Gary Coleman died today and I loved to watch him on Different Strokes. He reminds me so much of JJ from Choctaw County.
I hope he knew Jesus......
Friday, May 28, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
On the Line
Go Greyhound and Leave the Driving to US!
I received a message on my cell phone this morning from Bullen. "LaLa, I am back on the line if you want to call me." I laughed to hear his voice. He is so funny. What he meant was " My cell phone is charged and I am on the bus headed home to Alabama." He is making a 27 hour bus ride from Lebanon PA.
Longway to Meridian
I left Birmingham around 5:30 am, making my way to Meridian MS to pick up BBolden. We drove back to Birmingham to apply for section 8 housing at the renovated Mark's Village. With us we had a 3 month old and a 3 year old, one facing forward and one facing backward. As we head down the highway, I find out all kinds of information about her family, children, significant other, friends, personality, temper, coping skills, etc. Time flew by as we had so much to talk about and of course, I was asking all kinds of questions. BBolden was raised very different from me and I am trying to understand what life must be like for someone who has very limited reading and writing skills. I am trying to understand why someone who has no job or way to provide for herself has seven children. I am trying show the love of Christ to someone who has no hope and is very defensive towards life and others. I think we talked about 3 or more law suits during our driving time. Do I think she wants something for nothing? I really don't know. I know that she loves her children and is raising them just as she was raised. I know that she favors a couple of her children over the others. I know that she is very clean and keeps the clean apartment. I know she was made by GOD for His purpose and we are called to love others regardless of their situation or personal habits.We arrived around lunchtime to Mark's Village, filled out 15+ pages of information and then she had an interview with the housing authority. Afterwards, we were able to see one of the apartments. It was very small and this giant (i mean very very big) heater was in the middle of the floor in the family room and the other rooms were tiny. I could tell by the look on her face, that she didn't like it. I didn't like it either! I knew she wasn't sure how she was going to tell me this, especially since I have now driven over 5 hours, with 5 more to go. Mark's Village was in much worse condition than where she is currently (Eastern Gardens - Meridian MS).
We headed back to Meridian around 1:45 pm and storms were brewing. Both children decided they didn't want to be in their car seats any longer (i don't blame, them neither). The baby fell asleep quickly, the 3 yr old, not so much. He began by asking nicely to be unlocked, that turned to yelling, then crying, then screaming and crying at the same time, then vomiting. For 1 1/2 hours, he did not STOP! Throughout the day, when BBolden wanted to get the 3yr olds attention or make him stop doing something, she would tell him a bug was going to get him. She finally admitted to me that he didn't like bugs and this was only way to get him to obey her.
We arrive in Meridian around 4pm and the car was met with 4 happy boys with lots of energy. I found out that it was JJ's birthday. I took him to the dollar tree and let him pick out three items. He chose a neon necklace, a brush, and a jump rope. I took him to Taco Bell for a Mango Freeze. While he and I were sitting at the table - He responded " This is the rightest place ever to come" This precious child was all smiles.
Thank you Lord for allowing me to love on Ms. B and her children. They are precious in Your sight.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Changing Spaces
Hundreds of Brook Hills members sacrifice big for sake of Kingdom
By Grace Thornton - The Alabama Baptist
May 20, 2010
Your church only thought it squirmed when your pastor preached on tithing.
Imagine this!
It’s Sunday morning, and your pastor opens the Word and begins preaching from Numbers 13–14, encouraging the congregation to faithfulness, not fearfulness, when it comes to following God’s leadership to take the land.
Then he gets specific.
He mentions a community roughly 15 miles away, a part of town you don’t really want your wife or daughter driving through in the daytime, much less at night.
And then he asks you to pray about taking your family and moving there.
What would you do?
When David Platt, pastor of The Church at Brook Hills, Birmingham, posed that question to his congregation March 7, you could’ve heard a pin drop in the room.
But that just made it all the better for Chuck and Margaret Clarke — and roughly 40 other families and singles — to hear the call just that much more clearly.
Forty households. All looking toward putting “For Sale” signs in the yard and surfing real estate ads in neighborhoods nothing like their own.
