God's Busy!

Wow. So much has been happening the last several days and its been hard to find time to do anything but eat, sleep and work. But it's good...really good! We had a guy in our recovery house go to treatment. He called me tonight to let me know how thankful he was and that he was doing good and wanted to move into an Oxford House for a more accountable atmosphere. I thought that was great and it made me happy to know that the time spent was worth it. I almost gave up on him. My boot camp instructor asked me on Friday what I did. I told him and he called me later in the afternoon wanting to know how he could help. Knowing that he was in the car business, I told him that we really needed a new van for our church and compassionate ministry center. Would you believe it? He called me on Saturday afternoon and had a van that he had been able to get for us and wanted to donate it. I picked it up on Monday afternoon. It drives really good and will hold 15 kiddos! I found out today that a lady at OKC First wants to take care of our newsletter for us. We found out tonight that a couple from OKC First wants to pick up a large part of our salary which is unbelievable. We found out yesterday that we are getting closer to covering our entire shower project that will be completed by a wonderful group of people coming from KC Central Church in just a couple of weeks. God is good. He's been busy. We are thankful!

New Website!

Happy Sunday morning to you!

I wanted you all to know about our new website that has recently been built. It's still a work in progress in many ways, but it will help tell more of the story! I hope you'll check it out! www.okccompassion.net

Celebrate Compassion

One of the most exciting things of the past two to three weeks has been the coming together of a group of people to help plan and organize a ten year celebration event for OKC Compassion. We're calling it "Celebrate Compassion." It's hard to believe that Pastor Bond has been here for ten years plugging away. At times, he's been about it and he's continued to faithfully serve people and model for the rest of us what it looks like to extend the hand of Jesus to others. I'm excited about this for a number of reasons. First off, we want to celebrate Pastor Bond. A very humble person, he has worked behind the scenes for so long and really is never recognized for the work he has done. It's truly amazing. If he was in one of our denomination's "big" churches, he would be well-known and acclaimed and people would know his name. But he's more interested in helping people and making a difference in the world and that's cool. Another reason I'm excited is because of the group of people that are helping. Debbie Repka, a friend from OKC First Church has come on board to help guide and lead this process. I'm not sure I've met a more talented individual when it comes to fund raising and helping non-profits think about development. Most events you see or go to are "flash in the pan" kinds of events. The whole purpose is to raise X number of dollars on a given night. We'll do some of that, but the main goal of this event is to get people connected on a number of different levels. With this kind of vision comes the need to be prepared on our end as things will begin to change. This is good as we need to shore up some of our organizational issues and move on to the next level. Skip Cannon, a local businessman and brother in Christ has also joined us. He has made a new website for us. Insert shameless plug here--www.okccompassion.net I would encourage you to check it out! God is moving in incredible ways. I'll write more soon to keep you updated. Have a great day!

Hooya!

Well, I am into my last week of boot camp for this session. I've already decided to re-up for the next one, however. It's been one of the most challenging, yet inspiring things I have ever been a part of. Yesterday, we pushed a truck almost two miles up and down hills for our workout. That was crazy! Everyone in the group is getting stronger and faster and in better shape and that includes me. Not really sure how much weight I've lost, but my clothes are fitting much loser and I'm down to last belt loop! Hopefully by the end of the next one I will be ready to enter the Mr. Olympia contest. He, he.

Other Ideas...

We are looking forward to going to a couple of new places over the next several weeks to see how people do things. I am speaking here about the recovery program that we now have at OKC Compassion. It's such a great ministry, but we need to make some changes/additions and I think that getting some new perspectives will help. We plan to visit the Pershing Center, in Oklahoma City as well as a place in Tulsa that sounds in incredible. I think we actually have some of the pieces in place in our houses right now to make a big difference. I think we have a potential live-in supervisor right now! Praise God!

Collaboration and Pride

Pride is a funny thing. Even those of us who pride, did I just say that?, ourselves on being fairly mature in our Christian journey can fall prey at any moment to this insidious vice. I have seen it in my own life and I have seen it work its way into the life of the church on many occasions. It usually presents itself in moments when people are talking about a certain plan, and one exerts his/her opinion over the other. Sometimes this can be done in healthy ways, especially when one person is better qualified and has reasoned out their thoughts in a more structured way.

We had some meetings here this weekend that were really important. One had to do with a big event we are planning and one had to do with the Celebrate Recovery programs that the two churches in significant partnership are starting...Penn Ave and OKC First. We had some of the regular Penn Ave folks who are always here plugging away at things and we had some folks from OKC First there as well. All in all, it went pretty well. We had some good discussion about different ideas and eventually came to a place where we had to make a decision, determining that one idea better fit our DNA than another. During the course of the conversation, I found myself wanting to be right, wanting to promote my thoughts over the others, wanting to in some ways just be a jerk. Because I was right. Wasn't I? I mean, my ideas were in line with Scripture and the concept of Jubilee and I didn't want to be something we weren't. I went home that day thankful for the collaboration that occurred (maybe this is more important than whatever the outcome is) but I found that I was aware of my "voice" at the table. I pride :) myself on being quiet and a good listener and a good decision maker. I pride myself on being sensitive to the thoughts and concerns of others. I also pride myself on being right. At the end of the day, I do feel like I handled things OK. I was passionate about it. I wanted to do it a certain way because I felt like the way we chose would best represent the King we serve. Can I be prideful and confident in serving him? Would love to hear your thoughts on this tough dilemma.