James' Blog

The Gospel: an option or obligation?

2011-05-17T12:24:00.000-07:00

This is a blog post from my friend Kevin Connell at http://www.hiimkevin.com/

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A few days ago I was reading Romans and came across a verse I’ve read many times. This time it wouldn’t let me go.

For I have a great sense of OBLIGATION to people in BOTH the civilized world and the rest of the world, to the educated AND uneducated alike. For I am not ashamed of this Good News about Christ. It is the power of God at work, saving EVERYONE who believes…” (Romans 1:14,16 – NLT)

No matter whom you come across today, in light of the gospel, you’re obligated to them.

Obligated.

Why don’t we have a sense of obligation like Paul did?

· Maybe we see ourselves as better than them. (Paul’s perspective was different. He labeled himself as the worst of sinners.)

· Maybe we are ashamed of the Gospel

· Maybe we’d rather serve them than verbally share with them (see Romans 10:14)

· Maybe we are fearful or lazy

· Maybe we don’t believe it really does have the power to change lives

Maybe you believed it a long time ago, but have since then lost your passion about it. If we don’t believe it, why should anyone else? We don’t need to pray for an opportunity today, we need to pray for boldness, conviction, and a broken heart for those who don’t know God.

It’s not an option, it’s an obligation.

Have you ever prayed for your great-grandchildren?

2011-05-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

This is a story that really inspires me. There are a lot of people who are similar to the way I am. I want to do tremendos things for the Kingdom. I want to be a part of a "movement of God." But sometimes I spend so much "doing" things that I forget to set time aside to discuss things over with my Creator. If you are that way too then I hope this story inspires you as well.

In Point Man, Steve Farrar tells the story of George McCluskey. When McCluskey married and started a family, he decided to invest one hour a day in prayer, because he wanted his kids to follow Christ. After a time, he expanded his prayers to include his grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Every day between 11 a.m. and noon, he prayed for the next three generations.

As the years went by, his two daughters committed their lives to Christ and married men who went into full-time ministry. The two couples produced four girls and one boy. Each of the girls married a minister, and the boy became a pastor. The first two children born to this generation were both boys. Upon graduation from high school, the two cousins chose the same college and became roommates. During their sophomore year, one boy decided to go into the ministry. The other didn't. He undoubtedly felt some pressure to continue the family legacy, but he chose instead to pursue his interest in psychology. He earned his doctorate and eventually wrote books for parents that became bestsellers.

He started a radio program heard on more than a thousand stations each day. The man's name was James Dobson. "Through his prayers, George McCluskey affected far more than one family."

So I will ask the question again, "When was the last time you prayed for your great-grandchildren?"

Easter is not over!

2011-04-25T11:43:00.000-07:00

It was on Feb. 27, 1991, at the height of Desert Storm, that Ruth Dillow received a very sad message from the Pentagon. It stated that her son, Clayton Carpenter, Private 1st Class, had stepped on a mine in Kuwait & was dead.

Ruth Dillow later wrote, "I can’t begin to describe my grief & shock. It was almost more than I could bear. For 3 days I wept. For 3 days I expressed anger & loss. For 3 days people tried to comfort me, to no avail because the loss was too great."

But 3 days after she received that message, the telephone rang. The voice on the other end said, "Mom, it’s me. I’m alive." Ruth Dillow said, "I couldn’t believe it at first. But then I recognized his voice, & he really was alive." The message was all a mistake!

She said, "I laughed, I cried, I felt like turning cartwheels, because my son whom I had thought was dead, was really alive. I’m sure none of you can even begin to understand how I felt."

Perhaps not, but some who walked the pages of the New Testament would have understood how she felt because they experienced the same emotions themselves. One day they watched their best friend & teacher being nailed to a cross. They witnessed His pain as He cried out, "I thirst!" & "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?"

They listened as finally He bowed His head & said, "It is finished!" & "Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit." They watched as His body was taken from the cross & buried. All their hopes & dreams were buried with Him.

Friday & all day Saturday they mourned, until finally, on "the first day of the week, early in the morning," the scripture says, some women made their way along the path that led to His tomb, wondering who would roll away the stone for them.

But when they arrived, they found that the stone had already been rolled away. And an angel there told them, "You’re looking in the wrong place. You’re looking for Jesus among the dead. He is not dead. He is alive. He is risen, even as He said!"

"He is risen!" That is what we celebrated yesterday morning. When all the evidence is in we’re convinced that Jesus is alive. He is risen from the dead, & what a difference His resurrection has made! Let's not stop celebrating just because yesterday is over. I am sure Ruth Dillow celebrated for more than a day.

Are You Giving Your Best to the King?

2011-04-18T12:07:00.001-07:00

There is a legend about an ancient village in Spain. The villagers learned that the king would pay a visit! In a thousand years, a king had never come to that village. Excitement grew! "We must throw a big celebration," The villagers all agreed. But, it was a poor village, and there weren’t many resources. Someone came up with a classic idea. Since many of the villagers made their own wines, the idea was for everyone in the village bring a large cup of their choice wine to the town square, “We’ll pour it into a large vat and offer it to the king for his pleasure! When the king draws wine to drink, it will be the very best he’s ever tasted!”

The day before the king’s arrival, hundreds of people lined up to make their offering to the honored guest. They climbed a small stairway, and poured their gift through a small opening at the top. Finally, the vat was full! The King arrived, was escorted to the square, given a silver cup and was told to draw some wine, which represented the best the villagers had.

He placed the cup under the spigot, turned the handle, and then drank the wine, but it was nothing more than water. You see every villager reasoned, "I’ll withhold my best wine and substitute water, what with so many cups of wine in the vat, the king will never know the difference!" The problem was, everyone thought the same thing, and the king was greatly dishonored.

So the question today is this... are you giving your best to King Jesus. This is a week of rememberance for all that Jesus did for us. He gave us EVERYTHING! We should do the same.

The Big But.

2011-03-31T12:05:00.000-07:00

Today I think of the book of Revelation. And I think of chapter 2. John the apostle is speaking to the church of Ephesus. And John goes through a lot of good things about this church. They must have been feeling pretty good about themselves. Listen to this Revelation 2:1-3.

1 "To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands: 2 I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3 You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.

Right so this is like when a guy is asking out a girl, and she says well Jehtro you’re a nice guy and your very sweet, my parents love you…. And he holds his breath because he knows what’s coming next. BUT…. Well quite frankly I am in love with a biker named Spike. And this is what the church of Ephesus was bracing for. I know you do some great things and you hate evil… but… and then here comes the “but” in verse 4.

4 Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love.

They lost their first love. What a sad commentary on the church. So how did this happen and how long did it take? Well luckily we have some history on that as well. Ephesus was one of the first churches established after Jesus’ ascension. It was a booming town right on the Mediterranean Sea. And you don’t have to go very far back in your Bibles to find that they didn’t always use to be this way. Listen to what is said about them in Eph 1:15-16.

15 For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, 16 I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.

This certainly doesn’t sound like the same church does it? Most smart people have these two texts dated about 30 years apart from one another. So in 30 years this church went from being described as having faith in the Lord to losing their first love? I think there are a lot of churches like this. They have lost their first loves. Do you know why this is? Because WE have lost our first love. Take some time today to reunite with your your Savior.

What would you do for twenty dollars?

2011-03-22T12:36:00.000-07:00

Let me ask you this question, what would you do for $20? I have done some really stupid things when offered $20 and I am certain that some of you may have as well. I believe also that if I asked people in this room to attempt something for $20 that they would do it.

So people are willing to do a whole lot for $20, but let me ask you this… what would you do for a penny? Twenty bucks is a lot, but in our culture, a penny is almost seen as worthless. You can’t even buy a gumball with a penny!

I think we often look at people in that same way. We see some people as twenty-dollar bills—the ones who have it all together—and we would do anything to be accepted by them. Then we see other people as ten-dollar bills, fives, ones, quarters, dimes, nickels, and even some as pennies. Let me ask you, have you ever looked at people that way? You might not admit it out loud, but I bet there are some people you treat like pennies—like they are not worth your time.

It’s crazy, but Jesus came into a world full of twenties, tens, fives, ones, quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies. In Jesus’ time, there were people called the Pharisees, and they were the very definition of twenty-dollar bills. The Pharisees had it all together, and everybody went out of their way to impress them. There were also pennies back then, too. They were the outcasts of society, the people everybody went out of their way to avoid. If there was ever someone who could come down to this earth as a crisp hundred-dollar bill, it would have to be the Son of God. Now, listen to the crazy thing—check out Philippians 2.

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross! Philippians 2:5-8

Do you get this? Jesus came to Earth not as a hundred-dollar bill but as a penny, and a scuffed-up penny at that! When He did this, He completely changed all the rules. Now there are really only two kinds of people: Those who know they are pennies, and those who are pennies but think that they are twenty-dollar bills. I know you are thinking, “You're calling all of us 'pennies'—that isn't very encouraging.” Well, the fact is we are pennies. We all mess up, we’re limited, we’re stubborn, we get sick, we die. Set us up beside the Eternal Creator of the universe, the Holy of Holies, the Almighty, the One who holds the stars in His hand, and you have to agree—we’re pretty much pennies! But think about this for a second: The God of the universe says you are worth His only Son dying on the cross for you! Wow! So here’s the deal: If a perfect God is willing to go out of His way to love us and reach out to us, even though we’re pennies, how can we ever look at another person and think we are too good for them, or they are not worth our time?

Father Knows Best

2011-03-16T10:40:00.000-07:00

Mark 12:28-30

28 One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" 29 "The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.'

The man who asked this question, “What is the greatest commandment” I bet had a lot of possible answers in mind. I bet he was thinking “Do not murder” would be the greatest commandment. Or maybe “Do not take the Lord’s name in vain” would be the greatest commandment. However Jesus went a completely different direction. He said to Love the Lord your God with all of your heart, mind, soul and strength.

I think that there is a problem with some people… a misconception maybe. The misconception is this, I think there are a lot of people who view God as a dictator, as a mean, vindictive Zeus-like character up in the clouds throwing lightning bolts down at all of the puny humans who do wrong. That is an unfortunate way to view God.

People really dislike being unjustly classified and I think that sometimes we unjustly classify God in a negative way. That is really sad and really unfair. I don’t think that you will ever truly appreciate your relationship with God if you view Him in such a narrow way. The way that Jesus teaches us to view God is as a loving father who cares about our every concern. As you all should know sometimes a father has to discipline his son regardless of how much they love their child. That is how we should view God, not as a hateful, dictator but as a loving father.

Jesus gives you an example in His life of how we should relate to God. In the book of Mark 14:35-36 Jesus was going to be handed over to be crucified and He went to the garden of Gethsemene to pray. This was His prayer. 35 Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. 36 "Abba", Father," he said, "everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will."

Jesus cried out to God by saying “Abba Father” That doesn’t translate very well to English but basically it is a very personal way to refer to your father. It’s like calling Him “daddy” and that is the relationship with God that Jesus teaches us to have.

I believe that the word daddy however still doesn’t describe the word Abba very well. I want to take it a little bit deeper than just “daddy.” Can you remember when you were three or four and you were physically very small and couldn’t do a lot of things. Do you remember how big and strong your father looked those days. Your dad was like Superman and he was stronger than anyone or anything and so when you were in trouble you cried out to your daddy. Your father took care of what the problem was and then you crawled into his arms and it felt as though you were safe and secure because you were in your father’s arms. That is the word picture that goes along with the term “Abba” and that is how God wants you to view Him.

I hope that today if you are struggling, that you will run into the arms of your Heavenly Father and let "Abba" make everything right.

Who would steal baby Jesus?

2011-03-04T11:02:00.000-08:00

An excerpt from my book, Can I Get Baptized in Fruit Punch?

My father-in-law told me a story once of someone who had a plastic nativity scene out in front of their house. One night someone stole the baby Jesus. Now I can understand stealing Santa Claus or maybe even a wise man, but this person had the gall to kidnap baby Jesus as He lay asleep in His manger.

Some time passed and the lady who had Jesus stolen from her gave up hope on finding Jesus. I mean, what do you do? You can’t put up posters around town as though your dog ran away. So this lady continued living her life business as usual.

Something happened with a children’s organization she was volunteering for and suddenly she was in need of a large sum of money really fast. She woke up one morning and found the baby Jesus had been returned. Soon thereafter she ran into more than the exact sum of money that she needed. Now she may have just thought that the two instances were coincidences except for the fact that the people that returned the baby Jesus left a note.

Apparently, the culprit’s car had broken down in front of this person’s house and they stole the baby Jesus. They then decided that the baby Jesus was lucky so they kept it in their house and worshipped it. In fact, the stolen baby Jesus had its own room in the house. Eventually though they started getting little baby Jesus guilty feelings and had to return the baby to its rightful owner. The note said that God told them that even though He was blessing them they wouldn't go to heaven as long as they didn't make the theft right.

As I think of this story I wonder how many people think of Jesus this way. How many people think that Jesus is just some superstitious good luck charm? Like Jesus is a troll doll during the Bingo game of life.

I "hope" you read this post.

2011-03-03T13:01:00.000-08:00

1 Thessalonians 5:8 "But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet"

You have heard it said in many sermons and by many Sunday School teachers to put on the helmet of salvation. But what does that really mean? I think this verse gives us a lot of insight as to what it means because it refers to our helmet of salvation as the "hope" of salvation.

Now what does “hope” mean. I hope the Rays win the World Series, I hope I don’t go completely bald before I am thirty, I hope a lot of things, but that does not have any sort of power in my life. So at first thought, if the helmet of salvation is also the hope of salvation does that mean that you stand in the middle of the battle field and “hope” that no one kills you… absolutely not!

The word hope here is the word “elpis” which means expectation and confidence. There is a difference between right now, in Spring Training, hoping that the Rays will win the World Series, but if they are in it and they have the closer in trying to get the last out with a twelve run lead, all of a sudden I have an “eplis” hope that is that at that point I expect them to win.

The helmet of salvation enables us to take the long (Eternal) view of the warfare. If we do not have it on, Satan can cause us to give up, quit, despair, and become discouraged by whispering words to us like, “You’re having to wait too long! This fight is lasting too long! This isn't working, you may as well quit.”

The helmet of salvation enables us to maintain total confidence in victory, no matter how long the battle may seem to last here on earth. We have a salvation that is certain and eternal! We cannot be ultimately defeated! There is absolutely no room for discouragement in light of the helmet of salvation!

I "hope" you understand that.

Wash the dishes.

2011-02-28T09:57:00.000-08:00

2 Timothy 2:20-21

20 But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honor and some for dishonor. 21 Therefore if anyone cleanses himself from the latter, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work.

What is a vessel used for? Some vessels carry blood. Blood vessels. Some vessels carry cargo. Cargo vessels. And some vessels carry messages. That’s us. We are to be the vessel that carries the message of Christ to a world that needs to hear this message.

But these verses say that there are different kinds of vessels. Some vessels are of honor and some vessels are of dishonor. Are you living an honorable life? Because if you are not living an honorable life, then God will not use you for good works. I have heard it asked by many people, “How can I get God to use my life?” This verse makes it very simple… live a life of honor. Cleanse yourself, allow yourself to be sanctified.

Let's put it this way. If you go over to someone's house and they have two plates, one plate is clean and perfect and the other one is gross and disgusting, which plate would you use? The obvious answer is the clean one. God's choice is no different. He would rather use the clean plate too.

If you want to truly reach your community for the cause of Christ, if you want to be used yourself by God to do amazing things then you must strive to be holy… always… holiness matter to God.

I think that if God were to tell you right now what He could do in your life if you would let Him that it would blow your mind. But God can never do these amazing things in your life until you become a vessel than He can use. A vessel of honor. Nothing is a substitute for personal holiness and moral authority.

You see, you can fool people when you are in a crowd. You can convince people that you are a vessel of honor. But the true measure of who you are as a person is what you are like when no one is around.

So when it comes time for God to use you, will you be ready? And the true question that it comes down to then is this… are you more interested in your sin or being used by God?

And if you are more interested in being used by God then you must surrender to the process of sanctification. You must strive every day to be more and more like Jesus, you must strive to be a vessel of honor.

Sometimes Christians are weird.

2011-02-24T07:38:00.000-08:00

Guys, I think if we were all honest with ourselves, we would agree that sometimes Christians are weird.

You know for a long time Christians differentiated themselves from the rest of the world by looking as “Christian” as possible. We had t-shirts that said things like “God’s Gym” and “Faith Book” instead of Facebook. We shopped at Christian bookstores, went to Christian movies and Christian concerts and, my personal favorite, even had our own brand of breathmint called a “Test-a-mint.”

And then we started this thing called a Christian bumper sticker. We put a fish on the back of our car that said Jesus, and then the atheists put legs on the fish and made it say Darwin, and then we got a big whale on the back of our car that ate the Darwin fish, and then the atheists came back with a dinosaur to eat the whale that was eating the Darwin fish. We had a huge battle going on through the bumpers of our cars. And then the Christians got real clever and tried to summarize their beliefs into small, ridiculous, possibly offensive sayings like “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” and “I Believe in the Big Bang, God spoke and bang it was.” So instead of trying to have legitimate conversations with people about what they believe and why they believe it, we shut off the conversation with our bumper sticker argument mentality. And I got to think that sometimes… Christians are weird.

I mean you can completely understand why the outside world would look at our subculture and think I am just not like those Christians and honestly, I don’t really want to be like those people either.

And then some of us actually try to engage the outside world in a conversation of what we believe. And the problem with this is that we have become so indoctrinated with key phrases that we don’t know how to adequately have a conversation with someone about what we believe without using our Christian clichés.

Let me give some examples of what I am talking about. Let’s suppose you are going to get your car fixed and the mechanic engages you in a spiritual conversation. What do you say?

Well some people would say “Mr. Mechanic listen to me because I am on fire for God.” Mr. Mechanic is thinking, “Why is God setting him on fire, is it one of those weird churches.”

And then he would say “My life has never been the same since I’ve been saved.” Mr. Mechanic is thinking, “I can understand that, nobody is try to set you on fire anymore.”

And then you give your best closing argument “Mr. Mechanic I just want you to know that I am a Wide-eyed, Sanctified, Blood Bought, Spirit Taught, Bible Totin', Scripture Quotin', Satan Bashin', Sin Trashin', Christ Followin', Pride Swallowin', Hard Prayin', Truth Conveyin', Faith Walkin', Gospel Talkin', Bonafide Big Time Believer who is washed in the blood of the lamb and I am proud of it!” And I am sorry to say but not only does Mr. Mechanic not know a thing that you just said, but he is making fun of you in his head and trust me he is not using words that go very well with the Christian subculture.

