New babies were a big part of the day yesterday. We had a new baby, 2 weeks old, in attendance in worship yesterday. It is always great to have that kind of biological church growth. I was also excited to announce that my wife and I have a new grandchild that was born Saturday morning. I had to make the announcement because my wife hopped in the car drove to Michigan to hold this new blessing shortly after we got the call. I love new life. Speaking of new life, here are my musings…

-There was a beautiful, active spirit in our worship yesterday.

-Someone came to the altar at the conclusion of my sermon yesterday and that was without any plea to come forward by me. Love seeing people respond to the prompting of the Holy Spirit.

-We had a new family visit and they have indicated that they will be returning.

-Things are always different for me when my wife is not here.

-We had a special time of prayer during worship as we anointed one of our men who has been going through a lot of physical issues. I loved seeing so many men gather around him and pray fervently for him.

-Our attendance was very good.

-After two Sundays of real winter weather we enjoyed a very pleasant and remarkably mild day for a Sunday in January.

-I enjoyed sharing lunch with a family as they celebrated their Dad’s 81^st birthday. He is definitely one of my favorite guys and this last year has not been an easy one for him.

-It was great to see many people in attendance who had missed the last couple of weeks due to the weather.

-I loved the fact that a couple of men who are participating in our mid-week men’s discipleship study asked if they could get some of the material ahead of time so they could study more. How awesome is that?

-Once again we had some people who had to step up and fill in for people who were scheduled to serve but didn’t make it.

-I attended a funeral for a former pastor on Saturday. There were 35 pastors who attended and created an honor guard of sorts as his casket came into the sanctuary. We also sang a couple of songs as a choir. Not sure about the quality of our sound, but we were passionate. Seeing a sanctuary that was filled so that several of us had to stand throughout the service was another reminder that serving as a pastor does make a difference in many lives.

-Spending a lot of time in planning this week as I prepare to begin pastoring 2 churches. I will meet with the board of the other church this week for the first time. I am excited and nervous about this new adventure.

-I love that my wife is able to go and help when a grandchild is born. I love that they asked if she could come to help. But I miss her fiercely when she is gone.

Here’s hoping you recognize that you have the opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life this week.

Dennis

Yesterday was a very cold day outside but there was a warm spirit inside. I know that is cliché, but it is accurate. I am so glad that our furnaces were all working given that it was 4 degrees when church began and the wind chill was negative 16 degrees. As for my musings …

-Given how cold it was our attendance was very good.

-I was reminded that I am not a fan of anonymous suggestions or criticism. There is no way to dialog with the person.

-Yesterday I was reminded that we have some very dedicated people who sacrifice personal comforts to serve others regularly.

-Three weeks from yesterday I will be preaching at 2 churches each Sunday. I begin pastoring the additional church the first of February. I am excited and a bit overwhelmed thinking about it.

-I am humbled and encouraged by the attitude of so many of our older people who are excited by the changes we have made in the church because of the growth that these changes are producing. Lord help me have that same attitude in my later years.

-It is normal for me to preach from what God is showing me that I need. This current series I am preaching is really directed at me. It is painful when you study all week, practice a message and then preach the message and realize that all of it is directed at you.

-I have thought a lot about the power of examples recently. I have been reflecting on some great examples I have had in my life and am praying that I will be a good example for some.

-My wife and I are excitedly awaiting a call about the arrival of another grandchild. I know that when that call comes I will be by myself for a few days as my wife will head out to help. I am grateful that we are in position for her to be able to help.

-Our worship service yesterday was very good.

-I was really moved by the words of all of the songs we sang during worship.

-Last week was the beginning of a couple of new mid-week Bible studies. It was exciting to see 11 men in a discipleship study and 18 ladies in their study. This can only produce good things.

Here’s hoping that you are able to express gratitude this week to someone who has been a good example to you of following Christ.

Dennis

Perseverance was the name of the game yesterday. With the temperature in single digits, the wind chill below zero and some of the streets and roads a little slick it took perseverance for people to make to church. Not many ventured out. As for the musings …

-There was a lot of adjusting to fill in for people who didn’t make it to church.

-I am always amused at who comes and who doesn’t on days like yesterday. We had several of our older people who made it, not all of them but several of them.

-We had some sound glitches. We were working on some things this past week in trying to get the right balance, but that balance was not there yesterday. We need to spend some more time working out the new system and learning all that it can do.

-Our worship team was 2 when it is normally 5. 2 of the absences were planned before the weather hit and the third was weather related. They did a nice job of leading us and setting the tone for the service.

