel like a week off!

War in the South

So I interrupt this blogging hiatus for an interesting piece.  Seems my home state of TN is at war with GA over some land.  Actually GA thinks it should get its land back after not caring about it for 212 years.  Oh, it happens to have the TN river.  Droughts seem to change opinions.  The whole thing is absurd.  But I read a great op-ed on the subject here.  Enjoy!

Newlyweds

So Jennifer and I stayed up later than usual to watch ‘Here Come the Newlyweds’.  It was a hoot.  But we had them all beat.  Jennifer and I met in Feb, engaged in May, and married in August.

We would’ve been good on that show.

Anointed

I would normally wait to post this until I had pictures – but I’m too impatient and I have too much on my mind.

Yesterday was absolutely unbelievable – I think possibly one of the best services I’ve ever been a part of.  I think I’ve been saying that a lot lately.  What can I say?  I’m blessed!  And if you missed yesterday my heart goes out to you.  What a day!  It was electric!  Packed!  Anointed!

So let me back up.  About a month ago we had the hair-brained idea to have a gospel choir come in and sing "Ready for Miracle?"  (Click the link and it will pull up your iTunes store with the song.)  Well our Pastor liked the idea and made contact with LU Praise from Liberty University.  And as God would have it, they had a cancellation on that particular Sunday we were talking about Miracles.  So on short notice they agreed to come and learn the song.  In fact, come to find out, they learned the song Thursday!

Lup_main1 But let me back up.  They left Lynchburg at 5:00 AM.  Some of them woke up at 2:00 AM.  Some didn’t even go to bed.  They arrived a little after 8:00.  Got changed, sat in on our production meeting.  Got up on stage.  We hit the first note of the song – and I was blown away….but let me back up some more.

They helped us lead worship with "Salvation is Here," then blessed us with "O Taste and See," "You Are So Awesome," and "You Deserve the Glory."  Man are they anointed.  God was all over that group and thick in that place.  Heaven came down!  It was such a blessing to see that group sing, clap, have fun, but more importantly, worship without reservation.  It was incredible!

Then….THE song.  I am so proud of our band for absolutely nailing this song.  Jason had the whole Gospel beat on the drums going.  Bill learned the amazing bass walk.  Dave learned the organ part to the ‘t’.  Ronnie played the guitar solo better than the CD.  Brandon…well he seemed he was about to jump off the stage at any moment.  And poor Elizabeth hit the tambourine so hard her hands were swollen after the service!  Seriously!

And when the soloists came in, the choir bellowing walls of amazing harmonies – I was quite literally in heaven.  They sound even better than the CD.  The energy was palpable.  I was dancing all over the place.  The crowd was on their feet.  And to think they learned it 3 days prior.  The guy soloist was sick and learned his part Saturday!  (By the way, I think he can sing higher than some of the girls!)  But I can’t stress enough how much they pegged that song.  It was everything we dreamed of and more.  Kristen was jumping up and down in the back during the run-through because it was such a culmination of planning and dreams….and now it was a reality.  I was actually upset after the 2nd service because we didn’t have anymore services to do!  I wanted to keep going!

But let me say this.  If you want to be blessed; if you want your people to see true worship; if you want your people to be led in spirit-filled praise to God – GET THIS GROUP!  They were absolutely amazing.  I can’t say it enough.  Thank you LU PRAISE!  Unbelievable job!