In closing, I understand your enthusiasm... I share it. But when dealing with the outside world... try not to be so weird :)

Latest book entry

2008-11-24T18:14:00.001-08:00

If you read my blog over a year ago, you know that I have a lifelong dream of writing and pubishing a book. I have ideas of what it will be on, but it has to have some life stories involoved. The following is what I have learned in youth ministry and how I got there. I find it to be interesting, tell me if you do too.

If you read the whole post then please comment, I will make sure to send you the first copy of my book to be released in 2025.

Enjoy...

Youth Ministry

Conversion Experience

My journey in youth ministry began on March 26, 1996. It was on this date, that as a 13 year-old boy I accepted Jesus Christ into my heart as my Lord and Savior. It was the beginning of my life, and even if I didn’t know it then, it would be the beginning of my ministry and my career as well.

I was not raised in a Christian home and had no Christian role models. I was at the age when I was trying to decide where my life was heading. I had to find my identity, and the process was not coming easy. I was very lonely and could be very depressed, but really I had a lot of anger and was unaware of how to channel and control my emotions.

I had one too many fights with my family and I decided that I was running away from home. I thought that it would be easy to find a place to stay for the night, but it was a school night and that made it impossible. I decided then that I would sleep in the grass of this local area. The grass had dew on it and there were bugs crawling, but it was then in that grass that I had my first “encounter” with God. As I looked up at the stars that night I said, “God, there has to be more than this.” There was. I made a bargain with God right then (something I do not suggest) that if I went home and everything would be okay that I would go to church or something.

I then made the walk back to my house (I didn’t run away very far) and my mother was very happy to see me and it seemed as though God kept His end of the bargain.

The next day my neighbor (the local smiley, power-walker) invited me to church. After the previous night’s ordeal, I thought that if I did not go to church with her then I would get struck with a lightning bolt. So that Sunday I had my first real church experience at First Baptist Church of Tampa. I had no idea what to expect.

The first thing I remember is how nice all of the other youth were. They all acted as though they really cared about who I was. I was shocked. I remember meeting the youth pastor and being overwhelmed by how cool I thought he was. I don’t remember the Sunday School lesson, and I don’t remember the sermon, but I do remember sitting in a beautiful sanctuary and seeing Alex NeSmith, the Minister of Music crying as he sang a song. This was so foreign to me, and yet so intriguing. I loved every bit of it and wanted to continue going back.

That day set the stage for March 26, 1996 when the youth pastor and three other youth (that I remembered were all very nice to me) came to my house on what I now know was an Evangelism Explosion visit. I do not remember hearing the whole outline, but the part I do remember was when the youth pastor (JJ Johnson) said, “God loved you so much that He sent His son to die for you.” That blew me away. I did not know that I was loved at all, and especially not that much. Whatever he asked me to do that night I would have done, no questions asked.

Fast forward a little bit and the story takes me to my first youth camp. I could not afford it, but someone in the church anonymously paid for me and my brother to go. I don’t remember a lot of the details of the camp, but I do remember very clearly that the camp speaker Turk Holt (a huge man) broke down in tears and said, “If Jesus didn’t die on the cross, I would love Him just the same.” That saying would revolutionize my thinking.

I had what most would say is a “typical camp experience” and the emotion and the Spirit of the camp had me sobbing and weeping and wondering why I was such a terrible person. I asked to speak to JJ and I told him that I didn’t think I was saved and he told me, “Yes you are, I was there, and I have seen the fruit in your life.” He then proceeded to tell me that what I was feeling was called conviction, and it meant that God wanted me to do more with my life.

That was not just a “typical camp experience” for me; it was something that completely changed my life. When I returned from youth camp I realized the importance and the severity of sharing my faith with other people. As a result, a lot of people in my inner circle got saved; friends, acquaintances, my father, my cousin, my aunt, and my 82-year old grandmother. It was quite a conversion experience.

My Youth Group Experience

There was no place this side of Heaven that I would rather have been as a teenager then at church. Whatever it was that was being offered, I was going to be there. Luckily, my neighbor would take me to church on Sundays and Wednesdays and on a few other occasions, but if she was not involved with something I had to get creative on ways to get to church. I lived quite a ways away, and my dad always worked, and my mom can’t drive. I would call everyone I knew and beg to get driven to church, even if I had no legitimate way back home. Sometimes I would take the city bus, which took about an hour and a half with three transfers. But whatever it took I would make it to the church.

I got involved in a lot of things that would mold my life as a youth pastor. I was asked to do Bible Drills, in which I memorized all the books of the Bible (I previously had no idea) and learned a lot of verses that I still have memorized today.

The year after Bible Drills I was asked to do the speakers tournament. I did it for three years and finally my senior year of high school, I won state. This would mold me as a public speaker. The pastor’s wife spent hours upon hours with me to make me an excellent public speaker.

I was asked to be on an Evangelism Explosion team, and since I knew the merits of it, I gladly signed up. I am now a certified trainer who has (as of yesterday) trained 40 members of my local church in Evangelism Explosion.

But one of the greatest things that happened to me was that I was asked to be in Student Leadership University. I was shocked and blown away when JJ told me that I was a natural leader, that was the first time I had ever heard anything like that. In SLU I was held to a higher standard then everyone else. I was asked to read my Bible daily, and to share to gospel on a regular basis, and to help with small details of the youth ministry. It was very difficult because I felt a lot of times like JJ was being hard on me, but as I look back at the whole process, it was this accountability that made me who I am today.

It didn’t take long after my conversion experience until I realized that I desired more from my life. I went to my pastor, Dr. Jim Knight, and told him that I think I was being called to full-time Christian service. He said, “I know.” He then told me something that I repeat to every youth that comes to me with the same intentions. I say, “If you can picture yourself doing anything else with your life, then do it… if not then God is calling you and you have to follow Him.” I dedicated my life to full-time Christian service on Mothers Day of 1997, a little more than a year after being saved.

One more thing I want to point out about my youth years is this. One day, JJ called me up and asked me to come to the church. I thought he wanted me to do something for him. I caught the city bus and made my way to the church. JJ told me to get in the car and he took me to Westshore Plaza, the local mall. He took me into Structure (which is a store my parents could never afford) and told me to find what I wanted. I was completely and totally blown away. I never had nice clothes to wear and now I finally would. I still to this day don’t know if he paid for it out of his own pocket or out of a church benevolence fund, but I knew that one day I wanted to help kids out the way that he did with me.

A year or so after that, the Senior Pastor called up and the same occurrence happened, only this time he took me to Men’s Wearhouse and I got my first ever suit. He was getting me ready for the speaker’s tournament and I will never forget that hospitality either.

The College Years

The college years were a hard time for me. I was given complete independence and had no one holding me accountable for any decisions I was making in my life. I decided to leave home and go to the Baptist College of Florida in Graceville. I finished one semester and got real homesick and decided to go to community college.

I missed the deadline for community college and so I took a semester off. I got a nice job and dabbled with the idea of not going into the ministry. It was then that I had a chance occurrence with a man named Edwin Newman while I was camping. He was on the site next to us, and he was there with his youth group. We hit it off so much that he asked me to come and intern with him. This revitalized my zeal for the ministry.

The Sumer of 2001 I decided to make a big move that only college-age kids can make. I decided to leave everything and go to Colorado as a camp counselor. The whole summer was crazy and exhausting but I saw so many kids get saved that I was ready to go back to the Baptist College.

This time though I did not even make it through the semester and started working full-time at a Cracker Barrel in Dothan, Alabama. I was close to forgoing the ministry. It was then that I got a vision of my future and I realized that if I did not get back in college that I would be stuck in a dead end job for the rest of my life. I could not accept that.

I moved back to Tampa and transferred to the closest Cracker Barrel and stayed wherever I could find am open couch. I finally got registered for community college and I worked very hard to go to school full time and work full time but I finally got my Associates Degree.

It was now that my life would hit a fork in the road. I got involved in this business model (pyramid scheme) and I saw the potential to make a lot of money as a business man. I had to decide whether or not I was going to go to USF or to this college that my friend told me about, Trinity.

I had a day off of work and had decided that I was going to go and talk with both schools. I decided to start with Trinity College. Little did I know that not only would I never make it to USF, but that day I would meet the woman I would spend the rest of my life with. I walked into the admissions office and there with a huge smile on her face was Heather Fitzgerald, and even though we had only really met one time, she remembered me, and my life has never been the same.

At this crossroads in my life I finally realized that life was not about getting money, or even making other people money… my life HAD to be about sharing the love of Christ with anyone and everyone I meet.

My First Ministry Job

Shortly after Heather and I got married I started to think about ministry opportunities. I was currently working at a warehouse making sealant for tile, and I was very grateful for the job, but I was definitely looking for more. Heather and I were interning at First Baptist Church of Lutz at this point in our lives.

I was only 21 and still had a year left in my degree program so I was not actively looking for a ministry position because I didn’t feel like I had a lot to offer. I decided to sit down and write a very detailed resume, that wasn’t necessarily about my ministry accomplishments, but was about what I would do if I were a youth pastor. My resume was about 7 pages long and it had the best picture I could find of my wife and I one the front page.

One Monday night while at the Trinity Quest program, my wife and I were a little early and started looking at the bulletin board. On the bulletin board was a request for a youth pastor at Willow Bend Community Church in Land’O’Lakes. The next day at the warehouse I called and talked to the pastor. I remember this very clearly because his name was Geoff Gordon and I wrote his information on a Dale Earnhardt Jr. notepad. Pastor Geoff is an incredible man of faith and he scheduled me for my first ever ministry interview.

I was more nervous than I had ever been in my life, and I was so blessed to have my wife next to me. My wife understood what I was too nervous to understand and frequently rephrased the question for me to buy me some time to think. The amazing thing is that Pastor Geoff is such a man of faith that he said that even though he got over 100 resumes for this job that the second he saw our picture, he knew we were the ones.

This was a “part-time” youth ministry position and along with not very much pay there were a few other draw backs. First of all, there was no church building. There had been a year and a half of red tape in getting the permits for their future building. Our church services were held on a slab of concrete underneath of a yellow circus tent. We had huge fans set up and a sound system and chairs were set up every Sunday and taken down immediately afterward. This would also be where our youth meetings would be held. This was cool most of the time, but in the summer time we had to get creative because the weather forecast ALWAYS called for rain, and parents don’t like it when there kids are next to medal poles in a lightning storm. We occasionally had to have youth group at the local McDonalds.

The second issue was that there was no youth budget. When I asked what the youth budget was, Pastor Geoff said, “You are the youth budget.” So I had to get creative with what I did. I would frequently take my TV and DVD player from my living room and load it up in the car when I wanted to show a video clip. I had to get donations for every little thing that we did, and we had a poor congregation as well as youth group and so fundraisers became a huge part of what we did. I oftentimes ended up paying for a lot of little things out of my own pocket, and it added up real fast.

The third, and probably biggest issue with my first youth pastor job was this… there were no youth. There were a few teenagers that had family in the congregation, and a list of other teenagers that don’t go to church, but other than that there were no youth. When I first arrived the church was having youth meetings on Sunday nights, and the first one that I was in charge of had six adult leaders (which was awesome) but only three teenagers. It was very discouraging to plan a message for three youth, but it was my job to grow it.

We didn’t have a lot of resources and we didn’t really have a draw so I had to figure out what strengths we did have. Our greatest strength was the amount of adults who were willing to do whatever it takes to see the youth ministry be successful. Another strength was that I lived in the area my whole life and had made connections of people that could help. We added a lot of younger youth workers, who were just acquaintances of mine that were ready to have a more hands on opportunity in ministry. The last strength was the big open field that our circus tent was on. It became evident very fast that by having Frisbees and footballs every week that we could attract a lot of younger boys, and that is exactly what happened. We grew in numbers to a maximum of 25 weekly students before I left, but the whole time I was there, there were probably only five total girls that came through our ministry. But we were reaching the boys, and we were reaching boys that had a lot of baggage and would never go to a “typical” church.

An immediate change that I had to make was to change the night of the youth service. By having it on Sunday night it felt as though I never saw the kids. I would see them on Sunday morning, Sunday night and then not again until the following Sunday morning. I couldn’t develop any accountability with them by only seeing them one day a week. The great thing was that I told the Pastor that I wanted to switch youth group to Wednesday nights, and he agreed to start a Wednesday night Bible study for the adults at the same time, so that parents would have no excuse not to bring their kids. This was great for the church as well.

In addition to my duties as youth pastor, it was also part of my job description to have a college ministry. Now this was a bit out of my comfort zone. I was in a few college groups, but I was not in one that would be deemed “successful.” I had to figure out how to have a college ministry. Once again I had to look at my strengths.

We had more college students who were looking to be filled in our church then we did youth. Some of those were youth workers. We had one of the largest universities in the country close to us. (USF) And the greatest part was the Pastor’s sister owned a coffee house real close to the church that she opened up for us on Thursday nights specifically for our college group.

The first night of college group after setting up booths at USF and handing out flyers and sweet tea, and all of the word of mouth advertising that we did… our first meeting had only 4 people. (Including me and my wife) The two people were Cat and Buddy and they didn’t even go to our church, although it wouldn’t be long before they did, and we would become GREAT friends.

Our college study was going through a small group curriculum on the book of Romans. I had it set up to ask open ended questions, get a lot of dialogue going and then close it with a summary of what the particular passage was showing. As it would turn out this was excellent for what this college group wanted. I made no changes to this group in the first 6 months except for my buddy Mike Hall came and led us in worship before the Bible study began. I made it a Thursday afternoon tradition to call everyone that had ever come to our college group and ask if they were coming. If they were not going to come they had to have the courage to tell me why they were not coming.

After our first week of only four people, we had eight the next week, and I think we maxed out at close to thirty college students. I was putting all of my effort in trying to grow the youth group and it did not grow in the first six months. I put almost no effort into growing the college group and it just exploded, and ministry was really happening.

Unfortunately, the Pastor’s sister had to sell the coffee shop and we had to move our group to the church and after the first semester a lot of schedules changed, life happened, and the ministry plateaued. We were still growing and lives were being changed but it wasn’t at quite as fast a pace as it was before.

As far as the youth group went I felt a real sense of responsibility to the kids in our youth group. Life has a way of coming full circle, and the people our ministry was attracting was people that were a lot like I was when I was a teenager. We didn’t have ideal church kids, we didn’t have the popular kids… but these kids looked up to me and to the other youth leaders and we had an immense obligation to lead these students in the way of the Word.

We named our youth group “The Refuge” after one of the verses I learned in Bible Drills. Psalm 62:8 “Trust in Him at all time, you people. Pour out your heart before Him. God is a REFUGE for us.” This verse fit our youth ministry perfectly. We had a lot of foster kids and we had a bipolar kid and we had a kid with autism, but mostly we had kids that had never felt loved. We wanted our ministry to be a place where any kids can come and feel like they belong and like they are accepted, and that God loves them just as much as He does anyone else. That was our main goal in ministry.

During this amazing time at Willow Bend I got connected with this group that headed up what was called The Faith Based Initiative at San Antonio Boys Village. This was a program that Jeb and Laura Bush put into effect and got a 3 million dollar grant for. The rate for teenagers that get out of jail going directly back into jail before their first year out was at something like 80%. The Faith Based Initiative gave some of these teenage inmates the option of going to the Boys Village for a different type of program. These boys signed up to be in prison for only six months, to get matched up with a Christian mentor, and for the next six months after being released had to get involved in their mentors church a minimum of once a week.

Our church got involved and it was amazing. We had a lot of our men sign up to be mentors and we led their chapel service for one Sunday night a month. It was one of those times in life when you feel like you are doing relevant ministry. After the first couple years of this program the inmates who went back to jail after one year of being out dropped from around 80% to around 17% for the boys in the Faith Based Initiative. It is one the thing that I am most proud of from my first ministry year. Sadly though, when Charlie Crist took over he did away with the program. This is just another of his many bad moves. (But that’s for another paper entirely)

From this time in my ministry I learned a lot of things. I learned that I need to live a lot more on faith. This is a lesson that the life of Pastor Geoff taught me. I learned that you could do ministry without a lot of resources, you just have to be creative. I learned that the first thing you need to do in building a youth ministry is to build a healthy adult leadership team. I also learned that I loved being a youth pastor and that this is exactly what I will do with the rest of my life.

Moving to South Carolina

Things up to this point had been really great, but I only knew they were really great in hindsight. One of the greatest lessons I learned from the next two years if my life is that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

We finished our degree program at Trinity and had a year of youth ministry under our belt and now it was time to spread our wings. Married life was not going too well, we had no idea had to deal with family issues because we were from two completely different family dynamics. I did not see our marriage lasting very long in the current situation because the stress of ministry and families was weighing on us. Jesus said you cannot be a prophet in your hometown, and I completely understood that. Ministry is a 24/7, lifetime commitment, and we were being pulled in too many different directions to every truly be “successful.”

The greatest thing I could ever say about my wife, is that when I suggested we move away from everyone and everything we had ever known, she said yes without any hesitation. My wife is the absolute greatest human being on the planet.

So we had personal reasons to leave Tampa, but selfishly I thought I needed a “typical” youth ministry with all the bells and whistles. I needed a youth budget and sanctuary and an office, to be completely honest I needed more than the money I was getting paid at Willow Bend too.

I put my resume on a lot of different websites and sent it to a couple churches, and one day a pastor from South Carolina called and asked me if we wanted to fly up to South Carolina for an interview. We heard all that was there: approximately 60-70 kids, a huge gymnasium, a beautiful building, $14,500 youth budget, and a salary that was over 4 times what I was making at Willow Bend… of course we will fly up.

The interview went well, and it seemed like most of the people on the committee liked me. It seemed like the Pastor’s wife was my biggest supporter, I found out later that she fought for me to get hired. So here we are two 22 year old newlyweds leaving everything in Tampa, FL and moving to South Carolina where we knew NO ONE.

I honestly was enamored by the differences in the two churches. I loved having church indoors. I loved having an office. I loved kids that had already been programmed to go to church on Wednesdays. I loved a lot of the kids. But this wasn’t nearly as simple as my last church.

In South Carolina I was introduced to something called “church politics.” It was ugly and it was everywhere. First of all, I had my first experience of following another youth pastor. He had a good following and I was not him. Some of the students resented me before they even met me, as though I made the guy leave. Some of the adult leaders, including the pastor’s wife, didn’t take very well to the change that had occurred and emotionally detached themselves from the youth ministry. In addition to all that, I went from having a Pastor that loved me and was an amazing role model to having a Pastor that I did not trust.