“People might be surprised at that response to a sermon, but it wasn’t an isolated message,” Chuck Clarke said. “For three years, David has been preaching what it means to be a follower of Christ, so now when the opportunities come, people are ready to take them.”
And God makes it happen once you do, he explained. The Clarkes got a cash offer on their condo nearly immediately after surrendering to the idea of uprooting. They quickly found themselves prepping with their three children for a move to inner-city Birmingham.
And it wasn’t long after moving that they found themselves already a mainstay in the neighborhood.
In the afternoons, Anna Katherine Clarke, 13, invites groups of neighborhood kids up onto the sprawling porch of the Clarkes’ new home, and her mother offers them a spread of drinks.
“You want to just go in and get yourself a snack while you wait on your parents to get home?” Margaret Clarke asks two little girls.
Another crawls into her lap and starts munching on a pretzel stick — she’s already made herself at home.
“We just wanted to be a place of refuge in the neighborhood, and [the house] is already fulfilling what we wanted,” Margaret Clarke said. “We want people to come and feel loved and welcome and safe.”
Do the Clarkes themselves feel safe?
“We heard gunshots yesterday morning, two houses down. That’s all around us,” she said. “But God has woven such a beautiful tapestry of His grace in leading us here that we know if anything happens to us, it’s going to be OK.”
They are the first to move there from Brook Hills, but others will be joining them soon, including Ben DeLoach, the church’s associate local disciple-making minister, and his family.
Though the influx is significant, it’s not going in loud and proud under the Brook Hills banner — it’s just a few families moving in to live life and show Christ to the neighbors. They will be joining some people from other churches who are already doing the same thing.
“People ask, ‘What are you going to do there?’” DeLoach said. “I tell them we are going to love God and love people.”
The inner-city move is one more outgrowth of a challenge to take Christ’s commands literally that Platt has been preaching since at least fall of 2008. He preached the Radical series in November of that year, messages aimed at taking a long, honest look at what Christ really said about being His disciple.
Referencing the story of the rich young ruler, as well as the call of the 12 disciples, Platt notes that Jesus called His followers to abandon everything for the sake of His glory in the world.
“What if I were the potential disciple being told to drop my nets? What if you were the man whom Jesus told to not even say goodbye to his family? What if we were told to hate our families and give up everything we had in order to follow Jesus?” Platt asked. “This is where we come face to face with a dangerous reality. We do have to give up everything we have to follow Jesus. We do have to love Him in a way that makes our closest relationships look like hate. And it is entirely possible that He will tell us to sell everything we have and sell it to the poor.”
In fall of 2009, the church began work on a drastically different budget for 2010 — hundreds of thousands less spent on the church itself, and hundreds of thousands more sent to help further the gospel and fight poverty locally and around the world.
And at the end of 2009, Brook Hills voted to send more than $500,000 in tucked-away surplus money to fund 21 of Compassion International’s Child Survival Programs in India.
Continuing to fund them became one component of this year’s Radical Experiment that the congregation committed to in January — an emphasis Platt calls “one year to a life turned upside down”:
1. To pray for the entire world (using resources such as “Operation World,” a book and website that lists a different people group to pray for each day of the year)
2. To read through the entire Word (together as a church)
3. To commit our lives to multiplying community (through small groups)
4. To sacrifice our money for a specific purpose (to meet needs locally and globally, specifically in India)
5. To give our time in another context (by going on missions trips)
“Ultimately Jesus is a reward worth risking everything to know, experience and enjoy. But claims such as these remain theories until they are tested. That is the reason for the experiment,” Platt wrote in his new book, “Radical: Taking Back Your Faith From the American Dream,” which came out earlier this month.
Brook Hills members would be quick to tell you — it’s an experiment that’s changing their lives.
One went home after the sermon on the rich young ruler, emptied all his clothes on the bed, collected bags of food and other items and drove into the projects and gave it all away.
Nearly 100 families completed training and are being certified to take care of foster children after a sermon based on James 1:27 last fall that challenged the congregation to not let a single child in Shelby County go without a home for the night.
Still more families are signed up to go through the training soon.
