the day after back2school

Philippians 4:5  NLT

Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon.

1 John 3:18  NLT

Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.

Overwhelmed.  Grateful.  Surprised, but not really.  Hopeful.  Amazed.  Encouraged.  Ready.  Those are just a few of the things rattling through my mind as I look back through all God did this past weekend and weeks through back2school. 

The final numbers are not in as of yet, but it looks like we served about 1,900 students and their families on Friday and Saturday.  There are a few hundred more students will get backpacks and school supplies.  Several schools will also receive boxes of supplies that will help teachers and students.  That means over 2,000 students will be served this year.  I am so grateful.

There were five churches involved.  But really it was many more.  I walked through our church Saturday morning and met several new friends.  They were from several churches.  Some I knew.  Some I just met.  I saw the same happening at other five churches too.  At this point I estimate that around 600 hundred volunteers made our serving so much stronger.

Those numbers are important, but there are a few things much more important.  People are our greatest resource and why we do what we do.  I am overwhelmed with all God accomplished through people willing to go above and beyond the status quo.  I am grateful for the money and resources God provided through many different means.  I really am not surprised that God did more than I expected.  Hopeful is an easy way to describe the results that are yet to be seen.  Amazed might be the biggest of all the words and the concepts because it all happened with so many people involved, so many parts working together.  It was amazing!  I am encouraged.

Sunday night was the icing on the cake, the tip of the iceberg, the cream of the crop, the best of the best as all five churches came together to celebrate, to share, to worship God and to lift up our great God.  Manny Ohonme of Samaritan’s Feet brought the heat with an inspiration challenge to step in to the dreams God has given us and believe what God says to us and about us.

More will be shared as the week goes on.  But I leave the weekend and give you and I a thought that makes God smiles and reminds us that we are stronger when we chose to work together.  The five churches that took part in back2school are an example of what Jesus had in mind for us all.

Jesus prayed it.  I pray it.  Let’s be one.  Serving together for His glory!

John 17:21  NLT

I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one—as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me.