The other issue that I did not foresee in moving to South Carolina was that I could not relate to these students and to this culture at all. I was only three states away my whole life, but it may as well have been another planet. Evangelism wasn’t a big deal because everyone was “saved.” Church was just something you always did, and so I became more of an event coordinator than a youth pastor, I set up the social lives of 60-70 teenagers. I could never tell when a commitment that was being made was genuine or not, crying at an altar was a weekly occurrence for some kids, almost like going to a Catholic confession booth. There was also a spirit of negativity throughout the church, complaining was the spiritual gift of even the greatest Christians of the church. I did not fit in there very well at all.

One of the main things that bothered me was the spirit of racism that predicated every aspect of life in South Carolina. I had no intentions of moving to South Carolina and being any sort of race relation change agent, because I thought that racism went away 40 years ago. Not only was it prevalent, but it was accepted, and any sort of change was an abomination. The saddest part is that I am not just talking about the adults; I am talking about the teenagers as well. It is a sad, sad commentary on human existence when in the year 2005 bigotry was still an accepted practice in the United States.

People in our church referred to people of the opposite race as “those people” and made grand generalizations about what “those people” do. The statement “I am not racist” is always followed with “I have a black friend” which of course means that you still see them as black. I was told once at a convention that I went to that if I kept “talking like that” that I would eventually lose my job. I had no intention of being a Civil Rights leader but I REFUSE to teach my teenagers that racism is okay, regardless of the consequences.

In the midst of two of the most difficult years of my life there were some bright spots. One of the things that our church did well was disaster relief. We moved to South Carolina just as Hurricane Katrina was reeking havoc. The pastor had a pastor friend in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. I personally made two trips to Mississippi in support of this church that had been destroyed in the hurricane. We saw a lot of pain and a lot of devastation, but I truly believe that we did a lot of good for these people and we held the banner of Jesus high on these trips. They were some of the most depressing trips I had ever been on, but they were the rare times when I knew that I was doing what God wanted me to do.

One of my other job requirements when I took the job in South Carolina was that I was in charge of the Upward basketball ministry. During basketball season we would have kids from K5 to 6th grade going through this ministry and on most occasions we would have more people come through the doors of our church on a Saturday then we did the next day on Sunday. This was one of the flagship programs of the church.

These two years was a great learning experience for me. I learned to be grateful when you are in a good situation. I learned that in ministry you can NEVER follow the money. I learned that my wife is the greatest partner I could ever have. And I learned that if you cannot click with your Senior Pastor then you will never be “successful.” One of the main things I learned was from the book, Seizing your Divine Moment by Erwin McManus. In the book he said something that I never thought of before; he said that just because God calls you to do something doesn’t mean that you won’t “fail.” God said He would never leave us or forsake us. He never said He would make us a success. I learned this lesson well, but I know that this situation was a time in my life that I can compare everything else to and appreciate what I now have.

My Current Church

Everything came to a head in South Carolina and it became very apparent to all parties involved that it was time to move on. I went back to the internet and I went back to sending my resume out. I had three major interviews within months of each other and they were all back in Florida.

On Easter of 2007 we went to church at this amazing church in Clearwater. This was a very relevant church that had a lot of things going for it. Our interview lasted three full days… three “full” days. It was a grueling interview process, and we had to deal with something we never had before… rejection. For the first time in my life I didn’t get a job that I interviewed for and it was pretty devastating.

We had to get over it fast because we had two more interviews coming up soon. We went on the same road in Clearwater for a 24 hour interview. They flew us in, put us up in this nice condo, fed us 4 times, razzled and dazzled us and put us back on the plane.

That weekend we had another interview in Haines City, Florida. We thought it was pretty strange because we were not being flown down for this interview, they wanted us to drive. Everything about this church was less impressive. It was further away from Tampa, which was where we wanted to get close to. It was paying $15,000 less a year than the first one, and when asked about the youth budget, everyone always laughed. There was no reason in the world we should have gone to NorthRidge over the church in Clearwater… except… we believed in the Pastor and we bought into the vision that he had.

We got offered both positions and turned the church in Clearwater down to accept less money and virtually no perks, because we learned our lesson before… NEVER follow the money.

To be honest, I had my doubts at first. I was told the youth ministry at one time had 200 students; my first night there was twelve students. And there was a learning curve between me and the staff. I now had developed trust issues, and I continuously thought that people had ulterior motives. I was second guessing my decision for the first month or so.

I now know beyond the shadow of a doubt that I am where God wants to me to be. We run 60 faithful, eager students on Wednesday night. We have 10 faithful youth workers that I would take a bullet for. We have a congregation that is in love with Jesus. We have an Academy where students are being taught to grow into mature Christian adults following after Christ. Most of all, we have a Pastor, Pastor David Myers, that is as humble as he is great. Someone I can model my life after. He is an amazing Pastor and an incredible family man. He has the biggest servant’s heart I have ever seen. He is my biggest supporter, and I am his.

The thing that I have learned the most from my current ministry position is to cherish what you have. I have learned to make the most of every opportunity. I have learned that living a life of ministry will not get you rich with money, but there are greater rewards in Heaven.

I look forward to many more years in ministry, and it is all thanks to those who invested in me at such a young age.

WE ARE PREGNANT!!!!!!

2008-10-20T12:11:00.000-07:00

Check out my new blog at www.blewettbabyblog.blogspot.com
You will love it!

Favorite Time of Year.

2008-09-13T13:12:00.000-07:00

Wow! It is so hard to believe that it has been one month since I posted last. I always intend to post every two weeks, but things have been VERY busy lately.

Of course school started back and I am in charge of two Bible classes. This is my first time as a year-round teacher of any kind, but I love it very much. It has consumed a lot of time though, even though I didn't think it really would.

Another reason I have not posted recently is because of what I like to call "technology demons." You know what I mean, for some reason my wireless at my house stopped working a month or so ago, and through countless attempts to fix it or to have it fixed, I had never been able to get it back up. Then out of nowhere I decided to try it again a few days ago, and it mysteriously works again. So that's really neat.

It has been a time of transition and getting things started. Our youth group is starting new curriculum and has made a new partnership with Word of Life, and we were doing a lot of training to get all of that straightened out. And then of course our Evangelism Explosion ministry started up last week and that has taken a lot of my time as well, but it is going to be so worth it if even ONE person gets saved.

So all of those are reasons why it has taken me over a month to make another post. But I know that all of them are paltry.

This is a great time of year for sports, especially a Tampa guy like me. My wife and I have watched at least 75% of the Tampa Bay Rays games this year and we are utterly amazed. My best friend who runs a website called www.3guysandasportspage.com has predicted for years that the Rays were going to hit their stride soon, but to be honest I didn't see it. Our team salary is less than the Yankees luxury tax. We are out spent in that division like 50-1 (that's a wild guess) and the Yankees and Red Sox have looked so dominant over the past eleven years of the Rays existence. But right now our magic number is 16 to win the division.

The USF Bulls have also got off to a 3-0 start. Starting QB Matt Grothe (my friend on Facebook) is a Heisman trophy candidate and that team is easily the best team in the Big East after three games. Go Bulls.

And then there's the Bucs. I am a die-hard Bucs fan, but I have a really bad feeling about this season. I hope that I am absolutely and completely wrong and that the Bucs go 15-1 on the way to the Super Bowl... in Tampa. I do miss the days when we had a respectable and decent man at the head coach like Tony Dungy, but I am still die-hard.

All in all, I love this time of year. School's back in, sports are all over the place, the weather cools off a little bit, and we prepare for the holidays... awesome!

As far as the church goes, tonight we are having the Community Dedication Service for our new building. It should be an amazing service. We are honoring all of those people who assisted in getting that church building back to the beautiful building that we are now corporately worshipping in.

For the spiritual emphasis of this post I want to talk a little bit about Jesus. I recently taught about when Jesus chased the money changers out of the temple. This story really changed my view on Jesus when I first got saved. The Jesus I thought of before was the one in all of the pictures, where he looked like a dark-haired Fabio and had a huge smile on His face surrounded by children and sheep.

But when Jesus walked into that Temple during the Passover season and saw the people selling animals for sacrifice and exchanging money for the local temple tax, and saw that these people were making a HUGE profit off of God, Jesus couldn't stand for it. The Bible says that he made a whip and just went in and cleared the place out. This reminds me that Chuck Norris wears JESUS pajamas. (a few of you will get that) Jesus wasn't a sissy, He was a man's man and he had the courage to stand up for what is right. Why don't we?

I am not suggesting that we run people out with a whip, but I am suggesting that we not listen when people try to gossip to us; that we walk away when people try to tell us a dirty joke; that we say something when someone says something offensive toward God.

It takes a lot more courage to stand up for what is right than it does to just let something go. But think of the courage that Jesus had to do all He did for us, let's follow His example.

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PS Please comment.

PSS A friend of mine just released a book called "Tatoo on the Heart." Check out his website: http://www.tattooontheheart.com

NEW

2008-08-13T06:19:00.000-07:00

Well my faithful blog readers. Life is good, and God is on the throne!

I have been writing all summer about change and about how weird it is here at church with no kids running around, and no teachers hanging out. It is almost time for that to change.

This week is when the teachers came back to the school which means that it is not nearly as quiet around here, and it also means that me and my wife are working at the same place again. Life is good, and I am looking forward to all the kids coming back here, even if they may not be.

And of course, this past Sunday was our first service in the new building. It was an amazing, awesome service and I thank God for every moment of it. It didn't come easy. The enemy started to attack and he is still attacking. We know and believe that God is about ready to do some incredible things through the life of NorthRidge Church and due to this the Devil is scared.

I used to not think that the devil attacks in such ways, but I do not believe it to be a coincidence that whenever things start to roll around here, things to seem to get so much more difficult. But here is the good news, while the devil is mighty... GOD IS ALMIGHTY!!!!!

When I think of all of the sacrifice that Pastor David put into the rebuilding process, and when I think of all of the other Pastors faithfully following behind him without complaint, and when I think of the countless hours that volunteers put into getting this building back to where it is now... it overwhelms me.

However, it must be noted and it must be remembered that the church is not a building. The church is the body of believers that follow after Christ. It is so easy to take a church building and to make it an idol. It is so easy to marvel at our new seats, and new colors, and new sound system, and the entire beauty of our new sanctuary. But if we ever put that building above God then we are in huge trouble.

Our pastor has said this to us for the last month now, if not more, and it is a true concern of his. The thing is when I walk in that building I do not see a building... I see what God has done. When I walk in that building I do not see a building... I see Jehovah-Jireh.

God allowed that old church building to burn down, but he never left us alone. It was difficult and it was tedious, but there was always a way for it to be done. God is good and He is worthy to be praised!

Praise God!

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P.S. Leave a comment.

Reflect

2008-07-28T10:39:00.000-07:00

Well, it has been an interesting couple of weeks since my last post. I cannot believe that this is my 31st post. It is amazing how fast time flies.

Since my last post my wife and I got a Ford Explorer. It is burnt orange and it is perfect for families. We were planning on saving up for a family car, but now we have one and it is paid off. God is good!

It is quiet here in the office because every one of the Pastors on staff except for me are on a mission trip in Honduras. They are working on a church there as well as doing Vacation Bible School. Our church sent 22 people on this trip, this is quite an undertaking and your prayers would be valued as they are gone.

So with all of the Pastors gone, it leaves me to pick up the slack. Thank God, as of yet, nothing catastrophic has happened. We got through service yesterday with nothing bad happening (that I know of) and I had an awesome time bringing the sermon yesterday. I was fired up and I love each and every opportunity I ever get to speak to the congregation.

This is a pretty exciting time, we have 13 days until we have our first service in our new sanctuary, and I cannot wait. School will be starting back soon and I am excited to have all of the kids running around here again. As a youth pastor I feel it is a blessing to be so close to youth all day long. I will most likely be teaching a few Bible classes this year as well, which is also exciting. I have been working on our church website and it should be up last Saturday :) It will be up very soon, it has been edited and updated and we are waiting for one piece of information to go through the right person's hands and we will be up. Hopefully before the night is out, so that is exciting. And of course Training Camp has started and that means that football season is almost here, which is uber-exciting!

I am hopefully going training camp sometime toward the end of this week, and hopefully I will NOT be watching Brett Favre. The Bucs have 5 quarterbacks on their roster and we don't need the distraction of Favre. Me and my good friend Robert Wiley (who is also a HUGE Bucs fan) and I will be going on Thursday or Friday and I can't wait.

And in case you are wondering about the rest of my schedule for the week, we are going to Give Kids the World tonight and that is very exciting as well. I have mentioned it in previous posts, but it has been months now so I will refresh your memory.

Give Kids the World is a place where terminally ill children go for a week with their families during their last days. It is like a wonder land. Everything there is so amazing and nice, it is like Disney World with love. It is some of these kids last chance to ever have a good time. They will go to this place and be able to forget, for at least a little while, all of the things that they are going through. Tonight my wife and I are going with our church parents, the Beasleys, to work in the ice cream parlor. It is one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. It truly puts life into perspective.

To end, I want to reiterate some thing I talked about yesterday morning. I believe that one of the most important things in our Christian life is the helmet of salvation. The helmet of salvation is the hope of salvation, which is the expectation and confidence of salvation. I want for all of you, my faithful blog readers to stop and reflect on what it really means to be wearing the helmet of salvation. Think about how amazing this is. Think about how awesome this is. Think about how good God is.

Reflect.

God will provide!

2008-07-15T06:11:00.000-07:00

As I have mentioned in previous posts, this Summer is a pretty weird time for me. A lot of change, a lot of transition. This week is no different.

My faithful readers remember when I mentioned that the music pastor that I used to work with in South Carolina moved here to Florida. Well, he is moving to South Korea on Wednesday. My next door neighbors, who are the best neighbors a guy could ever ask for, and really good friends are moving to South Carolina.

What's behind these moves: the Polk County School Board. Jeremy has a degree in education and was teaching autistic students and because of "cutbacks" wasn't asked back next year. My next door neighbor Sonia has a flippin' Masters in education and wasn't asked back, both of them finding immediate work else where. I could use the rest of this blog to point out all of the problems with such things, but I want this blog to a positive place. But just know that I write this post with an aura of sadness surrounding me.

Last week a major occurrence happened: my wife got in a car accident. She is okay, but the car was totalled. She ran into the hitch on a pickup truck when the dude slammed on his brakes. Nothing wrong with the truck but because the frame on our car was bent the insurance company totalled our car. We are driving one car as we weigh out all of our options.

Here is the neat thing about it though: neither one of us worried about it. It is such a great feeling to know that you are a child of God and that God is going to provide for you. We actually got twice as much for the car from the insurance company as what the Kelley Blue Book value was. Now, we are just in a spot that there a lot of different roads that we could travel in this situation, and if God brought us this far we better make sure we continue to follow Him.

You wanna read some great news? Good, I am glad you do.. I am posting this blog from my office, yes my OFFICE! It is nice and it has a door on it. For those of you that don't know our church had a major fire last September and we haven't had any real place to call an office since then. But before the fire we had cubicles in our office so, once again God in His infinite wisdom provided for us, and now we have beautiful new places to work from.

The other thing is, the sanctuary and rest of the church looks amazing. I am putting a video on here that I threw together of the progress made on the construction. You may think that you have seen it but I added a lot to the end of it so this is actually its very first unveiling. I hope you enjoy it.

So here is the spiritual implication of this post, I think it is very obvious... God will provide. His name in this regard is Jehovah-Jireh and the first time it was used in the Bible was when Abraham was asked to sacrifice his son Isaac.

Why was he asked to do such a thing? As a test of faith, maybe. As a show of obedience, maybe. Some theologians believe that this was God's poetic way of getting people ready for Jesus. If we can feel an emotional connection to the story of Abraham and Isaac, then we will be even more ready to accept the gift that God gave us in His son Jesus Christ.

For whatever reason God asked Abe to do this, the important thing is that he was wiling to do it... with no hesitation. And because of his obedience and his faith... God provided! A ram in the thicket, and no harm came to Isaac.

So if all of my friends move away I have to know that God will still provide. If our cars are out of commission I have to know that God will provide. And if our church burns down then I have to know that God will provide.

What an amazing God we serve! Thank you Jehovah-Jireh.

Youth Camp

2008-06-30T06:12:00.001-07:00

Last week we went to Youth Camp. We went to Student Life Missions Camp at Stetson University, close to Daytona Beach.

Our speaker for the week was a man by the name if Sam Bhatt. This man was absolutely amazing. He was funny, he was so easy to pay attention to, and he was passionate. He said on his first day, "My name is Sam Bhatt, and I am a disciple of Jesus Christ." He wasn't a typical youth camp speaker that thinks he is above people. One of the greatest things for the kids at the camp (there were over 1000) was that Sam loved to just hang out with the kids. I heard Sam plays a killer game of ultimate frisbee.

Our band for the week was the Chuck Hooten band. Chuck was of the same mold as Sam, to where he was incredibly humble and in tune with what God wanted to do. We got even more time to hang out with the band, because they came and spent an hour or so with us during our small group time. I was amazed at how accommodating this band was. At the same time our youth LOVED this band, and I am going to do whatever is necessary to get them to Haines City.

It wasn't just speakers and bands though, during the middle of the day we went on Mission. Our mission for the week was volunteering at a Boys and Girls Club. This was incredibly gratifying for a couple of reasons. 1. The children we were working with was amazing 2. The staff at the BnG was so nice they let us lead them in Bible stories and share whatever we wanted with them 3. My wife used her kindergarten teacher skills to lead at least five of these children to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ (PRAISE GOD!) 4. Our teenagers stepped up in a huge way. You would be amazed at the ownership and responsibility these teenagers took in the mission we were given. The adults could have left the Club and nothing would have changed. I was so proud of them.

If all that were not enough, I have to tell you about Wednesday night. On Wednesday night Sam's message was so incredibly basic. He took us through some of Jesus' highlights, like turning water into wine and feeding the 5000 and then told us to put ourselves in the shoes of the person who witnessed the miracle. After that he read the horrific tale of the crucifixion of Jesus, but he did so from a medical examiner's point of view. And then he called us to a time of commitment.

Every one of our teenagers stood up to say that they wanted to step up their Christian walk and give God 100%. As I watched them, and saw how God was moving in them, I felt led to take them outside. We went out of the service and just prayed with each other. During this time of prayer we could almost see all of the walls breaking down. All of the stuff that they were holding back, all of the times that they gave less than 100%, and the all the times as their leaders that we let them down. God worked in that prayer circle in a way that will change lives FOREVER.

