Weekly e-News for August 14
Hey, everyone!
Happy Thanksgiving!
“Huh?!”
Well, not that one, but you know what I mean! It’s gonna be the perfect day to be thankful! Not just because it’s not gonna be too hot with… ”Continuing mostly sunny on Friday with warm highs in the middle to upper 80s… High temperatures will warm into the upper 80s this Weekend…” but also because every day, thanks is “appropriate and indicated!”
As the Apostle tells us, “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus!” (1 Thessalonians 5)
“Wait! Does that mean it’s God’s will for me to be thankful no matter what the circumstances?
Or…
Does it mean that whatever circumstances happen, go ahead and be thankful for them ‘cause they’re God’s will somehow anyway? That ain’t easy, dude!”
(I’ll get back to you on that…I’m kinda in the middle of somethin’…)
As I was saying, it’s a great day for thanksgiving! And I’m thankful for another unexpected reason! Lee’s been gone on his overseas Youth Life mission for so long but yesterday I found out that he misread his ticket and is coming back today and not tomorrow!
Dang! Pottsie and I have missed that dude!
How I love my team!
Pottsie, Lee, and I love more than anything laughing, praying, and serving Jesus together! There’s nothing better for us than to be going somewhere to do a thing for our Lord together! As Steven Curtis Chapman says in a song we often sing along to on the way, “This is life like in other! Woo oooo! This is the Great Adventure!”
But there’s another moment tho’ that we love almost as much! This one happens when we’re all three each one in a different place, each doing something for Jesus in a different way, all at the same time! Like last month when Pottsie was preaching at Callahan Towers, Lee was preaching at Triple C and I was preaching at St Andrew’s Church of Scotland in Lisbon! Lee always says, “We’re doing that thing!”
It’s just so cool to be sharing the same Message, doing the same mission on the same day in different places!
So…
Sunday, I get this text from Lee in the hills of Espana somewhere outside of Barcelona…”Dude! We’re doing that thing! You’re in one place and I'm in another and we're serving Him (no heart like His!) and we're both giving it everything we've got! Have fun today! Fight discouragement! Believe in Jesus!…etc…” And then Lee continued to tell me to be bold in my message to y’all and give it all my heart, and to encourage me in all the amazing ways he and Pottsie always do.
And yet…
Lee didn’t know…
It WASN’T happening.
We WEREN’T doing “that thing” where we’re all three in different places serving Jesus in different ways at the same time. I was at home in my pj’s, throwing up!
Lee didn’t know over on the Iberian Peninsula that I got a stomach bug and had spent two days looking down into the same porcelain view, and “sharing all that was within me”. I thought I’d be OK by Sunday but in the end on Saturday night (!) had to text Devon…”Devo! I’m sick! Can’t stop! Can you help me for tomorrow?” (I didn’t want to dump that responsibility on anyone that late into the weekend! Devon hit me right back…”I got this! Get well!” Wow!!!)
So while Lee was praising in Spain, and Pottsie was preaching in the Towers, I was (‘scuse the ‘xpression) puking in Oliver Springs!
But then I thought…
“This must be our Lord’s will for me today! To…’give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus!’…must mean that this unsettling circumstance must be what He has for me today!”
I wasn’t sure why this was His will for me…Then I listened online to the message y’all heard from Devo! Wow!! What a truckload of encouragement!!
Maybe that was just one of the many reasons in His wisdom, it was His will for me to be right where I was, doing what I was doing!
On the other hand, maybe that verse means that no matter what the circumstances, thanking Him IN everything (even if you’re honestly not necessarily thankful FOR everything!) is His will! So even “hugging the bowl”…”bringing in the heaves”…if I thank Him for His goodness, His kindness, and…Himself, I’m doing the will of God even then!
Pottsie was doing His will while preachin’ it up in the Towers, Lee was doing His will while singin’ it up in Spain, and I was trying to do His will while throwin’ it up at home!
I’m better today…and thankful!