No Fear

I find all kinds of good stuff at my friend Jared's blog. He has a great one today about us often having the spirit of fear.

A snippet:
What are we afraid of now?

- That liberals will take God out of America. (As if that was possible.)

- That Democrats will pass bad laws.

- That stores will say "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas."

There's a lot more, and most of them are of the culture war variety. Politics and social concerns. You may think these are all valid issues, and some of them are, but the way they grip the evangelical's attention and the way they drive him and her into anxiety, preoccupation, anger, obsession are all evidences of the spirit of fear.

The difference maker is this: Is God sovereign or not? Is Jesus risen and now sitting on the throne or not? If so: Relax.

Go read the whole thing here.

CCJ @ 9: Front Page Photo Details

Here are the details from the photo group on the front page of ccjasper.com this week.

First row from left:
2000: The early days in the Jasper 8 Theaters (picture scanned from from Saturday feature that ran in The Herald in late 2000).
2001: Building dedication for the warehouse building on Cathy Lane. The building was formerly owned by Canteen and was a full-on warehouse with oil stains, a not-so-lovely smell and uncovered walls.
2004: Sunday services on a Strassenfest parade float in August 2004. This was the first year the band played on a float.

Second row from left:
2005: Fall kickoff in late August 2005. This is the first year the inflatable jumper appeared at CCJ.
2006: Easter services at Jasper Middle School. CCJ was growing and didn't have enough room for Easter so services were moved to the JMS Auditorium.

Third row from left:
2007: First Sunday in current facility. Feb. 4, 2007.
2008: Additional staff helps CCJ. Mark came aboard in mid-2006 and Ryan joined us in early 2008.
2009: Breaking ground for building expansion. A week or so ago.

Feel free to share your thoughts on life at CCJ these past nine years in the comments.
What are your favorite memories and what are looking forward to seeing God do with the church in the future?

Gospel Singing

Wow! :) If you didn't make it to tonights (Saturday) gospel singing, you missed a great time. Ken & I were raised on this kind of music. We had a good crowd and S.O.S. Ministries provided desserts and drinks after the concert. There were alot of visiters and plenty of opportunity to witness about God's wonderful work at CCJ. I'm sure everyone left more blessed than they came.

Baby Shower

Today I attended the nicest baby shower that I've been to. Kara's 24/7 girls did a wonderful job.

This picture is one of the gifts that Kara received. I've not heard this 'saying' before and it got me to thinking about those moments in my life when my breath was taken away in awe of God's goodness. There have been many but the most awesome moment in my life has to be..............

Check out mine, then add yours to the comments.

Take Time To Smell the Roses

I know this is a really busy season for us all....trying to get things accomplished between the sunshine and the rain. Mowing the lawn, planting the garden or flowers (for us...working on puppet orders, too). Our daughters daycare was closed this week, so we spent a lot of quality time with our (soon to be 3 year old) granddaughter, Riley. Between rain showers, we flew a kite, played kick ball, blew bubbles and last but not least....fished. The simple things in life that bring laughter to a child don't cost much and hearing the giggles is priceless!

Have you taken time to notice...roses are starting to bloom? The smell of a rose is the next best thing to a hug from a child, both bring us closer to God.

What do you enjoy most about this time of year?