After that God led me to take them up on a hill and make an Old Testament altar. We got sticks for each of the teenagers and they made a covenant before God and their brothers and sisters in Christ of what God was telling them to do and what they were going to do. I would not trade this time in my life for anything. It was such a humbling, awe-inspiring time.

God is amazing, and worthy of our praise! But remember that God wants 100% and he DESERVES 100%. Don't give God your leftovers. Deny yourself, take up your cross daily and follow after Him. You won't be disappointed.

A Tribute

2008-06-09T08:38:00.000-07:00

Change. A very difficult thing. It is especially difficult when you are so content with the way things are. You know the joke: How many Southern Baptists does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: Change? What's that?

I like things the way they are and so right now is a particularly weird time for me. First of all, school is out and it is sooooooooooooo quiet here at the church now. I really miss my tenth grade Bible class. My wife is out of school, which is good for her, but I really miss eating lunch with her every day. (By the way, it's her birthday today... HAPPY BIRTHDAY!) And last but certainly not least, one of my favorite people in the world Michael Bartlett is moving away and taking his incredible family with him. As a way to pay homage to Bartman and to access a therapeutic release this posting is dedicated to him.

I remember the first time I met him, we were at Harold Butler's house for one of those awkward "Meet the New Guy" dinners. (I was the new guy) There were more staff members than I could possibly remember in one night and I always feel nervous at such things.

Bartlett and I met at the dessert table (a theme in our friendship) and he mentioned that he was recently in Pasco County, the site of the first church I ever served at. Me, in all my nervous brilliance said, "Did you know that Pasco County has more Nudist Colonies per capita than any other county in the U.S.?" Somehow he did not know that. Anyone else would have probably thought that was weird but Bartman rolled with it and I talked to him that night more than anyone else.

Well, somehow I still got the job and ended up working pretty closely with Bartman. He was my wife's boss and I am so grateful for the way he treated the one that I love. I could NEVER have asked for a better boss for my wife. Understanding, supportive, encouraging, respectful... it gave me such peace knowing that my wife was working at such an amazing school.

Bartman and I also developed a little tradition. His Bible class usually got over at 10:45 and I ate lunch at around 11. Him and I had an unspoken agreement to meet during that time at least twice a week. I truly miss those 15 minutes as well.

Bartlett and I share a heart's desire for reaching the lost and showing kids the love of God. Sometimes in ministry it can feel like you're surrounded by the world but standing all alone on an island, when those times came I always knew that Bartlett would join me on that island. We always seemed to see things the same way and the only disagreement we ever had was over how much worse his Bears are than my Bucs.

It is hard to believe that after only knowing a guy for one year that you could become this attached, but I have and I truly will miss my friend. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he will be "successful" at whatever it is that he does. He has often told me that he feels like his life is just constantly building to something else. Skills and lessons learned one place prepares him for the next stage of his life. I am sure that that is what is happening here as well.

And trust me, if anyone understands why he is leaving it is me. There is just something within you that is always drawing you to your home. He is from North Carolina and I know this must be a very bittersweet feeling to move back home, but it is definitely God's will.

I will miss him, I will miss our time together, but I will forever be connected through this one amazing year of my life. And to end I am putting on some of his "favorite" photos, and I am also ending with his famous catchphrase... "Onward and upward."

Product Placement

2008-05-31T09:36:00.000-07:00

Hello my friends, this is my 27th post I think. That is a lot.

Things have been great lately. My birthday came and went and I am now the big 2-6. I had a great birthday and actually got a lot of cool stuff. My father and brother-in-law got me Mario Kart, and I am pretty addicted. I connect on Nintendo WiFi and play people around the globe. I love beating people from Japan in their own game :) My wife got me Wii Fit, which is awesome. However the first thing it told me when I got on was that I was overweight and it made my character fatter. But it is cool to get a workout while playing video games.

Anyhow, I got other stuff from great people, but what I wanted to talk about was what my friend Mike Hall got me. He bought me Francis Chan's new book called Crazy Love. Check it out at http://www.crazylovebook.com/. If you have read any of my other posts you know that I have mentioned Chan before. He is a Pastor in California and seems to the most sought after speaker at every conference I go to anymore. But for good reason.

His book is challenging the norm of what we have become as the American church. He is asking some great questions. What does it look like to really love God? If we say we love God then shouldn't our actions reflect such an expression? If we truly loved God then wouldn't we thirst and hunger for every waking minute we can spend with Him? Does it ever seem like doing the things of God have become an obligation? And the big kicker... Are we truly in love with God or are we just in love with the benefits of God?

The book discusses the true meaning of what it means to be a lukewarm Christian and to be honest with you I don't think that many of us fall into any category but that one. Do we offer God our leftovers or do we give Him the first of everything we have? Do we worship God in our good times and our bad? If Heaven a was place with every thing we ever wanted... money, food, friends, stuff, happiness, fun, joy... but God was not there, would we still want to go?

If you can't tell, I highly recommend the book. But don't get it if you don't want your toes stepped on. Don't get it if you are satisfied with the status quo. Don't get it if you are happy with lukewarm.

Well, after my birthday dinner at Spaghetti Warehouse (love the place) we watched Prince Caspian, which was amazing. If you don't know anything about it, it is based on the book by CS Lewis and it is full of spiritual metaphors. The main theme of the movie is that you should never do anything without making sure that God is leading you to do it, and if you don't know where God is leading you... you must wait on Him.

So this post seems to have been one big commercial. So remember buy Wii Fit, Mario Kart, Crazy Love and eat at Spaghetti Warehouse and watch Prince Caspian. And don't forget mainly that you need to rely on God, and ask Him to give you a desire to fall in love with God all over again.

Dundies

2008-05-08T12:07:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

It has been a pretty eventful little while for me. Last week we took the 6th to 10th grade students to see the new Expelled movie starring Ben Stein. It was just as incredible as I thought it would be.

It was real interesting to see all of the evolutionists backpedal when confronted with just some very basic questions. It was also interesting to hear these scientists who are supposed to be really smart talk about their theories on the creation of the Earth. One guy thinks that it is more feasible to believe that the Earth was created as a result of tiny crystals, and yet another believes that the Earth was created because it was "seeded" by aliens. (politically correct term for any readers who might be children) Anyhow, it is hard to leave that movie without having a lot more faith than before you walked in.

My wife and I are going to go to the ESPN Zone with some friends this weekend and I am very excited about. And I am going to the Rays game on Saturday and I believe this is a team that is heading in the right direction. They remind me of the Bucs. First new uniforms, next a new stadium, and then the team starts to be a winner. Should be fun.

I am also pretty excited because not only is my birthday coming up (May 20) but there is also a movie coming out that I am ultra excited about. Prince Caspian is going to be released on May 16th. Here is a little semi-trailer/behind the scene vignette of the movie:

I am really excited about this and I have been teaching on it in youth group for the last two weeks and I still have one sermon left in me. For those of you that don't know, C.S. Lewis wrote the Chronicles of Narnia as one giant Biblical metaphor. He made the parallels deliberate but vague enough to where you have to search for them. It is on this journey of understanding that you truly begin to understand the prestige of Narnia.

If you know nothing about the movie, the only thing you need to know is that Aslan represents God and the White Witch represents Satan and then you can watch the movie with your spiritual glasses on and you will be blessed from it.

For my spiritual portion of my blog I want to point out that just like the kids traveling through Narnia were not in their home, we are also not in our home. We are just passing through this place and this place wasn't created for us. Therefore we should not be tempted by the trappings of this world because this world is not our home. We should also be as ready as possible for the day when Jesus comes and takes us home. The main way to do this is to make sure that you don't go home alone. Use this movie as a way to reach out to people who would never go to church with you, but they would go to a movie with you. Just don't go home alone.

I have been reading a lot of youth pastor blogs off of the list on http://www.youthpastor.com/. I like mine the best, but I am biased. I have noticed though that a lot of youth pastors like to give out awards. That is what I am going to do right now.

I am going to hand out the NorthRidge Dundies. (If you don't know what a Dundee is, watch The Office on NBC.)

The Jim Halpert Dundee that represents the person who jokes with everybody in a nonchalantly sarcastic way go to: Pastor Bill Hatley

The Kevin Malone Dundee that represents the person who seems to always find where the food is at goes to: Pastor Michael Bartlett (I am coming for you to get that title)

The Dwight Schrute Dundee that represents the person who can obviously find and devour a werewolf and catch a bat from the ceiling tiles goes to Pastor Harold Butler

The Stanley Hudson Dundee that represents the person who won't take anything from anyone but will handle all situation with his classic, respected sass goes to Pastor Terril Gilley

And finally... the Michael Scott Dundee that represents the person who should go to Spencer gifts and by himself a mug that says World's Best Boss goes to Pastor David Myers

Thank you for attending the Dundees, see you nest year a Chili's near you.

National Day of Prayer

2008-04-30T06:46:00.000-07:00

May 1st is the National Day of Prayer, and we need it more than ever. If at all possible get to some festivities that your area is putting on, or at least get on your knees and spend some time with the God of the Universe on Thursday.

I was going to go to the Mayor's Prayer Breakfast here in Haines City but we are actually going to take the 6th to 10th graders at NCA to see the movie Expelled. We got a private showing at 9 a.m. so I am not going to be able to make it, but we will be letting our kids know about the National Day of Prayer and we will be praying.

Anyhow, I know from looking at Web stats that most of my readership comes from people outside of my church, but I am still asking for prayer. I believe that God is doing some big things in our area (in spite of me) and I believe now our area and our ministry is under extreme attack.

Last week we had an amazing youth service (in spite of me) and God showed up in an immense way, and on Thursday and proceeding days I had to get through some of the worst days of my life, and it is no coincidence.

This morning I went to go pray at one of our local middle schools as I do every Wednesday and things were different. The students are usually herded like cattle to sit on the basketball court until the bell rings for security measures. We are allowed to pray right in front of the entire student body and we typically have 100-200 kids praying with us.

This week I showed up and there were no kids on the basketball court. Apparently last Thursday there was a sever fight that actually led to some arrests. Due to this all of the students are now herded to their classrooms and only allowed out for breakfast. The amazing, dedicated secretary at the front office asked the principal about prayer and she said, "We are just going to have to have a moment of silence over the intercom." The secretary was almost in tears and our prayer meeting consisted of me, three faculty members and two students who didn't care if they got in trouble. I am happy to say that we had the most amazing time of prayer and that the enemy can't keep us down.

Pray, pray, and pray some more. Romans 8 says that we are waiting with anticipation for the day when God reveals His glory through us. Make the most of every day, make the most of every opportunity and happy national day of prayer!

Update
______________________________________________

Our prayer at the Middle School resumed this Wednesday. While i was not like it was two weeks ago, all of the kids are allowed to pray again. The only thing they need to do is get a pass from their teacher. One teacher just went ahead and brought his whole class out. God is good and faithful.

Beaches and Idols

2008-04-11T07:08:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone.

It has been a pretty interesting couple of weeks. I have registered this blog with http://www.bloglines.com/ now. What that means is that you can sign up (for free) and put in http://www.jamesblewett.blogspot.com/ and every time I update my blog (like right now) you will get an email notification. That seems pretty cool to me. Oh, and by the way after 9 months of blogging I just figured out how to allow everybody to comment. So whoever wants to comment can. (but only nice things)

Last week was Spring Break, and it started out pretty bad. My wife got really sick and so I had to stay home with her, but I couldn't stay around her too much so that I wouldn't get sick either. That means that both Heather and I spent the first three days of our vacation completely alone. (it was worse for her though, being sick and all) I had a lot of constructive things I could have done with three days of solitude and no agenda. However, I did nothing at all that might be construed as productive.

The closest I came to constructive was on Monday. I started to surf the web, and decided to put a little fun website together. (after all its 2008 and just about everyone has there own website) Well what started out as just something to do for a few minutes, turned into ten hours on my laptop and I had no idea 10 hours went by. The result of these entranced 10 hours is http://www.jamesblewett.com/. Check it out if you like, but make sure to sign in.

So after a couple of days of boredom, Heather was beginning to feel better and that means that we didn't have to cancel our cruise. We left on Thursday to go to Ft. Lauderdale. My wife selected a very nice hotel, and we strutted the streets and beaches of Ft. Lauderdale, and took a little tour of Miami that night. (never again)

Friday our little cruise was shoving off, and we stood in line for what seemed like forever in order to get on the boat. (I forgot to mention this was a "free cruise" thanks Bill F.) We got on the boat and we realized how they are able to give this cruise away for free. Our room looked like a closet that would be straight from the TV show My Name is Earl. There were also a lot of people on the boat and not a lot of places to go. But not to worry, the morning was coming soon.

On Saturday we woke up (on the very bottom level of the boat) ported in beautiful Nassau, Bahamas. The water was so blue, the atmosphere was so interesting, the scenery was so beautiful, and the culture was so amazing. We had no plan we were just living for the moment, and it was one of the greatest days of my life. I am putting a little slide show on here for you, so that you can fully understand the scope of what I am writing.

I hope you enjoyed the pics. I heard a comic the other day say "Why is when people get back from vacation, they think everyone wants to hear about their vacation?" I can't remember the funny part, but I hope that this is not one of those instances.

Now for the spiritual part of the post. Did you see Idol Gives Back the other night. If you didn't, and you are a Christian, you need to check out Youtube and look up something. In fact, join my group www.youtube.com/group/youtubepastor and I will put in on their for you.

It was emotional to see all of the kids who need our help, it was inspiring to see Americans (and Simon) getting together for such a noble cause to raise money for people who need it. But the greatest part for me was when all of the finalists, joined by an amazing choir, sang Shout to the Lord. It was one of the greatest moments in television history for us Christians, because there was a worship song sung on one of the grandest stages in this country.

I understand that some of our brothers and sisters will find reason to be cynical of such an event. God is going to get His praise however he wants to, and we need not forget that. God is bigger than American Idol, and God is bigger than America. Some will say, "Yeah, but there was no change in any body's life as a result of that song." And some will say, "Yeah, but look at those immoral people singing a song to God."

But I will say, "Look at the incredible opportunity to share Christ with the lost world as a result of God infiltrating pop culture in such an enormous way." Use the opportunity to stimulate spiritual conversations with people that you know. Say something like, "Did you see that last song they sung on Idol Gives Back?" Wait for a response and pray that God will show Himself in that conversation, the same way He showed Himself to millions of people worldwide when He arranged for some of the greatest vocalists in Idol history to sing praise and honor to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords.

Youth Pastor Conference

2008-03-24T09:13:00.000-07:00

Hello everybody. I am writing this post a lot sooner than I usually do, because I have something to write about. I know I said that I would probably do my next post as a vlog, but I changed my mind. Maybe next time.

This past Monday I got to go to Universal Studios Hard Rock Cafe for a Youth Pastors Conference. It is put on by Student Leadership University and a few other sponsors and it is absolutely free. Not only that but after the conference you get a free ticket to go to Islands of Adventure or Universal Studios for the rest of the day. It has always been one of the highlights of the year for me ever since I began youth ministry.

It is always fun to catch up with old friends from college or from the past who are at this conference. I got to see my first youth pastor who led me to Christ 12 years ago, JJ Johnson. I got to see my college pastor who married Heather and I, Jason Waters. And I got to hang out with a lot of other friends of mine as well.

This year I went to the conference not really thinking that I would benefit too much from it. I feel as though I am in a good spot, I don't feel burnt out at all, I don't lack in motivation, and I love our students and even their parents. So I was excited to go, to hang out, to advertise my website http://www.youthtalksnow.com/ and to enjoy a great time inside of the park. What I got though, was so much more than I ever could have expected.

The key not speaker for this event is a man by the name of Francis ChanIf you have not heard of Francis Chan yet... you will. He is the most amazing speaker I have ever heard in my life, and it is for one reason only; he is genuine. This man has such a heart for God that it makes you want to be a better Christ follower just to be around him.

In listening to Chan speak I got to thinking that maybe a problem I am having is that I am "under-spiritualizing" things. You can tell from Francis that he has a close relationship with God and that relationship is what is guiding every decision he makes. He often asks this question, "If you were left alone on an island with no preconceived notions and a Bible, do you think that your church would look like our church does now?" The answer is an emphatic NO. We have so changed what the Bible says a church is supposed to look like into what Americans would like a church to look like.

He said at his church they decided that if they are to love their neighbors as themselves then they should give as much to their neighbors as they give to themselves. So 50% of their overall budget goes to do local and overseas mission work that will help their neighbors. This is a man that truly follows after God.

Later on in the day we heard from John ElderidgeThis man said some totally un-Baptist things. This man said things that would cause quite a stir in most of my circles. This man said some things that would be chalked up as heresy by some people in Christianity. This man said that he hears from God.

He said that the Bible is full of examples of people who were able to hear from God, and we call them exceptions "Yeah but that was the Old Testament." "Yeah but that was a long time ago." and this man says don't you think that if God put all of those people in the Bible that He would want them to serve as examples and not as exceptions.

He gave story after story of times when he heard God speak to him and the confirmation that came through the circumstances. He said one time he was going to take his family on a vacation to a dude ranch and he asked God if it was okay. God said no. Elderidge was disappointed but listened, and that summer during the week they were going to go on this trip there was a massive wildfire that spread through and destroyed the dude ranch.

I believe the sincerity of this man, and I hope that he is right, because wouldn't it be awesome to have that kind of relationship with God.

Finally we heard from probably my favorite preacher around right now. I tivo his messages and have seen him speak on TV on quite a few occasions. His name is Ed Young and he is known as the creative Pastor.

He talked about the big elephant in the room that Pastors would never talk about. He said the elephant was (and then he made an elephant noise) betrayal! That at some point in every Pastor's life they will be betrayed by someone. And usually it is someone who is close to you. He said it is like Judas, they get close enough to kiss you, so they're close enough to dis you.

But he said there are positive aspects to being betrayed by someone. And then he told us a true story.

When they were in the building process for Fellowship Church they wanted to make a 4300 seat auditorium but they could only afford to make it a 2000 seat auditorium. Then a man came through and said that he was going to give them millions to build the church they wanted. He showed them papers that would prove that the money had been wired over to the church's account.

Long story very short, after months into this building project they found out the man had lied and had made up all the documents and that there wasn't millions of dollars, there was nothing. Obviously Ed Young was hurt and was betrayed, but he said that if it weren't for this man betraying him that they wouldn't have had the faith to build the 4300 seat auditorium that they wanted to in the first place. Absolutely amazing!

Anyhow, I left this conference not even the least bit excited to go to Islands of Adventure, but I was very excited to get back to my people and do ministry. I left with a vow that our youth ministry was going to be a spiritual one, and that I was going to hold our kids to a much higher standard than I am now, and I am convinced that they will thank me for it one day.