-We actually had a couple of visitors yesterday. But not really, their church cancelled services so they came to ours.

-I was really burdened and greatly anticipating preaching the message that I felt God had prepared for yesterday. It was disappointing that the weather caused so many to miss. But I have to trust that those who were here will really apply it and pass it on. We attempted to video tape the message. I haven’t heard yet if it came out okay. I hate seeing myself preach, hopefully my congregation doesn’t have the same feeling.

-I met with another pastor yesterday afternoon about a project we are looking at working on together. I am blessed to have several pastor friends in the area as well as around the world.

-I am starting a new Men’s discipleship group this Wednesday evening. I am really excited for this and pumped for the potential and ongoing impact it can create.

-Today is one of those days where I am really missing being near my kids and grandkids. Don’t worry, just a little pity party this morning.

-Trying to figure out getting a few vacation days in before I begin the new adventure of pastoring 2 churches at the same time. Last minute vacation planning is not easy when you are a pastor. I guess that means I shouldn’t do this at the last minute. Maybe when I grow up I will learn this one. After all, growing older is going to happen, growing up doesn’t have to.

-I did a little visual illustration during my message yesterday in which I dropped a bunch of stuff on the platform. My wife admitted that the first thing that crossed her mind was, “Great, now I get to clean that up later.” For the record, I cleaned up my own mess. I think I need her to write a post about what goes through the mind of a pastor’s spouse during the message. Then again maybe I don’t want to know.

-I just received a call that the mother of one of my leaders passed away this morning. The mother didn’t attend my church but I knew her. She was a godly woman whose presence will be sorely missed in her family. I visited with her a few times when she was in the hospital and I loved listening to her stories.

-This week has a lot already scheduled and with the fact that I know there will be surprises throughout the week I better get back to work.

Here’s hoping that you let go of anything that may be keeping you from holding what God has for you today.

Dennis

The first Sunday of a new year and I wrote the correct date on our tithe check on the first try. This is going to be a good year. As for my musings …

-“But One Thing I Do” is the title of a new series I started preaching yesterday out of Philippians 3. It will be theme that we come back to many times this year. Too often we attempt to do too many things at the same time. The result is that we accomplish little in our personal lives and as a church body. We are looking to focus on the most important things and live them out in this moment. Too often we ignore what is right in front of us and miss great opportunities to serve, to grow and to bless others.

-We are still adjusting to our new sound system, but it sure is nice to be able to adjust things instead of settling.

-The congregation sang out yesterday. They sang loud. They sang with passion. They seemed to really be moved and engaged during the entire time of singing in our worship. It was an awesome way to start a new year. Todd Adkins tweeted this morning “It’s one thing to just ATTEND worship and quite another thing TO WORSHIP.” Yesterday our people didn’t just attend they really worshipped.

-I was reminded yesterday of some adjusts that will need to be made by me and the church in a month. The first Sunday in February I become the pastor of two churches. That changes my ability to fill in during our breakfast time and Small groups/Sunday School time on Sunday mornings. The reason is that I will be at the other church for the worship service before coming to my current church for worship. When this begins and someone gets sick, or doesn’t show or just doesn’t do what they were supposed to someone else must cover. In the long run this is a very good thing.

-I will need to begin worship next week clarifying a statement I made during my message yesterday. The bad news is that something I stated was not as clear as it should it have been, the good news is that it was brought to my attention, I was able to clarify it to a couple of people yesterday and I will be able to clarify it to the entire congregation. I hate when that happens. I hate it even more when I don’t discover it in time to clarify it for everyone. Just one of the many fears a pastor deals with on a weekly basis regarding their message. The fear of not being clear and being misunderstood is a biggie.

-We have had a lot of people struggling with some very major health issues in the past 2 or 3 months. It seems like it has been an unusually high number. It was encouraging to see some of them able to come and worship yesterday.

-With 8 Sundays to go in this church statistical year, we have only had 2 Sundays with a worship attendance below what we averaged the year before. I am excited by the fact that we are reaching more people this year than we did last year. I am even more excited that I am seeing tangible evidence of people growing in their relationship with Christ.

-In 9 days I will begin a new short term small group for men. This group will focus on discipleship. My prayer is for each of the men to grow in their own walk with Christ and that when our group ends many of them will continue in a discipling relationship with another man or group of men. I have been praying to have 12 in the group, and there were 8 who signed up on Sunday. There is still another week for men to commit so I am hopeful that we will see 12 involved.

