I begin today's with some of my thoughts of two special friends, and I will close with more notes from CATALYST conference.
Dale Clark passed away last evening in a peaceful time as he and his wife spent time together. This man was full of faith and a prayer warrior like few others. Yet Dale was rarely able to step through the doors of the church. His health kept him down, but it never keep his faith down. If you talked to Dale, you were encouraged. He never thought of himself, and he talked all the time about his precious wife, Donna, and his kids and grand kids. By the way, I know he loved his pastor. The way a person leaves this earth says much about their relationship with Jesus. I am humbled and God is seen through Dale's life and his death.
This afternoon is the memorial service for Libby Smith. I cannot believe this is real. Libby was my friend for all 36 years of my life. I remember a blanket she made for me (it is safely stored away for keeping), I remember her chocolate cake (my mouth is watering), and I can even remember her holding me when I was real small. Most recently she loved me by loving on my kids. But when I had something spiritual going on as a kid, a teenager and even an adult, Libby wanted to hear about and talk about it. As her health declined, never did her sweet spirit. Remember that old jingle? "Libby, Libby, Libby on the label, label, label..." All I can say is this lady was an angel in my life, and in many others.
On to notes from the conference....one of my favorite thinkers, speakers and leaders is a guy named Erwin McManus from California. Here are some of my notes:
Ephesians 1:9-10 (nlt) --- God has now revealed to us his mysterious plan regarding Christ, a plan to fulfill his own good pleasure. And this is the plan: At the right time he will bring everything together under the authority of Christ—everything in heaven and on earth.
God put us here to create the future, not to react to the past. God didn't create us to live in neutral, and He acts most powerfully in people who are willing to create. We are God's agents for creating the future that God has in mind.
How can we be so disconnected from what is real? the human spirit cannot like in the fictional. It longs for truth, reality and being real. Yet sometimes we train ourselves to think the worst is the best. God wants to take what is broken or ugly and make it beautiful. Look at John 1 where it takes about the Word or Jesus coming yet no one recognized Him. You see what the world needs from us is not a great sermon but it needs us to take them places where we've been with God.
If God can step into human history then we, being human, may be the best thing we can do is to create beauty.
Ecclesiastes 3:11 (New Living Translation) --- Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God's work from beginning to end.
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