God bless you all, and spend some time today thanking God for all of the many blessings that He has given us.

Facing the Giants

2008-03-14T07:59:00.001-07:00

Hello faithful blog readers. I wish there was a way that I could inform you when my blog has been update, but I don't know how to do that. Anyhow I have a web cam now thanks to my father-in-law and I think that sometime soon I am just going to put on a vlog (video log) and not type a word. That would shake things up a little bit.

Things have been alright lately. Except for a couple of things. Our good friends Patrick Peterson and Bobby Colletti have left the beautiful, sunny splendor of Florida to live with some family in New York. We truly miss them and it has been a difficult time for some of us. We made this video before they left to honor their memory. Enjoy.

Besides them leaving, I suppose everything has been pretty ordinary. We have had some great success with our evangelism explosion ministry that I referred to in my last post. A good percentage of our church have been participating in this endeavor and it has been really exciting to intentionally carry out the Great Commission.

I went to the Tigers/Braves game yesterday and got a really bad sunburn. The game ended in a tie too, which is really bad. I also got the privilege last weekend to lead a Bible study for a youth group that I was formerly youth pastor of. There are very few things in life more rewarding than to see young men that you poured your life into still walking with Christ years after you have been away from them. It was a very special night for me.

My wife and I have become addicted to guitar hero and now the American Idol karaoke game. (which I am really bad at) People just let us borrow there stuff and they leave it at our house and then I play until I fall asleep with a guitar or a mike in my hand.

I need to end with something of Biblical relevance. I spoke with the students on Wednesday night briefly of the story of David and Goliath, but we looked at it a little differently than usual. We used http://www.thebricktestament.com/ this is the closing slide from the story.

In this familiar story we know that the small David overcame, beat, and decapitated (see above) the giant Goliath. But the part that we easily forget is that God is the one that made that happen. God is the one who beat Goliath, not David. And the other part that we fail to forget is that God has not changed. The same God that used small David to beat huge Goliath is the same God who is watching over your life. This is the same God who knows the number of hairs that are on your head. This is same God that knit you together in your mother's womb. This is the same God who will never leave you or forsake you.

When you come up against giants in this world remember this story and remember that God is always with wherever you go and know matter what you're up against.

Evangelism Explosion

2008-02-26T20:17:00.000-08:00

I recently attended an Evangelism Explosion training clinic as all of you who attend my church know. I had the privilege of spending a week in Tampa being trained in how to train others in sharing their faith.

I cannot believe how much I learned, not to mention how fired up I got to share my faith. I realize now, that I have been a very selfish person. I am selfish in the fact that I have not been sharing the gift of eternal life with people I come in contact with, even though I had someone share with me.

It is easy as a Pastor to think that I am doing enough. It is easy to have the mindset that the congregation is supposed to "Go" and that I am supposed to "Stay" because I am going to reach those who come to my church who happen to be lost. This should not be the case. This should be the exact opposite, because as leaders we are to set the example to those who look up to us.

I wonder sometimes if we don't spend entirely too much time being "churchy" and not enough time being "Christ followers." If we were truly Christ followers we would have the heart and compassion for the lost that would not allow us to even sleep without a heavy heart and burden for people all around us who have no relationship with Christ and thus no hope of eternal life.

Watch this video that will help to illustrate this point.

As you can see, we have a long way to go in order to have a true heart for the lost. I hope that we can all do everything we can to "make disciples of every nation." We must stay in a prayerful, personal relationship with God and ask Him to send us the relationships He wants us to have influence over.

I must say that evangelism as we know it is not the way we make it out to be. It is not about "selling" anything to anyone, and if that's what it is to you then you must reevaluate your motives. Evangelism is nothing more than being prepared and obedient to the "divine appointments" that are in our lives. If we are involved with divine appointments, it will make no difference whether they receive Christ or not, because you will know that your seed has been properly planted and God will send the witness later that will reap the benefits of that.

Please be intentional in your evangelism and develop relationships that God would have for you, but not because you are trying to sell someone, but because you are looking at things through the same compassionate eyes that Jesus does.

Struggling through writer's block.

2008-02-07T10:15:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone... I must admit... I have writer's block. It is one week into February and I have not posted in a couple of weeks and I know that all of my fans ar eagerly awaiting my next post. I just don't know what to write.

My house in South Carolina sold.
That is pretty exciting. We have been trying to sell that house since October 2005. The market is really bad there, worse even than in Florida, so it is a huge blessing to have that off our backs.

Our church rebuilding is going really well, here is a little video I put together.

They obviously have a long way to go, but the progress is pretty amazing. Other than that life has been pretty ordinary. I am teaching the tenth grade Bible class which is a lot of fun. In March I am marrying my cousin. Seriously, I am marrying my cousin. Not like they do in South Carolina, I am performing the wedding of my cousin to another man that she is in no way related to. That will be fun.

I know I need some pearls of wisdom to impart on all of my readers, but I just don't know what it is.

I will let you know what we have been learning in youth group. For the last four weeks we have been doing a series on Deal or No Deal. We had someone come out as Howie and we played the game (we used the web version on www.pacdudegames.com) and then we taught on things that some people wonder, "What's the big deal?"

First we looked at "What's the big deal about God." We systematically looked at reasons for and against the existence of Creator God. The students seemed to enjoy when I took a hammer and smashed a remote control to pieces in an attempt to disprove the Big Bang Theory.

The next week we looked at "What's the Big Deal about Jesus." Once again we sytematically looked at reasons for and against the existence of Jesus. The most compelling point to me was that no one would be willing to die for a lie. If Jesus wasn't who He said He was then the disciples would have known it. If the disciples knew that Jesus was a fake then all of them would not have died horrific martyrs deaths for something they knew wasn't true. (John died of natural causes but he too was tortured for his beliefs)

After that we looked at "What's the Big Deal about Christianity." and we looked at the main doctrine that we believe as the Christian church which consists of the doctrine of God, Jesus, Man, Trinity, Salvation and the Church. Everything else is negotiable, for instance if you believe that you should baptize by sprinkling that is your opinion but we can still call you Christian and we can still fellowship together. But if you believe that there are more than one way to Heaven, then Jesus died for nothing and you are not following Christian beliefs, because Christian doctrine says the only way to Heaven is throught faith in Jesus Christ.

Two days ago we finished up the series by looking at "What's the Big Deal with World Religion." It was an informative message that looked at the basics of Islam, Hindusim, Buddhism, Mormonism, and Jehovah Witnesses. We then took what they believe and matched it up with what we believe. We decided that Christianity must be the real deal for a few reasons... first is grace. To live your life for works is a life of hopeless despair, because how will you ever know if your good works is good enough to get you to Heaven. (or Nirvana) Lastly, we believe that Christianity is the real deal because Jesus is alive! The "gods" of the other main religions are dead and their bodies are there in a tomb or a grave, but Jesus' tomb is empty! Because He is who He said He is. Because He did what said He would do... He rose from the grave!

To end every week I made this point: If someone gave you a Ferrari for $5 what would you do? Well, after you peed your pants, and then borrowed five dollars from your parents, you would call up everyone you knew and tell them about it. Why? Because you got such a good deal. The Christian life is the same way, we got what we did not deserve and it is a GREAT DEAL, so go and tell someone about the great deal that you got and let them know that the deal is available for them too.

How's that for writer's block?

The Joy of the Lord

2008-01-21T06:17:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone, I am so sorry that it has been so long since my last post. I would like to have a way to let everyone know who is interested when I make a new posting. So if you would like to know when this blog has been updated simply send me an email to jamesblewett@hotmail.com and when I put on a new post I will send you one email that says New Post with a link to this site. Nothing else. That should help you out.

I want to start out this post in a way that will turn off a lot of people. I want to talk about politics. Our Florida primaries are coming up on January 29th and it is time to put a lot of consideration into who you will be supporting. To wait until next year to vote on the presidential election will be too late since your candidates will already be chosen for you.

I will not tell you who to vote for, but I will tell you who I would vote for. I was reading a book called Spiritual Leadership by Henry Blackaby and in it was a section on what truly separates a spiritual leader from a secular one. The one thing that people like Billy Graham and D.L.Moody and the late D. James Kennedy had in common was that they totally sold out to God. It seems so simple and yet it is so hard. It has nothing to do with education or wealth or knowledge, only total commitment to the maker of the universe.

The author mentioned a specific time when he had a conversation with a very "successful" Pastor from Arkansas who said that he was feeling called to leave the ministry to make a difference in this world through politics. Mike Huckabee left everything he knew to be lieutenant governor and then ultimately governor of Arkansas, and is now in the running to be the next President of the United States.

I have been debated and insulted on this topic by a lot of "very brave" online users who believe that the issues and not religion should be the deciding factor in who to vote for. My answer is the same to you on that topic as it was to my online debaters: a man's values and character will let me know if he will support the issues the way that I would like for them to be supported. In other words, the most important issues to me are the millions of babies legally murdered each year through abortions, the sanctity of marriage between one man and one woman, and if we elect a president with the moral integrity of the Bible to guide his steps and make his decisions then this country will be a lot better place in four years than it is right now.

I will stop now and get off my soap box, but at least give some thought to what you have just read and remember that Chuck supports Huck.On to a more lighter topic... do you watch American Gladiators? The show that I used to love when I was a kid has made a comeback. I am pretty certain that it would not have been made if it were not for the writers strike, but however it got here, it is AWESOME and I hope it stays. Watch it tonight on NBC and watch full episodes at http://www.nbc.com/.

Anyhow, I am going to tell you what every other youth pastor who has a blog is writing about who watched Gladiators last Monday night, youth pastors rock! Let me explain.

The two contestants last week were a guy who had a rough upbringing but turned his life around and is now teaching Algebra in the very school he was kicked out of, and a man nicknamed the Hebrew Hammer who is a Hurricane survivor who now is a shark fisherman. Unfortunately the Hebrew Hammer got injured on the very first game when he got tackled hard and broke his leg. His injury replacement was none other than Andy Konigsmark... a youth pastor.

This dude was ripped and guess what else... he was good... he finished with the fastest time in the eliminator of any other guy and he had fun the whole way through. I have spoken with this guy through email since last Monday and he seems to be a really cool guy. He has been a model in the past and was a youth pastor and is still in school to finish his ministry degree, but he moved to California to be stand-up comedian on the side.

When he was first introduced as a youth pastor I had mixed emotions, my first emotion was excitement that there was a youth pastor as cool as I am. The second emotion was fear, because I was afraid he was going to embarrass himself. You see, Gladiators pick contestant that fit into some sort of stereotypical niche. They have had the NYC firefighter, the soldier, the surfer, the rodeo girl, the fitness model, etc. and I was afraid that when they said "Gladiators ready?" that he would answer with a big "Hallelujah!" and set us Christians back a few years in the relevancy department. But what I liked about Andy was that he showed the world that Christians are allowed to have fun, Christians don't have to be a bunch of stiffs, and Christians can whoop your butt on the eliminator.

I am reminded of the scripture in Nehemiah that says "Do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength." And this is what Andy showed America. So let this be a lesson to you that we can worship God with all that we are and still have fun doing it. We don't have to retreat from the world and lock ourselves in closets but we can be in the world and not of it, and others will benefit from it.

Let the joy of the Lord be your strength.

PS If you want to leave Andy a message or check out his stand up you can go to http://www.myspace.com/Andykonigsmark.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-04T06:57:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

I had quite an eventful time since the last time I posted. Heather's sister Destiny came and stayed with us for a while and since we live so close to Orlando there was only one thing to do... go to Disney World. I had never been to Disney with kids before, but let me tell you, it is a lot more fun when there is a little girl getting excited at It's a Small World. So that was a lot of fun.

That was Christmas Eve Eve. Then we had a good time with family and friends in Tampa the next two days. I was a good boy this year too, so Santa came to visit. Santa bought me a Nintendo Wii!!! It is a lot of fun to play and it is something that my wife and I can enjoy together. In fact, we are going to a Wii Party tonight. With grown adults :) I am very happy that I am not the only grown person addicted to playing the Wii. Anyhow, here is my picture of excitement after I found out what Santa brought.

It looks like my neck is broken. Anyway, Santa also came for my wife and brought her a new digital camera, so there should be a lot more photos in posts to come.

After Christmas we had the chance to just take it easy. I hope we are not the only ones that got to enjoy a relaxing Christmas break. We have been so used to traveling over the holidays from South Carolina to Tampa and back, that we had forgotten just how enjoyable the holidays could be. Now I only have a 45 minute drive to see my family instead of a 7 hour drive, which also means I get to sleep in my own bed. (and now it means also that I get to play my own Wii!)

We didn't do a lot to celebrate the New Year. We were invited over to our incredible Pastor's house and ate tacos (and played with their Nintendo Wii) but our party ended early and my wife and I went back home. I will give you two guesses what we did when we got back home... we played Nintendo Wii. We turned it off five minutes before the ball dropped (it is really sad to see Dick Clark these days) and said "Happy New Year!" and then went back to our game.

Since I have been accused of being a long-winded blogger, I will get to my main point. 2007 was a year of incredible highs and incredible lows for me and Heather. Our year started out terrible and just continued to get worse. Then came June. June was when I got voted in to be Student Pastor at the greatest church in the solar system. We had adjustment periods, we had rained out concerts, we even had a church fire... but in the last six months of 2007 I have been more happy and full of joy than I ever have been in my life... because I am at a place where God is moving!

I say all that to say this... turn the page... forget the past year... learn from the mistakes, give praise to God for the accomplishments and then... move on. Read these verses Phil. 3:13b-14 "...But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

To me this is the ultimate New Year's verse. Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead. There is no better time than January to do that. I am so excited about what God is going to do in 2008 that I can hardly stand it! It will be a year like no other, and it will be a year where I will press on toward the goal to win the prize. Won't you join me in that?

The Greatest Gift

2007-12-20T07:17:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas one and all!!! This will most likely be my last post of the year, and so Happy New Year to you to.

I have had a very eventful couple of weeks since I last posted. The most memorable part of it all for me was... Michael Spurlock!!! If you are not from Tampa or at least central Florida then you may not know what I am talking about, but I will enlighten you.

On Thanksgiving I had a relative (I think she is technically my Stepcousin??) offer me and my wife tickets to this past Sunday's Tampa Bay Buccaneer game against the Atlanta Falcons. This was a huge game because if we won then we clinched the division, which is huge considering the year of injuries and adversity that the team had.

My wife and I were to leave directly after church (after the last Amen) and make the hour drive to the game. On the way my stepcousin called and said she broke her toe could we find someone to take her spot. (no problem) My good friend Joseph met us at the place we were parking and my stepcousin gave us the tickets and dropped us off in front of the stadium.

The whole way to the stadium she kept on saying "I know today is going to be the day that the Bucs return their first kickof for a touchdown and I am going to miss it."

Let me fill you in if you don't know what that means. The Bucs are officially in there 32nd year of existence. They had NEVER returned a kickoff for a touchdown... NEVER. Ever since I was a little kid, every game I have ever watched the announcer would point this out. It was a huge thing for Tampa. I met the special teams coach Rich Basachia (not spelled right) at PF Changs last year and I know that everywhere he goes thats all anyone says to him "When we getting our kickoff touchdown?"

Well, the Falcons made a field goal and was kicking it off to us for the first time in the game. This was officially the 1,865th kickoff in Bucs history. 1,865!!!! And the second he kicked it I stood up and said "This is it." I just knew it. Michael Spurlock (former quartback at Ole Miss) took the kick, went to the center of the field and saw congestion and cut it out to his right... wide open. He was running straight toward us, and we were only four rows from the field, and the end zone he was running to... four rows! I have never screamed so loud in all my life, and I have never heard Tampa Bay fans get so crazy. He scored the touchdown!

Michael Spurlock was not on our team four weeks ago, and now he is being given the key to the city. It was the most amazing thing I have ever witnessed, and I almost have my wife convinced to name our first kid... Spurlock. Oh, and as for my stepcousin... she won't answer my phone calls. I hope to see her at Christmas and thank her, but I can imagine that after going to every game for ten years or so, that she is probably a little bit bitter.

That was great and amazing, but it is not the only thing in the world. I want you all to know that in this season when we all want and want and want; and we all buy and buy and buy; that Christmas is more than we are making it. It was an amazing gift to be able to witness Tampa Bay history but it pales in comparsion to the gift that this season represents.

I want all of my faithful blog readers to know that Christmas is not about presents and trees and parties. I want you to know that Christmas isn't even about the baby in the manger. That's right, it's NOT about the baby in the manger. You see, that baby grew up, and that man is my Savior and my God! For some there is a huge disconnect from Christmas to Easter, but I want you to know that Christmas is about the MAN who gave His life for you and for me on the cross at Calvary. There is no greater gift.

This Christmas in the midst of your gift exchanges and Christmas parties, take some time out and sing some worship songs to your savior; take some time out and lock yourself in a closet and pray a prayer of thanksgiving for the God who has saved your life.

Don't make Christmas about yourself, make it about your Savior!

Just catching up

2007-12-11T07:03:00.000-08:00

Well I have noticed that it has been a while since I posted and I was going through withdrawals. Just a little update on my last post. Golden Compass did lead the box office in its first week out, but was still a huge disappointment. It grossed $25.8 million dollars on its first weekend, but had virtually no competition for its release date. The number is also less than half of what Chronicles of Narnia did on its first weekend, and considering it cost $180 million dollars to make, I would hope that New Line Cinema would not make a movie based on the next two books in Philip Pullman's blasphemous trilogy.

I don't really have a theme to my post today, but I have a lot of things to relay to you. It has been very, very busy since I last posted and a lot of great things have taken place that I need to share with my public.

First of all, I went to South Carolina a few weeks ago and ran into some old friends from when I lived there. One of those friends was Jeremy Lucas who worked with me at St. George Baptist Church in Orangeburg, SC. He was the music pastor and I was the youth pastor. We worked very well together and he became a very close friend.

Anyhow, we offered for him to come and stay with us for a visit, and he came down the very next week. While he was here, he loved it so much that he found a job and moved into an apartment across the street from me. So I am very excited to have my good friend Jeremy back in my life again. So if you see this man that I am sword fighting with...make him feel welcome.

On November 30th we took a group of students to Lake Aurora Christian Retreat Center for a Fall Retreat. The name of the retreat was One Heart. My prayer for the weekend was that our youth group would grow together in unity so much that they would develop one heart. I believe that is was a huge success. On our last night I had them do something called an "affirmation circle." Basically the idea is that in our world we spend so much time focusing on the negative of people that we rarely say anything nice to them. So everybody at the retreat at one point in time had to sit in the middle of a circle and everybody in the circle had say something positive about them. It was such a great time, that even though the students were exhausted, we did the circle for three and a half hour and there was not one complaint. It was a very emotional and uplifting time for all of us.