And dozens like the Clarkes are selling their homes and possessions and moving overseas or into other ministry contexts, such as inner-city Birmingham.
“How do you deal with the hard sayings of Christ?” Chuck Clarke asked. “We decided it was time to act, and our joy in Christ has only been maximized through it. So it’s to our benefit, too.”
By Grace Thornton - The Alabama Baptist
May 20, 2010
Your church only thought it squirmed when your pastor preached on tithing.
Imagine this!
It’s Sunday morning, and your pastor opens the Word and begins preaching from Numbers 13–14, encouraging the congregation to faithfulness, not fearfulness, when it comes to following God’s leadership to take the land.
Then he gets specific.
He mentions a community roughly 15 miles away, a part of town you don’t really want your wife or daughter driving through in the daytime, much less at night.
And then he asks you to pray about taking your family and moving there.
What would you do?
When David Platt, pastor of The Church at Brook Hills, Birmingham, posed that question to his congregation March 7, you could’ve heard a pin drop in the room.
But that just made it all the better for Chuck and Margaret Clarke — and roughly 40 other families and singles — to hear the call just that much more clearly.
Forty households. All looking toward putting “For Sale” signs in the yard and surfing real estate ads in neighborhoods nothing like their own.
“People might be surprised at that response to a sermon, but it wasn’t an isolated message,” Chuck Clarke said. “For three years, David has been preaching what it means to be a follower of Christ, so now when the opportunities come, people are ready to take them.”
And God makes it happen once you do, he explained. The Clarkes got a cash offer on their condo nearly immediately after surrendering to the idea of uprooting. They quickly found themselves prepping with their three children for a move to inner-city Birmingham.
And it wasn’t long after moving that they found themselves already a mainstay in the neighborhood.
In the afternoons, Anna Katherine Clarke, 13, invites groups of neighborhood kids up onto the sprawling porch of the Clarkes’ new home, and her mother offers them a spread of drinks.
“You want to just go in and get yourself a snack while you wait on your parents to get home?” Margaret Clarke asks two little girls.
Another crawls into her lap and starts munching on a pretzel stick — she’s already made herself at home.
“We just wanted to be a place of refuge in the neighborhood, and [the house] is already fulfilling what we wanted,” Margaret Clarke said. “We want people to come and feel loved and welcome and safe.”
Do the Clarkes themselves feel safe?
“We heard gunshots yesterday morning, two houses down. That’s all around us,” she said. “But God has woven such a beautiful tapestry of His grace in leading us here that we know if anything happens to us, it’s going to be OK.”
They are the first to move there from Brook Hills, but others will be joining them soon, including Ben DeLoach, the church’s associate local disciple-making minister, and his family.
Though the influx is significant, it’s not going in loud and proud under the Brook Hills banner — it’s just a few families moving in to live life and show Christ to the neighbors. They will be joining some people from other churches who are already doing the same thing.
“People ask, ‘What are you going to do there?’” DeLoach said. “I tell them we are going to love God and love people.”
The inner-city move is one more outgrowth of a challenge to take Christ’s commands literally that Platt has been preaching since at least fall of 2008. He preached the Radical series in November of that year, messages aimed at taking a long, honest look at what Christ really said about being His disciple.
Referencing the story of the rich young ruler, as well as the call of the 12 disciples, Platt notes that Jesus called His followers to abandon everything for the sake of His glory in the world.
“What if I were the potential disciple being told to drop my nets? What if you were the man whom Jesus told to not even say goodbye to his family? What if we were told to hate our families and give up everything we had in order to follow Jesus?” Platt asked. “This is where we come face to face with a dangerous reality. We do have to give up everything we have to follow Jesus. We do have to love Him in a way that makes our closest relationships look like hate. And it is entirely possible that He will tell us to sell everything we have and sell it to the poor.”
In fall of 2009, the church began work on a drastically different budget for 2010 — hundreds of thousands less spent on the church itself, and hundreds of thousands more sent to help further the gospel and fight poverty locally and around the world.
