Got Em' Moved!

I am happy to report that we were successful in our attempt to get my grandparents moved from Okmulgee, Oklahoma to Edmond, Oklahoma this weekend. It took a lot of work and a lot time...but I'm happy to report that it is done. There's still lots to do...but it's basically over. Now, we'll just have to see how much stuff they'll have to give away as they have moved into a much smaller house! I am thankful for them, though. They are good people and I think they are looking forward to being closer to family for the first time in about 33 years! They had a lot of crap. A lot.

First Funeral

I had the privilege today of officiating my first funeral. People were shocked by that as I shared that fact. I guess they assumed that all pastor do funerals at least once a year...but when you serve most of your years on a staff the size of a football team its not normally the associate that gets the call. So, I was privileged to be able to spend good time with the family of a man named Richard Gaiski. Not knowing him, it was an interesting experience to have to rely on the family to help me get a taste of what kind of man he was. He seemed like a great family man and a great dad. He loved sports and cared about people. It was a good day and it will be one I'll never forget. I thank God he entrusts simple minded ministers like me with the huge responsibility of honoring the lives of people and ultimately pointing people to Christ. This man was the father of one of the guys in our recovery program at OKC Compassion. It was cool to come full circle with this guy to the extent that he would ask me to do that funeral for his family. Pretty neat stuff!

Your Money

Ok, it's really not yours. You know that and I know that. It's God's money that He's blessed us with. But he asks us to be faithful stewards with it. I'm curious to know how you determine who you give your donations to and why you give particular donations to that person or group. We're trying to get some things squared away at OKC Compassion and I would love to hear your thoughts on this subject. Do you give because you trust people? "People give to people justified by the cause." Is this true for you? Would you rather give to a specific project with your money designated...or are you comfortable giving to an organization to let them choose to spend your (God's) money how they want? Just some questions...and your answers will help us! Thanks!

God at Work!

Well, I last blogged about our current situation with the formation of a Celebrate Recovery ministry at Penn Avenue. I'm happy to report that at our last board meeting we came to a conclusion that we would start the program on Wednesday nights. We'd been focused on Sunday nights but came to a place where we decided that Wednesday nights would work out best. Everyone seems to feel really good about this and I think it will go very well. We start Wednesday, October 22nd. Now, we just need some volunteers to come forward to help us. I will be leading the worship piece of the ministry and look forward to it.

Celebrate Recovery vs. Regular Programming

Well, we have had somewhat of a dilemma the past few months trying to figure out how in the world to do what we feel we need to do with a lack of people to accomplish it all. For those of you unfamiliar, Celebrate Recovery is a Christianized 12 step program that makes no apologies for naming Jesus the Higher Power and the steps are focused on the Beatitudes. We've seen number of our people go through this program at CR's in our area. Transportation is always difficult as most of our folks don't have transportation, so it became necessary to begin to think about having a Celebrate Recovery run out of Penn Avenue Church of the Nazarene. We began to have conversations about the night we should do it. It's best to find a night that is open throughout the rest of the city so people could come if they can't come on another night. We were leaning toward Sunday night, for a number of reasons. #1--This is a regularly scheduled night when our people are already at church. As usual, Sunday nights tend to be the least attended service of the week as people generally stay home and rest. Penn Ave has two groups of people. We have "the street people" (as they are so affectionately called and I mean this) and we have the regulars who have stayed throughout the years. Initially the argument was made that the best night was Saturday as it would fill a desperate need for something positive in our community. This made sense to me but I began to wonder how we were going to get everything accomplished remotely successfully if we asked our people to be at church, Saturday night (really starting about three in the afternoon and going until ten) Sunday morning and Sunday night. #2--This is a good night in the community to do this. In our community, it would be a good night every night.

We've run into a bit of a stalemate, but not because anybody has a divisive spirit. Some very legitimate questions have come up. I ask that you pray for us as we begin to nail down some decisions tonight at board meeting.