We got back from that last Sunday, and last Monday I got back in the car and went to our staff retreat. The six pastors of NorthRidge all spent three days together at a condo in Daytona Beach. We ate a lot (restaurant called Aunt Catfish's mmmmm!), watched some football (the Ravens should have won!) had some fun, but spent most of our time working. We each had to teach about a different part of 2 Peter 1:5-7 and that was an incredible time of personal growth for me. We also went over goals for the upcoming year. I am very pleased at the direction we are going as a church, and our main goal for next year is to "Grow." It is pretty simple but the basic idea is to take our congregation from surface level knowledge to a deep rooted love and understanding of God's word. We are all going to be challenged to go through the Bible in a year and that will be amazing. I am also getting trained to be an E.E. trainer and we will be starting Evangelism Explosion in early 2008, and that will grow the church in their evangelism. And of course we are moving to two service in January, with a slightly different style of worship which will be a part of growing us numerically as well. 2008 will be an incredible year!

Finally, I wanted to share with you what I did the day after I got back from our staff retreat. I had the privilege of leading chapel at a place called H.E.A.R.T. Missionary Training Institute. www.heartmissionarytraining.com It is down a long dirt road behind Warner Southern College. This is a training ground for students who want to learn to be a missionary in a third world country. It is a three month program that they are going through. For the first month they are cut off from the outside world except for mail they receive once a week. They are forbidden electricity, running water, stoves, microwaves, etc. The site is filled with amenities that are found in a third world country. Such as the shower is a water pump pumped into a shed with a solar panel of sorts attached to it. The water goes into a five gallon bucket that has holes stabbed into it. After their one month of adjustment, they sit in a classroom for one month and learn things such as "appropriate technology." Things like how to get water to a village that has no water, how to weave clothes, and how to grow your food. And then in the last month the students become the teachers, and they have to prove that they have learned enough to go overseas by showing projects and doing the daily duties that the instructor would normally do.

I met a lot of students who have a heart for going to places of the world that have not heard the Gospel. I felt very honored to have been a very small part of their lives, and I will be excited to get to Heaven and learn just how many people they reached with the message because of the H.E.A.R.T. Missionary Training Institute. Please keep them in prayer.

Do Not See Golden Compass!

2007-11-27T09:59:00.001-08:00

I am writing this post out of my normal routine of blog because I have been made aware of something that I need to bring to the attention of all who read.

First I have a confession to make. I was making some changes to my layout (got bored of the old one... hope you like it) and in checking to see how my changes were coming out I accidently became the 1000th viewer. So congratulations to the 1000th viewer... ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now onto my main goal today. Those of you who usually read my blog know that I have a few themes, I like to have fun, I like to give you Biblical truths, I like to poke fun at Mr. Bartlett. But today I have to use my platform to speak out against something that is damaging to the gospel of Jesus and all of the truths that this very country was founded on.

There is a movie coming out on December 7th called The Golden Compass and it should not be viewed by any person with any moral fiber. I usually wouldn't speak out against anything like this, but usually movie makers aren't trying to trick people like they are in this one. For instance, if a movie is coming out with a lot of violence and/or sex and it is not good for children it is pretty obvious by the previews. The reason I am speaking out against this movie is because they make it seem like a fun, adventerous ride for the whole family. But the moral implications of this movie have been hidden from everyone

It looks on the preview like a movie that anyone who likes Chronicles of Narnia would enjoy, but it was made in direct opposition to Chronicles of Narnia. Listen to what the author of the book Philip Pullman says about C.S. Lewis' masterpiece "I hate the Narnia books, and I hate them with a deep and bitter passion," he told one interviewer, "with their view of childhood as a golden age from which sexuality and adulthood are a falling-away."

Not only does he hate C.S. Lewis, but he is not that fond of Christians in general. He told the U.K.'s Daily Telegraph about his religious viewpoints, "Atheism suggests a degree of certainty that I'm not quite willing to accede. I suppose technically, you'd have to put me down as an agnostic. But if there is a God, and he is as the Christians describe him, then he deserves to be put down and rebelled against. As you look back over the history of the Christian church, it's a record of terrible infamy and cruelty and persecution and tyranny. How they have the bloody nerve to go on Thought for the Day and tell us all to be good when, given the slightest chance, they'd be hanging the rest of us and flogging the homosexuals and persecuting the witches."

The Golden Compass begins with a precocious 12-year-old girl named Lyra (similar to Lucy) clambering into a wardrobe to avoid detection ... a choice that unwittingly launches her into a universe-altering adventure. (Sound familiar?) Lurking in the wardrobe, she hears her uncle, an iconoclastic explorer named Lord Asriel, describe a mysterious substance called Dust to a group of scholars.

Several events then occur almost simultaneously: Lyra is given a truth-telling device called an alethiometer (the golden compass) and told to keep it secret; she begins to hear rumors of children disappearing without a trace; and she's whisked into the care of a glamorous but ruthless agent of the church named Mrs. Coulter. Lyra soon discovers that the church is also desperate to learn about Dust—a substance they believe is somehow connected to original sin—and that Mrs. Coulter is spearheading chilling experiments on children in her pursuit of "truth." Specifically, she's separating children from their dæmons (pronounced demon), animal spirits that physically embody each person's soul and accompany them throughout life.

Listen to a quote from one of the witches in the movie "There are churches there, believe me, that cut their children too, as the people of Bolvangar did—not in the same way, but just as horribly. They cut their sexual organs, yes, both boys and girls; they cut them with knives so that they shan't feel. That is what the church does, and every church is the same: control, destroy, obliterate every good feeling." Without exception, Pullman characterizes churches and anyone connected to them as agents of wickedness, oppression, torture, murder and malevolence.

It's a fair question for those curious about this story to ask what it is teaching. At the most basic level, His Dark Materials (The trilogy of which Golden Compass is the first book) is an attempted refutation of the Christian faith: "The Christian religion is a very powerful and convincing mistake, that's all," says an influential character named Mary Malone, who then goes on to relate her own "testimony" of why she abandoned her calling as a nun.

As to what his books are about, the author himself said, "My books are about killing God." But despite a great deal of publicity on this subject, the series never addresses the issue of God's existence with any real certainty. There is a character who masquerades as God, known as the Authority. But we discover he was simply the first being to evolve—and there's definitely a heavy emphasis on evolution in this story—out of Dust into conscious existence.

As to whether or not a real Creator is responsible for everything, however, another character says simply, "There may have been a creator, or there may not: We don't know." Ultimately, then, the story remains agnostic about God's existence. And with regard to death and the afterlife, Pullman first imagines a dark underworld where all the dead go, regardless of their actions or beliefs. The dead are then released by Lyra, and their molecules are dispersed throughout the world.

To end this post Beliefnet's Rod Dreher writes that he intends to protect his children from Pullman's poisonous influence. "One expects that religious parents will keep their children away from the [Golden Compass] film. 'But why?' the question arises from liberals. 'What are you afraid of?' My children losing God, especially before they have a firm hold on Him, that's what. At some point they will question the existence of God. I did. It's normal to do so. I want more than anything else I want for my children, even their own happiness in this life, for them to believe in God, who is their salvation. If you believe in God, and that the loss of God is the worst thing that can happen to a person, then you would sooner give your child a rattlesnake to play with than expose him or her at an early age to the work of a man who openly says he wishes to destroy God in the minds of his audience."

Let's remember that and openly tell anyone who will listen not to see The Golden Compass.

Post written from article by Adam R. Holz on http://www.pluggedinonline.com/

Nothing is impossible with God!

2007-11-16T07:49:00.000-08:00

Alright my friends well this is a great day in blogville. It is almost Thanksgiving, and everyone is in a good mood and there is a lot of leisure time coming for me and my wife. I hope you all are not getting bogged down with the stress of the holidays, but thanking God for each day that you have breath.

It is almost time for another milestone. It took us from August 3rd to September 28th to get to 500 and now it is time for our 1000th PAGE VIEW! So if you are the 1000th visitor to our site we want to know. Make sure you email me at jblewett@northridgehc.com if you the tracker at the top of the screen right now says 1000.

Also our contest winner from last week was none other than Debbie Schumacher. She figured out that the mistake on our website was that my picture was Matt Damon's and my colleagues was Ben Affleck. That is a mistake because obviously we are better looking than them. So congratulations to Debbie and in honor of her, our poll question is who is your favorite Debbie and make sure that you all vote for the incomparable Debbie Schumacher.

On to some more fun stuff. Last Friday night was our 6th to 10th Grade dance at NorthRidge Christian Academy. It was a sock hop and all of the students dressed up in their 50's outfits. The star of the show though was none other than our fearless leader and good friend of James' Blog Mr. Michael Bartlett.

He showed an enormous amount of dedication to his school and to his students when he dressed up as a nerd. He walked around in a hilarious impersonation of someone like Mr. McFly in the first Back to the Future. I could not let that go without sharing it with all of my faithful readers. So here it is...

This is priceless! After that he changed into an old man looking for his son. (His son was the nerd who was his previous personality) but then to top off the night The Bartman topped himself, and came out to an enormous ovation as... The King! He sang a couple of songs and looked incredible, here is the proof...

It was definitely one of the best events I have been to in a long, long time. A lot of people put a lot of hard work in and it paid off in an incredible way. And great job Elvis!

Onto the serious part of my post. We have recently watched Facing the Giants in youth group and if you haven't seen it then you must. But one of the main messages in the movie was that there is nothing impossible with God... NOTHING!

This past week I got the chance to go to Dundee Ridge Middle School (This is a public school) and I spoke at the Great American Teach In (Career Day) and I got to talk to 5 classes that totaled 300 7th graders and we had an amazing time. They learned about life as a youth pastor. They learned about why I am a youth pastor as God transformed the life of me and my family when I was at my lowest point. And they all left class knowing that God has a plan for their life, a purpose for their life and a promise on their life that He will never leave them or forsake them.

Public school!!! Public School!!! I ask you what is impossible with God... nothing!

I am so very grateful for the time that I got to spend at the school and I am eager to see what else God plans on doing through the teenagers of Haines City. Follow Him, dream big, and remember that nothing is impossible with God.

I am going to end with a video that I played to the kids as an ice breaker, and have since put it on youtube and godtube to advertise my website. Hope you enjoy it.

AAA

2007-11-09T08:43:00.000-08:00

Well everyone it has been a long time since I have posted on my blog. I am very sorry for that, but I know that you are all in utter anticipation of this post.

I am currently sitting in 10th grade Bible class at NorthRidge Christian Academy and all the students are taking a quiz. It is mainly on the Beatitudes and it is so quiet that every stroke of my keyboard sounds incredibly loud. One kid keeps looking at me whenever I look up and it makes me think he is cheating... I hope he's not, but I will let you know at the end of this post if I caught him or not.

I have started another contest for all of my faithful bloggers. On our website, http://www.northridgehc.com/ I have made an obvious blunder. There is something that is obviously inaccurate on the site. You do not have to be an attender of NorthRidge to figure it out. Whoever is first to email me with the "mistake" I made will be enshrined into the James' Blog Hall of Fame in my next post... good luck and God speed.

I will let you know that the kid was not cheating. Judging by the answers on his quiz though, he probably should have :) Well I have looked at some of my old postings and they are really lacking if they do not have a picture on them, so here is a pic...

This picture has absolutely nothing to do with anything that I am writing about, I just think it's really funny.

So onto the serious portion. (By the way I got constructive criticism from one of my coworkers that my posts are too long so I am attempting to make it shorter.

I attended the annual Youth for Christ banquet last night (with Sharon and Seaton Hodges) and I learned a few things that I want to share with you. The Polk County branch of Youth for Christ is really big on reaching the less privileged.

They brought up a few students that were either from a detention center, a halfway house or just a neighborhood meeting for underprivileged. These students gave testimonies as to what God is doing in their lives. It is very amazing to hear stories of transformation and I am looking forward to partnering with Youth for Christ to see what amazing things God will do.

To keep this shorter than usual I must skip to my main point. One of the speakers got up to give a report of the past year. He gave us friendly reminder that when you see a sticker on someone's car that says AAA to remember to pray for them. To pray specifically for the Abused, the Abandoned and the Arrested. These are the people that Youth for Christ tries to reach and these are people that Jesus would have reached if He were here right now too.

So remember when you see the AAA stickers on the back of the car to pray for the Abused, the Abandoned, and the Arrested.

Truth

2007-10-18T09:39:00.001-07:00

Hello my friends out there in blogville. I know that most of you are going through withdrawals because I have not posted in two weeks. I think that now everyone will understand how much really appreciate this blog. The old saying is that absence makes the heart grow fonder so now I am sure that you all are extra fond of this blog.

Actually I just wasn't inspired with anything last week to bring to you and I know that my blog readers expect nothing less than excellence and so I took a week off to prepare again for excellence.

I have a couple of updates for you. First of all, most of you will remember that about 4 0r 5 weeks ago I submitted a post that had my fellow staff member and my good friend (and my wife's boss :)) Mr. Bartlett's picture and I put it on there just to poke some fun at my pal. In case you don't remember here is what the picture looked like:

For some reason Bartlett didn't take to well to this picture, and he must not have liked it posted on the World Wide Web for all of my faithful fans out there to read. So Bartlett did something that deserves my respect... he sent me another picture. Here it is:

I made it a little bit smaller, because well I need to guard my friend against getting an ego. In other words I made his head smaller to keep him from getting big headed. :) But I will be honest with you... I like the first pic better. It makes me giggle. So that is this weeks survey question... which Bartlett do you like better: Big Headed or Small Headed.

Which brings me to my next point. I got some of you to fall for the oldest trick in the Christian joke book. Last week's survey asked how many of each kind of animal did Moses take on the ark. 4 people said 2, 1 person said 4, and 3 people said zero... and the answer is ZERO! Because Moses didn't take any animals on the ark, it was Noah so congratulations you three and for the other five... better luck next time... and for the other 199 people that viewed my blog since the survey was posted... answer the stinking questions!

Okay, one more order of business, and I know it is what you have all been waiting for... my Derrick Brooks picture. Without any further ado here it is:

Can you tell how incredibly nervous I was? I cannot believe that I was that close to the greatest football player in Buccaneer history! It was quite a night! In the picture with me is (from left to right, top to bottom) Doc Murphy, foot doctor and chaplain for the Haines City High football team; his wife, chaplain for the cheerleaders; my wife, the most beautiful woman God ever created; me; Coach Sam Wyche; and Mr. Derrick Brooks.

Now onto the meat of this post. I have been teaching the students at NRC the past few weeks something that I think I want to share with all of you, my faithful blog readers. I have been teaching a series called Lessons From the Master. The premise of the message is to sum up all of Jesus' teachings into four easy to remember lessons. I have been coming from the angle of if Jesus were physically standing in front of you and could only tell you four things what would they be? Of course, this is only speculation, but after much prayer and preparation I was ready to teach this series and would feel ready to give an account for my teachings.

So the first week was pretty simple it was to Love God. And we talked about loving God as your Abba Father. In other words to love Him as your daddy who can protect you from life's hurts. The second week we learned to Love Others and we looked a little more deeply at what love really is. We talked about the three different Greek words for love; Eros- physical love, Phileo- brotherly love and Agape- unconditional love. And when the Bible says to love your neighbor as yourself it means to love EVERYONE UNCONDITIONALLY! Wow! That is tough.

But last night's message was the most difficult for me because it is So Hard. Last night's message was to Love Truth. We looked very closely at the world's truth and at God's truth. The world believes that right and wrong is based on how you feel and the circumstances you are in and God's truth is absolute.

Let me give you an example that will rock your world. Imagine a woman is living on the streets with her daughter and neither one of them has eaten in three days. The mother decides to steal an apple to feed her daughter... is it still wrong to steal?

The answer is yes and will always be yes. Just because the truth is difficult doesn't make it any less true. Stealing is wrong always. That woman's circumstances are difficult and the world would say that in that situation it is perfectly okay to steal, but the Bible says that it is wrong to steal. Period.

I was trying to get these students to understand that all of their outside influences are telling them that truth can change and to do whatever is good for you, but the Bible says that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and that is never changing.

My goal in posting this, the same as teaching it last night, is not to condemn anyone. I told you up front that this was very hard. My goal is to get you to think about where you get your concept of truth. Do you get it from the outside world or do you get it from the Word of God?

Christ Follower

2007-10-05T12:29:00.000-07:00

Hello everybody, hope you have had a good week.

It has been a bit of a disappointing week in blogville. We have had good numbers, and for some reason we had excellent weekend numbers last weekend, but we also have had some disappointments. First of all, I have not yet heard from Jimmy Blewett's people, but I am holding out hope that someone in New Jersey will read my blog and the word of mouth will spread, and I can meet my long lost race car driver relative. Second disappointment in blogville this week is that our 500th reader did not email me. I imagine it took place on Saturday and I am guessing it was as a result of someone catching on through http://www.youthpastor.com/ or some other site that links me over and so the person probably has no idea who I am, but I still want to know if you were the 500th reader PLEEEEEASE let me know, I want to congratulate you.

Now moving from disappointment to utter bliss, outside of blogville in a place I like to call The Real World I had one of the greatest nights of my life this week. On Monday I was invited to sit at the VIP table at the annual fall banquet for FCA. This was initially a huge thrill for me! Not only have I never been a VIP before and not only did I know that FCA has a reputation of serving great steaks at their banquets, but I was excited because the key note speaker was Sam Wyche.

This is a picture of him back in the day coaching the Bucs and talking to our quarterback Craig Erickson. I am so glad we don't have those uniforms anymore and I am so glad we have a better QB. In school they used to say of the Bucs: Be Understanding Craig Stinks B.U.C.S.

Anyhow, I was excited to meet him, I knew that he used to go to the church that I got saved at, FBC Tampa and I also knew that he drafted Derrick Brooks so I was very excited.

Well, Monday afternoon rolled around and I realized that I didn't know what time it started and how to get to where it was at, so I opened back up the email that I originally got from my good friend Carlos. I didn't originally realize that the email had an attachment, and when I opened it up I saw the flyer for the banquet, and yes Sam Wyche was to be there... BUT SO WAS DERRICK BROOKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

For those of you that don't understand what this means to me, Derrick Brooks has been my favorite player since he was drafted in 95. I could not have met anyone in the NFL that would have got me more excited than him. Not only is he a great player (10 pro bowls, 2006 pro bowl mvp, 2002 Defensive player of the Year) but he is also a great Christian man. And when I got saved in 96 the whole Christian thing was knew to me, so reading articles and listening to interviews from Derrick and Tony Dungy and Danny Wuerfful did a great deal in showing me that being a Christian doesn't mean you have to be stuffed into a "No Fun Box" and that you can do what you love and be a Christian influence.