And at the end of 2009, Brook Hills voted to send more than $500,000 in tucked-away surplus money to fund 21 of Compassion International’s Child Survival Programs in India.
Continuing to fund them became one component of this year’s Radical Experiment that the congregation committed to in January — an emphasis Platt calls “one year to a life turned upside down”:
1. To pray for the entire world (using resources such as “Operation World,” a book and website that lists a different people group to pray for each day of the year)
2. To read through the entire Word (together as a church)
3. To commit our lives to multiplying community (through small groups)
4. To sacrifice our money for a specific purpose (to meet needs locally and globally, specifically in India)
5. To give our time in another context (by going on missions trips)
“Ultimately Jesus is a reward worth risking everything to know, experience and enjoy. But claims such as these remain theories until they are tested. That is the reason for the experiment,” Platt wrote in his new book, “Radical: Taking Back Your Faith From the American Dream,” which came out earlier this month.
Brook Hills members would be quick to tell you — it’s an experiment that’s changing their lives.
One went home after the sermon on the rich young ruler, emptied all his clothes on the bed, collected bags of food and other items and drove into the projects and gave it all away.
Nearly 100 families completed training and are being certified to take care of foster children after a sermon based on James 1:27 last fall that challenged the congregation to not let a single child in Shelby County go without a home for the night.
Still more families are signed up to go through the training soon.
And dozens like the Clarkes are selling their homes and possessions and moving overseas or into other ministry contexts, such as inner-city Birmingham.
“How do you deal with the hard sayings of Christ?” Chuck Clarke asked. “We decided it was time to act, and our joy in Christ has only been maximized through it. So it’s to our benefit, too.”
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Fork in the ROAD
What in the world is a fork in the ROAD? Well, it is a place we come to in our life where we must decide to go one way or another. God always has the perfect path, but do we always follow His path? Sometimes we go through doors that are open and we shouldn't and sometimes God closes the door before we can walk through. Sometimes we think we are going in the right direction, only to find out later that it wasn't correct at all. When sin is involved - we always know the turn in the opposite direction and RUN to the other side of the fork. The answer is not always easy. There are so many forks in the road facing my family today. My mind thinking about each one and calling on God, thinking about another, calling on God. I know I am not suppose to worry, but Just Saying - There is a Fork in the ROAD.Here are our forks, if anyone would like to pray with us for wisdom.
1. My junior in college is waiting on acceptance into ATEP. If yes, the he will proceed to be an Athletic Trainer, if no, a new profession must be chosen.
2. My oldest son is at a point in a relationship - Marriage or DONE.
3. My Sudanese boys must make greater-than 80 in their one summer class to remain in America for their education. If their grade is less-than 80 - no degree from USA.
4. My husband is between a rock and a hard place in his current job. Change in management, economy, and responsibilities - a decision has to be made on which fork do we take.
5. My JBG has just finished his freshman year. He made a wrong choice which took him on part of the fork he didn't intend to travel. Now his life decisions are in front of him. Army or School with no job, money, car or home.
MAX LUCADO-When God Whispers Your Name
Each Day. . .
It's quiet. It's early. My coffee is hot. The day is coming.
In a few moments the day will arrive. It will roar down the track with the rising of the sun. The stillness of the dawn will be exchanged for the noise of the day. The calm of solitude will be replaced by the pounding pace of the human race. The refuge of the early morning will be invaded by decisions to be made and deadlines to be met.
For the next twelve hours I will be exposed to the day's demands. It is now that I must make a choice.
Because of Calvary, I'm free to choose. And so I choose.
I CHOOSE .LOVE,. . .
No occasion justifies hatred; no injustice warrants bitterness. I choose love. Today I will love God and what God loves.
I CHOOSE JOY. . .
I will invite my God to be the God of circumstance. I will refuse the temptation to be cynical. . . the tool of the lazy thinker. I will refuse to see people as anything less than human beings, created by God. I will refuse to see any problem as anything less than an opportunity to see God.
I CHOOSE PEACE. . .
I will live forgiven. I will forgive so that I may live.
I CHOOSE PATIENCE. . .