So we got to the banquet and we immediately went into the VIP room and I was standing 5 feet away from Derrick and was awestruck. Coach Wyche was next to him and was getting no attention so he walked up to us and started talking to Heather and me. Ordinarily that would have been the highlight of my night but DB was standing next to me.

Charlie Warren (great man!) announced that we were to get with our table and take pictures with the coach and 55. So we did! They were sitting down and we stood behind them and I could have talked to Derrick Brooks right then, and... I froze! I couldn't get a word out. Luckily I have the best wife in the world and she leaned over and started talking to him on my behalf. She told him that she had to memorize all of his vital stats before we got married (which was true) and I chimed in with "It was part of the wedding vows." Then we took the picture and I managed to get out, "It was great meeting you."

I was so excited, but it wasn't over. Something great happened. Half of our table showed up late. So we had to take the picture again. This time I wasn't going to freeze up, I got a sharpie and asked him to sign my jersey... and he did. I have never been so excited in my life (except for on my wedding day), and the steak was great and Derrick gave a great speech and the coach was awesome as well. I hope to have that picture of us with the greatest player ever to post on my blog next week.

So that was my exciting night and I want to transition into something else. If you haven't noticed I have a added a few features on the page. There is a section at the bottom that will give you news on Christianity, Bucs, and Youth so you can utilize that and there are also a couple of videos attached to my page.

I urge you to watch these videos this week after you get done reading my blog because they post great points. The main point they are trying to convey is that there is no special way that a Christian is supposed to look. In other words, just because you have on your church suit with your offering envelope sticking out it doesn't make you any more or less of a Christian than the guy in ratty jeans and a t-shirt.

This is something that I learned from the likes of Derrick Brooks. When I got saved I had this thought of what a Christian should look like and he definitely didn't fit that mold. Coach Dungy says that he is a Christian that happens to coach football but he is a Christian first and foremost.

That word unfortunately has taken a huge hit in recent years and it almost has a negative connotation to it now. I love the phrase Christ follower because it really simplifies things. Jesus never wore suits. Jesus never stayed away from lost people because they weren't like him. Jesus never was unaccepting of anyone. Jesus was a man of love and compassion. I would love to think that one day when I have breathed my final breathe that it would be said of me very simply, "He was a Christ follower." It doesn't matter that I am a Pastor, that doesn't make me any more or less of Christian. All that matters is that I, like so many others in this world, am doing my best to live like Jesus lived, not like people have told me to live.

To live is Christ, to die is gain!

Legacy

2007-09-28T07:02:00.000-07:00

Well my blog fans, I apologize for being late on my post. I altered my week and took Thursday off and came to work on Friday. It seems to be okay though, because our Thursday numbers were down drastically yesterday. For some reason this week Tuesday was, by far, our biggest day.

We are coming close to a milestone. If you look at the top of the screen right now, you can see our page views tracker. As I am writing this the tracker is at 459. I want to know who 500 is. If you are reading this right now and the tracker says 500 please email me at jblewett@northidgehc.com so that we can let everyone know who the lucky person is.

I have something that I want to share with you this week that I found very interesting. I was googling my name to see how some of my Internet ventures were coming up. Do you know what I found? I found my long lost relative! I don't know how this man is related to me, but I am convinced that he is. Take a look at this picture of Jimmy Blewett and see if you can find some resemblance.

I have never met anyone in the world that has the same last name as I do that is not related to me. I have done searches on my last name and I found it to be a fairly common name in Europe and such places, but not here in the US. Do you want to know what is really cool? He is a race car driver!

He was born in 1980 which only puts him 2 years older than me and he lives in New Jersey. My dad's side of the family is from Syracuse, NY. Here's another thing about him... he's really good! The reason I found out about him, is that he just won another race this weekend, and now he is leading his particular racing organization. I do not know a lot about racing, but here are some things that I found in his biography.

-- 2-time Wall Modified champion (2001-02)-- 2-time Garden State Classic winner (2002-03)-- SST B Modified Chemung 100 lap winner-- Wall R.O.C. Tour Sunoco 150 winner-- 2 Riverhead Modified wins -- 2-time Turkey Derby winner

I don't know what that means but it sounds impressive. Here is a picture of the car he drives.

But if that fact that I have a man sharing my name who is a successful New Jersey race car driver is not enough... he has a brother. His brother is also a race car driver and owns a used car parts shop called John Blewett, Inc. Now it would be really eerie if this guys name was Mike or Mikey or Hunter or whatever alias my brother is using these days, but his name was John. And, in the spirit of giving out very personal information over the World Wide Web my mom lost a boy and his name was John. He was born around the same year as this John. So, here's the picture of John Blewett III and if you have ever met my brother Mikey you would see a few similarities there too.

So anyhow there is my interesting discovery for the week, and I will keep you up to date with anything that may transpire from this situation. Here is what I am hoping will happen... the power of this now very famous blog will spread all the way to New Jersey and the Blewetts will find out about this Youth Pastor in Florida who shares the same name and a few facial similarities with their race car driver Jimmy. I will let you know when I receive the phone call.

Onto some more spiritual things. This past weekend Heather and I attended a marriage conference called Weekend to Remember http://www.familylife.com/conferences/marriage.asp and it was held in West Palm Beach. (So for those of you that thought I skipped church to go to the Bucs game... you were wrong.) At this conference we learned a lot of interesting things. We learned the proper way to communicate, we learned about the way God views marriage as opposed to how the world views marriage, and we learned about how differences in expectations will lead to conflict.

The part that I wanted to share with you though was told to me at the part of the conference where the men and women split up. The men were learning about what it means to be a Godly father. The talk was very interesting and I am sure it was a lot of stuff that I will remember when I do become a father. I wanted to relay to you how this speaker ended his time with us men, because it relates a lot with the 30 days post that I talked about last week.

The speaker told the story of being woken up in the middle of night at his home in Atlanta with the news that his nephew was dead. His nephew was 23 years old and was apparently shot while trying to rob a convenience store. This was shocking news to the speaker because he felt like this man was not the type of guy who would do something like that.

As information started to unravel, the speaker had found out that his nephew had just found out that he was going to be a father. In a moment of foolishness decided that he needed some way to get Christmas money for his new baby and the baby's mother. Even though this man had never been in trouble before and would never do something so extreme by his nature alone, he will now be forever linked to a convenience store robbery and he will never be remembered as anything more than a thug.

The sad part is that one day his baby will be old enough to ask questions. And inevitably the question will be raised to his mother, "Mom, why don't I have a daddy?" Can you imagine the anguish that that mother will feel at that moment, and can you imagine the feelings of abandonment and confusion that that kid will have to grow up with. The speaker acknowledged the fact that when his nephew died, he left behind a terrible legacy. A legacy that will haunt his kid forever. All for a few dollars.

The question was then posed: If you left this Earth right now, what would be your legacy? Parents, would your legacy be as a loving parent? Christians, will your legacy be as a faithful Christian? What will you do today to ensure that you leave a lasting legacy? What will do today to make sure that everyone around knows that you love and care for them?

What's your legacy?

30 days

2007-09-20T11:42:00.000-07:00

Well my friends, it is that time again... blog time!

I don't know if you have noticed the top of the screen of this blog. If you have you will see how many page loads we have had in the past month. We are up to 317 and last week we had 186 page views. So in only one week our readers have nearly doubled. That is awesome!

On my stat tracker I noticed that by far more people read this blog on Thursdays than any other day. So Thursday is my official blog day. This works well for me, because I don't work on Fridays and so Thursdays are my last work day you all know what that's like... it is so hard to stay focused on what needs to be done.

We have a couple of things going on in the online world of NorthRidge. First of all, there is the obvious greatest blog on Earth known as James' blog (and even my wife has read it now :) ) But there are a couple of other things. Jackie Noland and some others have felt compelled to start a prayer chain. So you can email northridgeprayer@yahoo.com to submit any prayer requests you may have or to be a part of the email prayer chain and receive all of the requests that are submitted. We are also looking to post some great stories of answered prayers on our website so submit some of those stories to us as well. And I have posted some new pictures of the fire damage on our website, so check those out at http://www.northridgehc.com/.

Now that those details are out of the way, I wanted to let you know that I have been working out. My wife joined Gold's Gym a couple of weeks ago and there was a 7 day guest pass along with it. So I went last Thursday and took a spinning class (that's bicycling) and I was sore for 5 days. But I am really trying to expand my horizons and develop a new circle of influence. As a Pastor I feel a lot of times like I can get stuck in a church bubble. So I speak all the time on sharing your faith with the lost, but the truth is that I don't know many lost people. So I am excited to become a part of this tribe. I have already seen dividends. Here I am with my shirt off.

So I guess you can see that it has been paying off.

Anyhow, onto the seriousness. I give careful thought now to what I am to post on this blog. I did it at first as a way to get people to use our website and now I see it is a way to minister to people. I do not take that lightly.

So in preparing for this week's post I was drawing blanks, until today. I started watching http://www.lifechurch.tv/. If you have not been there you must watch it. This man had a huge vision for ministry in the modern age and he has multiple church sites across the country and simulcasts to all of those churches as well as to an online community that is apparently very large.

I was watching his last sermon series he completed entitled 30 days. The basic premise of this sermon series (and I suggest you watch it yourself) is, what if you knew you had only 30 days to live what would you do. He mentions that way he came across this idea is because he was having a hard time prioritizing his life. The Pastor was being asked to speak in quite a few churches and seminars and he didn't know when he should say yes and when he should stay home with his family. He talked to his mentor who told him that when accepting a speaking engagement ask yourself if you only had 30 days to live would you still go and speak there. This became a great way to gauge his priorities.

This Pastor went to great lengths to get his point across during this series, including interviewing people who had been given only a short time to live by their doctors. The stories were extraordinary. Do you realize how much your perspective changes when you have been given an ending point to your life. It changes in an immense ways.

In listening to this weeks message (which was after the 30 days series) the Pastor gave some follow up information. He informed his congregation that one of the people interviewed had gone on to be with the Lord, and that people from his small group were there with him the whole way through. But there was another story that really caught my attention.

The Pastor said that during the 30 days series there was a woman who decided that she needed to quit her high paying job to become a stay at home mother and have time to spend with her family. Because she decided that if she only had 30 days to live that she would definitely spend them with her family. Only 2 weeks after making this life altering decision, her 18 month old baby drowned in a swimming pool. It is a shame that she only had her epiphany a couple of weeks before her babies death, but it is a blessing that she had those 2 weeks.

My question to you, my faithful blog readers, is quite simple... if you only had 30 days to live what would you do? Then do it! Then do it! The book of James says that life is like a vapor, it is here and then it goes away. Don't get to the end of the road and be full of regret. Life life to the fullest.

I will end with a little poem that I memorized for some reason when I was in high school

Exhaust the little moments for soon they die,

And be it gash or gold they will never come again in this identical disguise.

Follow Up: Added Monday September 24, 2007

I received a comment from Andrew Statezny who is a campus Pastor for Life Church in Hendersonville, TN (I told you the blog was gaining popularity) and he informed me that there is a website called www.30daystolive.com that they made especially for that sermon series. On it are the videos of the people they interviewed, follow up with how they are doing, videos of the sermons in their entirety, and a section where you can answer what you would do if you had only 30 days to live. So check it out, and look for the next posting this Thursday... Go Bucs!

Fire

2007-09-13T10:22:00.000-07:00

I am pleased to inform you that this blog is taking off in an enormous way. Thank you for all of your word of mouth advertising. To date we have had 183 page loads and in the last seven days alone we have had 65 unique visitors. This is quite amazing, and it now puts pressure on me to deliver, and people have been asking me all week when I was going to blog. So there is also a sense of anticipation which is cool.

I wish I had something funny to start out with this week, (like Mr. Bartlett's picture :) ) but I do not. Unfortunately this has not been a very funny week. For those of you that don't know there was a fire at NorthRidge Church last Sunday night. There are a lot of pictures on the church website and more to come. This has been a reason for a hike in my blog stats I understand; because I actually had a fire chaser call me on Monday trying to get work for his company. But there has also been a curiosity in the community and beyond and so a lot of people have checked out our site for the first time this week.

I was sitting at home on Sunday night watching the Bucs game (I put in on my DVR and I was watching it about an hour after the game was actually over) I was downstairs and my phone was upstairs. I was very, very upset at the outcome of the Bucs game. Heath let me know that I missed a phone call and that it was my good friend Alex Smith (which is also the name of the tight end for the Bucs) and I thought that he was calling to bust my chops about the Bucs loss.

So I called Alex Smith back and he told me that the church was on fire. Now understand that he is a fireman and I make constant remarks about his profession and I sometimes even joke about fires. So when he called to say that the church was on fire, I was convinced that he was joking. He told me he wasn't and I still didn't believe him. But then he got mad... Alex never gets mad... so I knew he was serious.

I immediately got in my car and drove to the church expecting to see a little grease fire or something. When I got there though I was in total shock looking at our sanctuary, seeing flames rising out of the top. I stood on a hill facing the church surrounded by 100 people, watching the church go up in flames knowing that our lives were never going to be the same again.

At that moment the Bucs loss seemed so petty. At that moment everything seemed so petty. I immediately felt deep sympathy for our Pastor, because I knew that he was about to enter a time in his life that will be hectic and chaotic and a time in his life where people were going to be looking to him for answers and for guidance, and there is no book and no class that teaches answers in this situation. I know that right now will be the time when his leadership is put to the test, and I do believe that great leaders rise up from bad circumstances and find a way to rally the troops and to keep the ship afloat, and I believe that Pastor David is a great leader and that is what will happen.

But something else happened on that hill on Sunday night. Something that is very, very hard to explain. We became a family. There was such a spirit of unity on that hill, that it was almost hard to believe that we were there under such terrible pretenses.

******* As I am writing this I am having a very hard time explaining the feeling that was on that hill. I know that some people will read this that were there with me, and you will understand... but the rest of you, I don't think that words can do justice to what happened on Sunday night. ************

The really weird thing is that I felt privileged. Can you believe that!?!?! I had personal items ruined in my cubicle, I had a knowledge that our youth group would have to make enormous sacrifices. I knew that things were going to be totally weird, and that my job description would completely change to Pastor Flexible. And yet throughout all of that I felt privileged.

I felt privileged to be a part of something amazing that God was doing. I felt privileged to be surrounded by a church FAMILY. I felt privileged to be a part of this incredible team of Pastors that we call staff. I feel privileged to be at NorthRidge Church at such a time as this because I know that this event will change people's lives at that people will come to know Christ in a very real way as a result of this incident.

It is hard to understand, but I praise God for this fire. I praise God that no one was hurt. I praise God that the school can still function. I praise God for the space to continue on. I praise God even more than anything that by destroying a church building, He made the CHURCH grow stronger.

Keep in the center of God's will and look for opportunities this week to turn the church fire into a gospel sharing opportunity. And praise God for who He is!

Thunderstorms

2007-09-05T11:03:00.000-07:00

Well faithful blog readers. It has been around 2 weeks since I last posted and it feels like a part of me is missing. I don't know if you have noticed or not but I have added a stat tracker to the top of my blog. As of the moment I began typing there have been 75 views in the past week and a half. Of those 75 views there are 28 unique visitors. So I have grown from 9 to 28 which is progress. I have been pleasantly surprised at the people who have been confessing to reading my blog. People will mention stuff to me all the time now that they would only know if they were a faithful blog reader.

Of these special people that have been keeping up with James' blog I found out that we have royalty among us. The principal of NCA elementary division Mr. Michael Bartlett is now a faithful blog reader. I thought that some of you may not know what he looks like, so here he is...

I honestly just wanted to put his picture on because he hates this pic and I am laughing hysterically at the thought of posting this. But anyway, he does read, but he may not after this. :)

So, onto my blog.

This past weekend was a weekend to remember and a weekend I wish I could forget. For those of you that don't know we had a little diddy at the church on Saturday called Fusion Fest. We had been working really hard to get the word out to all of the public school campuses... and we did. We were excited of the prospect of what would happen on Saturday.

Well Saturday came and we had been working diligently for over a month on the details of this event. We had been begun setting up three days in advance. The band came in set up on a flatbed under a tent and then about an hour before our diddy was to begin... it started to rain.

No big deal we thought, we were protected by our great tent. Then a huge gust of wind came and toppled our whole tent over leaving all of the band's equipment unprotected. I must say that we had some incredible volunteers that stayed under the tent holding the medal poles to the tent in such a way that all of the equipment would stay dry. During the duration of this pole holding there was a little thing called lightning flashing all around us. 20 minutes later the rain stopped, everyone lived, and we officially had 45 minutes to re-set up everything that took us three days to prepare.

Our incredible volunteers didn't flinch, they got right to work and we made arrangements for the band to go inside and... praise God... 5 or 6 kids raised their hands saying that they accepted Christ!

Ever since this Saturday I have been searching for meaning in the whole event. I mean there were hundreds of kids that told me they were coming that didn't show up. Two football teams were supposed to be there in their entirety and both head coaches even cancelled. We had planned for this event for weeks and weeks and less than an hour before the event one gust of wind messed everything up. In these instances I can't help but ask the inevitable... why?

I may never know why things happened the way they did. I may never know why circumstances ended up the way they did. But I know for at least 5 kids their eternities changed forever because of Fusion Fest. And I suppose that was all worth it.

I wonder also, just wondering, if everything went off without a hitch, would I have taken the credit? I would like to say that I would have given all the praise to God, but honestly speaking I don't know that to be true.

But now I believe without any doubt or any reservation that the only way we pulled that event off on 45 minutes notice is through the grace and power of my almighty God! And I must not be discouraged over only 5 salivations, because... 5 kids got saved! God is the only one with that might.

Thank you faithful blog readers... God bless and know that Principal Bartlett is a cut above the rest.

Experiences

2007-08-23T08:45:00.000-07:00

Well, I have been discovering a lot of my faithful blog readers and I am very grateful to you all. I understand now that I must continue on my weekly blog or my readers will become disgruntled. So I am here to satisfy the public.

I have a lot that I could write about today. School started and I think it is the greatest thing to see all of the students that are here. NCA is an incredible school. My wife is teaching kindergarten, and I could write an entire blog on why I could never be a Kindergarten teacher and the amazing patience that it takes to do that job. We have a big event coming up called Fusion Fest and I could write on all of the details and the opening doors of the event. However, I have something else entirely to blog about today.

Last Saturday I went to Kissimmee, Florida and volunteered at a place called Give Kids the World. This is a huge theme park like resort for terminally ill children and their families and it is usually one of the last stops on the journey of life for most of these kids.

I was real nervous going, and to be quite honest when Cindy Beasley asked us to go I wanted to find any reason not to go. After all, there was a Bucs game on during that time frame. But how could you possibly say no to that. Knowing that there are children who are dying and we have a chance to fill their last days with just a little bit of happiness; I kept on telling Heather that we just can't say no.

So we met last Saturday with a group of about 15 church goers and a handful of incredible youth and we went. My job was pretty easy I was to team with my awesome wife and two of our youth and we were to bus tables for half of the dining room. We were to clean off the tables, put away the dishes, and we were to help people with their trays to the tables.

I worked in restaurants while I was in college and so this job seemed great to me. I really loved the work and I really loved the satisfaction of helping out and I really loved partnering with my wife. I had a great time.

Having a great time at a place like that made me feel guilty though. How can I have a great time knowing that so many people in this place were struggling so badly. But the thing is that Give Kids the World was a happy place. The people that work and volunteer there go out of there way to make the families week the best of their lives, to give them some happy memories to cling onto when the times get rough.

As we watched people coming into the Gingerbread House we were told that the kids wearing the buttons were the ones that were terminally ill. Some kids had no hair or were in wheelchairs, but a lot of them you would never know by looking at them that anything was wrong with them. We sang happy birthday to this boy that was turning 12. We joked around with a lot of the people. We offered to take trays for the ones who looked like they might need help, but most of them politely refused my help. I was amazed at all of the people that came in for dinner that night.

I became the primary dish scraper of my group and I was okay with that. My team would bring a tray full of dirty dishes to me and I would scrape off the food and organize the dishes and send them back to the dish room where their were people to wash the dishes.

On a couple of occasions a lady had a few words to say about a few of the things that I was doing wrong and a few things that our church was doing wrong. I very politely accepted the criticism and informed my team if we had something we needed to change. This lady apparently felt bad about chastising me so harshly and she came to apologize to me. I said it was okay and by the end of the night I found out a lot about this lady.

I am very bad with names so I don't remember what her name was but she was 70 years old. She looked 50. She said that she works taking care of an old man (this is a 70 year old talking remember) and then she cleans houses as her main source of income. And three nights a week she goes to Give Kids the World and she leads the kitchen crew, which is made up of paid employees from Perkins who almost all have some sort of affliction, whether it is that they are bipolar or autistic or something like that. Here is the kicker... she has been volunteering in that kitchen three nights a week for 19 years. Yes I said it... 19 years! Which, to make my readers feel old, was when I was 6. I couldn't believe the work ethic of this lady.

At the end of the night, just like at any restaurant we all were standing around waiting for the final people in the place to stop talking and leave. There was a big round table with a bunch of Spanish people and one of the kitchen workers was over there chatting it up with them. I have not watched Telemundo enough yet to know exactly what was being said, but I was a little bit frustrated because I was ready to go home.

I would soon feel bad about that. The man came over to me after the people left and told me that he was sharing Jesus with them. He told me that every night he shares Jesus with at least one or two families and that is the only reason he helps out in the kitchen. When I asked him how this particular family responded he looked me in the eye with an air of confidence that we all should have and said, "Who could say no?" The man's name was Israel and I look forward to meeting him again one day soon.

My fellow readers there are many people who need us. Please don't put God in a box, express your faith freely and openly and with great pride because the God of the Universe is at work all around us... we just have to open our eyes and see.

Under the Overpass

2007-08-14T07:51:00.000-07:00

For all of you faithful blog readers out there... welcome back. I am encouraged because I made a mistake on my post the other day and someone called me to correct it. That means that someone actually read it. So what I am going to do is I am going to put a mistake in this post and see if anyone can find it and that will let me know who is reading this post.

I just finished reading a book called Under the Overpass (www.undertheoverpass.com) and it was about a college student named Mike and his friend Sam who felt convicted to live as homeless people for five months. They wanted to view things from a different, less-privileged perspective.

I learned a lot of valuable lessons from this book and I will remember a lot of the anecdotes as long as I live. There are a few things that I wanted to touch on for my blogger nation out there.

These two guys lived on the streets and played worship songs on their guitars for money to get food and they did everything that normal homeless people would do. But on Sundays, being the good Christian boys that they are, they went to church.

The book has a lot of interesting stories to tell of how people treated them when they walked in on Sunday morning. They went to a mega church in Phoenix, Arizona where security followed one of them into the bathroom and asked him in a very rude and threatening way if he was disrupting the service. They were forced off of a grassy knoll they were sleeping on on a church campus because the man was afraid of what people would think when they showed up for their "Outreach Breakfast." Come to find out the man who kicked them off the grass was head of community outreach at his church. They asked a Pastor at a small church whether the church could provide them a meal, to which the Pastor answered, "We don't do that here, we worship God here."

But then Sam and Mike went to an afternoon service on the beaches of San Fransisco, California. People were handing out bag lunches to the homeless while a young guy led worship. After that a 17 year old got up to bring a message to the crowd that gathered.

When the service was over the worship leader and the preacher boy came over to Mike and Sam and they talked like they had been friends forever. The ministers offered the two homeless guys more lunches and asked about their lives (now understand Mike and Joe never let people know that they were Christians with an address and money and a good family) and the two told them that they were trying to get bus fare to go to San Diego.

These two preacher boys then felt led by the spirit to invite Mike and Sam to their church for night service and offered to let them come back to their apartment to shower and eat and hang out. When these two showed up at the church they were treated like royalty and the worship leader took them to his car and opened the trunk... it was full of food. Then the 17 year old man of God gave Mike and Sam an envelope filled with the exact amount of bus fare needed to get to San Diego.

It was amazing to me that in all the stories Sam and Mike told about Christians it took two young guys on a beach to live out the gospel in their lives. What would you have done?

I am convinced that if Jesus were alive in this day and age that he wouldn't be as we picture Him. We picture Him as a white guy with luxurious brown hair and blue eyes. He drives an SUV, lives in the suburbs and is a member of the PTA.

From what we know of Jesus' background, He would look like a Middle Eastern man and would be talking radical talk. This means that Jesus would be targeted by Homeland Security and He would make people nervous if He got on an airplane, and quite frankly... most people would think of Him as a possible terrorist.

From what we know of who Jesus was He wouldn't live in a 4 bedroom overlooking the lake with a pool and a big backyard. From what we know of who Jesus was, my bet is that He would come to Earth as a homeless man. How would He be treated?

I am not saying that the answer to the Christian life is to give money to the poor because that is not the case. In fact, you should never give money to the poor because 9 times out of ten you are feeding a heroine addiction or providing an alcoholic with the very thing that put him on the streets. You should only give homeless people love, support, work, food, and gift cards.

My whole point is this: do we really want to reach the world with the gospel or just the people that are like us? If Mike and Sam walked into NorthRidge Church how would they be treated?

When I was in high school I witnessed to this homeless man, took him to McDonalds and brought him to night church. He felt led to come forward and profess his salvation, which in most Southern Baptist churches means to join the church. I didn't hear the conversation at the alter, but this man came back to the pew dejected because he was told he couldn't join the church without an address. That's all well and good, but his salvation was never rejoiced over within the congregation. Why was that? If that man made $50,000 and thus would supply the church with $5,000 a year you better believe we would have rejoiced. But the Bible says that the angels rejoice when any sinner comes to Christ.

My question then is... why are we so stubborn?

My new book

2007-08-07T12:02:00.000-07:00

Note: This post originally said that Dr. Maiden was speaking on the 12th, but he is speaking on the 19th. Pastor Harold Butler will be blessing us with God's word on the 12th.

I looked at my statistics and saw that 9 people have viewed my blog... Awesome! To those 9 of you who are now regular readers of my blog I have a special treat for you.

If I am correct (which I usually am) the former Pastor of NorthRidge Dr. Maiden will be in pulpit on August 19th to speak to our congregation. After this he will have a book signing for his new book.

This led me to reach back into my memory bank and withdraw January 1, 2006. On this day I made a resolution that I would write the book that has been inside of my head for a while now. The good thing about this resolution is that even though I have not made a lot of progress in the past year and a half I have not yet broken my resolution.

So what I wanted to do for my faithful 9 blog viewers is give you a never before sneak peak into my new book which will be realeased on August 12, 2014. So here it is and please leave me some comments on what you think and where changes can be made. I love you 9!

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I am sure that all of you are familiar with a timeline. We learned to use them in the third grade and have neglected them ever since. The basic point of a timeline is to chronologically arrange the order of events that have some significance to each other.
Such an example would be that I was born on May 20, 1982. I was saved on March 26, 1996. I graduated high school on May 22, 2000. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers won the Super Bowl on January 22, 2002. I got married April 24, 2004. Those are all of the significant events that have happened in my life up until this point and so the timeline of my life would look like this.

Now what I would like for you to do is to make a timeline of all of the significant events that have taken place in your life. They could be things like your birth, your salvation, your marriage, the birth of your children, the Bucs’ Super Bowl victory; whatever is important to you. If you like you can write it out in the space provided below.

Take a minute to look over your timeline and to reflect on these events. Think about how important all of these events were and where you would be if they had never occurred.

Now what I need to you to do is to use your imagination. I need you to imagine that this next picture is one straight line. In order to do that, imagine that you can physically pick up the beginning of this picture with your left hand and the end of it with your right hand. Pick it up straight off of this page and stretch the two ends out like Christmas lights. (like its that easy to stretch out Christmas lights) Then take your right hand and toss out the end of the line until it is straight

In your imagination this line should be perfectly straight just like a timeline. This line would be very, very long. It could probably stretch through your house and down the block for a little ways.
Now what I need to you to do is to use your imagination to take the timeline that you made for yourself and crumble it up into a little ball until it makes a tiny little dot. Place this little dot toward the very beginning of the long line that you stretched out in your head that went through your neighbor’s window. It would look something like this.

What you now have is a clear and understandable representation of eternity. The beginning of the line in your hand represents the beginning of time. I will leave it to people a lot smarter than I to argue whether there ever was a real beginning of time. For our illustrations purposes your left hand will represent Genesis 1 when God created Heaven and the Earth and everything on Earth.
The end of this line represents eternity. Now understand this: the line that you have in your imagination is very long. It is probably the longest timeline that you have ever seen, but if this truly represents eternity it is only a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of how long the line should really be. We can not truly make a timeline that represents eternity because eternity transcends time. But for the practical purposes that this book will serve we must try to wrap our finite brains around infinity and the only way to do that is use our imagination to make this line.
So if your left hand is creation and the line is eternity then what does the dot represent? It represents your life. I bet for some of you when you were making your timeline you were thinking, “I sure have lived a full life.” Or maybe, “Boy, I am old.” But when you crumbled up your timeline and turned it into a dot I bet it made your life seem insignificant.
What I need for you to understand is that this is as close to an accurate timeline as we will ever be able to make here on Earth. And every time you make your timeline and put it in relation with eternity, it will always be a dot.
What if I live to be 75? A dot. What if I live to be 100? A dot. What if I am like Bethusela and live to be ? Always a dot. When we put our lives on the same scale as eternity it will always be a dot. Regardless.
Do you remember the last time that you went to a cemetery? There were a lot of tombstones surrounding you as far as the eye can see. The tombstones said something like this:
Here Lies John Doe
A Great Man, A Great Father, A Great American
1945-2006
What do we really know about this man? We know his name. We know that there were people that loved him and thought highly of him. We know when he was born and when he died. That’s it. That’s all we know. The reality is that his entire existence on this Earth was summed up with a dash. All of the successes, all of the stories, all of the experiences, all of the hard work; everything is summed up in one little dash.
It seems pretty depressing doesn’t it, but it is a true statement that one day after you die, everyone will eventually forget about you or the people that remember you will die themselves. When that happens all that you were and all that you stood for will be encompassed in that one little dash on your tombstone that separates the year you were born from the year that you died. In other words it will be nothing more than a dot on the timeline of eternity.
The Bible makes this point very clearly a few times on just how short and frail our life is. James 4:14 says, “…you are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.” Job 7:6 says, “My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle…” And Job 9:25 says, “Now my days are swifter than a runner; they flee away, they see no good.”

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In order for you to understand what the line and the dot means to me let me paint you a picture of my childhood. I was born and raised in the beautiful city of Tampa, FL. I was an eighties child. Nothing beat the Dukes of Hazzard and the Ninja Turtles as far as I was concerned
I had blonde hair and blue eyes. I took my blonde hair and I parted it down the left side of my head and did a little bit of a comb over. So the left side of my head looked clean-cut and business-like and the right side of my head looked like tumbleweed rolling through the desert. It was almost like a sideways mullet.
I had a very keen eye for fashion. I wore nothing but t-shirts that usually contained some sort of cartoon character, such as Roger Rabbit or Bugs Bunny. I also owned one of those shirts that changed from one ugly color to the next if you touched it. And the prize of my t-shirt collection was a purple shirt with a surfer on it, but if you rolled up the sleeves the underneath color was orange.
Being from Florida, I only owned one or two pair of long pants and the rest of my wardrobe was comprised of jean shorts. The very same pair of jean shorts. You see, my mom found these particular shorts on sale at an outlet mall and felt it necessary to buy every pair, because it is hard to pass up such a good deal. So nearly every day for two or three years I was dressed in the exact same pair of shorts.
Coming form a family that wasn’t particularly affluent, we only got one pair of shoes a year. Shoes were a huge deal when I was in school, who you were was based on what shoes you wore. If you had the “Ken Griffeys” with the number 24 on the side then you could be part of the elite of the school. We bought our shoes at Wal-Mart and I can only remember one pair from one particular year and they had two velcro straps on them and had a picture of my favorite cat-eating alien ALF the side of them. During the summertime I absolutely loved my shoes, when school started and the jokes rolled in I would rather have went barefoot.
There is one thing though that I have failed to mention that topped off my wardrobe… my socks. I had socks that came up to my knees and had different colored stripes on them. It didn’t matter if the stripes matched my outfit, it only mattered that they matched each other. If you add all of this with the worst posture that anyone has ever seen and a set of teeth that makes Austin Powers look like Brad Pitt then you have a pretty accurate picture of what I was like as a child.
My name is James Blewett, (pronounced bloo-ette) not so hard. However when the first day of school rolled around and it came time to call roll all of the teachers pronounced my name as though they have never read English before. “James Blew It” would naturally be what poured out of their mouth. Being the first day of school and the first alphabetically called, this pronunciation would get the class rolling on the floor with laughter to start the year off. And then the statement that every teacher made with confidence as though they were the originators of the centuries old joke “James, you really Blew It this time.” And my year would get off to a great start. Just imagine my joy when I found out that in middle school we would have six classes with six different teachers and six different times calling roll. I am excited about going to Heaven, but I hope that the roll really won’t be called up yonder like the hymn says.
I painted you that picture in order for you to grasp the lack of self-confidence that I had. People that meet me today have a hard time believing that I ever lacked self-confidence because these dies I try not to cross over the cockiness line that separates self-confident people from pro athletes. It didn’t take long for me to create a defense mechanism known in the eighties as a “cut-down.” Now it is something that I struggle not to use.
My family life was not the best that it could be. My mom had an accident when I was really young and hurt her back, the injury handicapped her and she had to quit her job and stay home. My dad then became a workaholic, he didn’t have much choice with all of the doctor bills that were rolling in. My parents tried very hard, and I do believe they wanted the best for us however when I think back to my childhood I cannot think of one positive memory.
My mom was a frustrated, angry lady and needed an outlet for her anger and that usually came in the form of physically punishing me for any small hiccup that I made. I was truly scared of my mother for most of my life.
My dad had to unwind with a few beers when he got home from work and my brother and I would keep tabs on how many because once it got to three or four we made ourselves scarce.
I had often heard people telling me growing up that I was lucky to have two parents that have remained together for my whole life. The thing is that people didn’t know what went on behind closed doors. My parents fought like they literally hated each other on a nightly basis and the only reason they didn’t get divorced was because the state wouldn’t allow my mom to raise us alone and my dad worked too much to raise us, so they were stuck together.
I hated going to school. I really just hated that there were people at the school. I liked to learn and I liked to be distracted from life, but I hated going to school. However, until my freshman year in high school I only missed two days out of my entire schooling career because I just hated being at home more than I hated being anywhere else.
Of all of the things in my life that I hated, there was one thing that I hated more than anything else… nighttime. I hated being around people, but I hated being alone even more. It absolutely terrified me to be alone with my thoughts. When the lights when out and it was just me, I did nothing but question my existence...
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More to come, check a bookstore near you.... in 8 years!

My first blog

2007-08-03T06:59:00.000-07:00

Well, I am not sure how many people are going to read this but I am going to enter the world of blogging.

I am sure that if anybody is reading this (which I highly doubt) then they are most likely members of NorthRidge Church. The reason is because I mentioned it in the bulletin and so that is the only way that anybody would even know about this blog.

I am anticipating blogging on the inner workings of a youth ministry and letting everyone knows what really goes on behind the cubicles at NC. (that's my blog lingo for NorthRidge (why is the R capatilized?) Church) And I would like to tell funny stories and interesting antecdotes and maybe next week I will, but not this week.

This week the cubicles are less energetic than usual, because we are all working with a heavy heart. On Wednesday August 1st our good friend Jim Shemwell went on to be with his Father. It is still very shocking and very sad.

Now if you are a member at NC you would know that I have only been at this church for 2 months. But in those 2 months I have grown a close bond with Mr. Jim. He was such a nice man, such a Godly man, such an encouaraging man and I am going to miss him greatly.

I remember our interview process. My wife and I came to Haines City for the second time in a month. The first time went very well and now me and the Heath were coming to get voted on. Our fearless leader Pastor David decided that Heather and I needed some R and R. So Pastor got on the horn with Mr. Jim and asked him to take us to Disney World.

Mr. Jim and Carol and Larissa met us at the church and we followed them to the mouse world. We walked from the car to the train, from the train to the monorail, from the monorail to the front gate, from the front gate to the bathroom (it was a long walk) and the entire time me and Mr. Jim were chatting it up like we had known each other for 20 years. Heather and I knew that if everyone was even half as nice as him then we were definitely in the right place.

Ever since that day whenever Mr. Jim saw me he had an encouraging word for me. And I saw him a lot, and you would think that he would run out of nice things to say... but he never did.

A man that lived to serve the Lord. A man that made everyone feel special. A man that will be greatly missed.

I will see you again some day Mr. Jim.