I will overlook the inconveniences of the world. Instead of cursing the one who takes my place, I'll invite him to do so. Rather than complain that the wait is too long, I will thank God for a moment to pray. Instead of clinching my fist at new assignments, I will face them with joy and courage.
I CHOOSE KINDNESS. . .
I will be kind to the poor, for they are alone. Kind to the rich, for they are afraid. And kind to the unkind, for such is how God has treated me.
I CHOOSE GOODNESS. . .
I will go without a dollar before I take a dishonest one. I will be overlooked before I will boast. I will confess before I will accuse. I choose goodness.
I CHOOSE FAITHFULNESS. . .
Today I will keep my promises. My debtors will not regret their trust. My associates will not question my word. My wife will not question my love. And my children will never fear that their father will not come home.
I CHOOSE GENTLENESS. . .
Nothing is won by force. I choose to be gentle. If I raise my voice may it be only in praise. If I clench my fist, may it be only in prayer. If I make a. demand, may it be only of myself
I CHOOSE SELF-CONTROL. . .
I am a spiritual being. . . . After this body is dead, my spirit will soar. I refuse to let what will rot, rule the eternal. I choose self-comrol. I will be drunk only by joy. I will be impassioned only by my faith. I will be influenced only by God. I will be taught only by Christ. I choose self-control.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. To these I commit my day. If I succeed, I will give thanks. In fail, I will seek his grace. And then, when this day is done, I will place my head on my pillow and rest.
It's quiet. It's early. My coffee is hot. The day is coming.
In a few moments the day will arrive. It will roar down the track with the rising of the sun. The stillness of the dawn will be exchanged for the noise of the day. The calm of solitude will be replaced by the pounding pace of the human race. The refuge of the early morning will be invaded by decisions to be made and deadlines to be met.
For the next twelve hours I will be exposed to the day's demands. It is now that I must make a choice.
Because of Calvary, I'm free to choose. And so I choose.
I CHOOSE .LOVE,. . .
No occasion justifies hatred; no injustice warrants bitterness. I choose love. Today I will love God and what God loves.
I CHOOSE JOY. . .
I will invite my God to be the God of circumstance. I will refuse the temptation to be cynical. . . the tool of the lazy thinker. I will refuse to see people as anything less than human beings, created by God. I will refuse to see any problem as anything less than an opportunity to see God.
I CHOOSE PEACE. . .
I will live forgiven. I will forgive so that I may live.
I CHOOSE PATIENCE. . .
I will overlook the inconveniences of the world. Instead of cursing the one who takes my place, I'll invite him to do so. Rather than complain that the wait is too long, I will thank God for a moment to pray. Instead of clinching my fist at new assignments, I will face them with joy and courage.
I CHOOSE KINDNESS. . .
I will be kind to the poor, for they are alone. Kind to the rich, for they are afraid. And kind to the unkind, for such is how God has treated me.
I CHOOSE GOODNESS. . .
I will go without a dollar before I take a dishonest one. I will be overlooked before I will boast. I will confess before I will accuse. I choose goodness.
I CHOOSE FAITHFULNESS. . .
Today I will keep my promises. My debtors will not regret their trust. My associates will not question my word. My wife will not question my love. And my children will never fear that their father will not come home.
I CHOOSE GENTLENESS. . .
Nothing is won by force. I choose to be gentle. If I raise my voice may it be only in praise. If I clench my fist, may it be only in prayer. If I make a. demand, may it be only of myself
I CHOOSE SELF-CONTROL. . .
I am a spiritual being. . . . After this body is dead, my spirit will soar. I refuse to let what will rot, rule the eternal. I choose self-comrol. I will be drunk only by joy. I will be impassioned only by my faith. I will be influenced only by God. I will be taught only by Christ. I choose self-control.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. To these I commit my day. If I succeed, I will give thanks. In fail, I will seek his grace. And then, when this day is done, I will place my head on my pillow and rest.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Poky Little Puppy
One of the original 12 Little Golden Books, The Poky Little Puppy has sold nearly 15 million copies since 1942, making it one of the most popular children’s books of all time. I love this book.
Nite Nite poky puppy is a phrase I still use after 40 years.
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