-My wife and I were able to spend some time with 4 of our kids and 4 of our grandkids this past week. We were able to Skype for a brief time with our 2 kids and 5 grandkids who are serving in Kenya. It was a very good week.

-Nearly every Sunday morning a retired pastor in my church, he is also a former pastor of this church, comes in my office and prays over me before the worship service. Yesterday was especially meaningful to me. I am blessed to have 2 former pastors of this church in my congregation. They pastored this church during its highest attendance years. They are great encouragers to me.

Here’s hoping that you find your “one thing” for this week. Here’s hoping that you recognize God’s presence in your life and are reminded of how much you are loved.

Dennis

The Sunday after Christmas is often a unique day, and yesterday was no exception to this trend. As for my musings …

-We had a great conclusion to our worship service yesterday. A couple of people came forward to pray and several others came and surrounded them in prayer.

-I was my own worst distraction as I was preaching. Not sure what my problem was, but I was struggling. I did some platform rearranging by adding a small counter height table and chair. It was my choice and something I had wanted to do for a while but I found myself wondering what everyone was thinking about the table. The early returns are that people really weren’t thinking about the table. I hate when I do that kind of stuff to myself. At the very least I hope I made you feel better about your own idiosyncrasies.

-We had a lot of people missing today due to illness. I guess it is that time of year even if the weather is just now figuring that out.

-I am very humbled when people share difficulties, hurts or fears with me. That happened yesterday morning and I never take for granted that it means we have built a relationship in which they feel they can trust me and that they know I will pray for them.

-My wife and I had a very enjoyable lunch with a new couple after church. They have just started attending recently and it was great to hear some of their story and get to know them a little better. God really is up to something good around here.

-I concluded my series “Secret Wishes at Christmas”. We looked at the Wise Men and asked the question “What’s next?”. The conclusion of any event or project usually leads to the question of what’s next and can create anxiety, discouragement and more. We looked at the example of the Wise Men and how that can be a plan for answering our questions of what’s next.

-I am looking forward to spending some time with our stateside kids and grandkids this week. We will have our family Christmas and spend time playing with grandkids and playing games and sharing lots of laughs. Hopefully we will be able to Skype with our kids and grandkids who are serving in Kenya. I love my family and cherish any time we get to spend together.

-I am excited for this next year to begin. I will be preaching from Philippians 3. We will be looking at “But This One Thing I Do” as a theme to start the year.

Here’s hoping that you are finding your answer to “What’s Next?”. I will be praying that you see God’s leading as you seek his will. If you would like me to pray for something specific leave me a comment and I promise that I will spend time praying for you and your needs.

Dennis

P.S. – It appears that I won my Fantasy Football league’s championship. I knew you were wondering.

I think I am going to be seeing pancakes in my sleep for a couple of days. Why? Yesterday my wife and I provided and cooked breakfast for our church as our Christmas gift to the congregation. I made, cooked, and flipped pancakes for over an hour and a half as my main contribution. We had egg casseroles, ham, and muffins as well. It was worth it, because they are worth it. As for my musings …

-The breakfast time was a lot of fun. It was tiring, but it was well worth it. My wife does awesome at these type of things (and many other things for that matter) and she worked much harder than I did. She had the tables decorated well and had planned the menu with great thought. It was fun to do this for our awesome congregation.

-I had the privilege to do a child dedication yesterday during our worship service. I love doing those.

-I am loving our new sound system. We are still learning how to run it, but I absolutely love the quality of the sound and that we have working monitors and much more.

-Yesterday was part 3 of my Christmas series of messages, entitled “Secret Wishes of Christmas”. The wish this week was “I wish I could have peace and feel whole in spite of my circumstances”. We looked at Mary and the hurt that she likely felt of “I feel completely overwhelmed by my circumstances”. I think we can all relate to feeling overwhelmed, especially around the Christmas season. We looked at healing for this hurt for Mary and for us today.

-After the energy of our Children’s Christmas program last Sunday things felt much different yesterday. It was still a good service, with a good spirit, but it was not as dynamic as last week. I just can’t compete with the kids. I noticed also that last Sunday many people arrived early and took the seats near the front. That didn’t happen yesterday. I am slightly offended. Just kidding.

-We did have people sitting in the front row in 3 of our 4 sections because of the good attendance. This happened even with us adding an extra row of seats a couple of weeks ago. God really is up to good things around here.

-I struggled with feeling distracted while I was preaching yesterday. I hate when I allow that to happen.

-We had a family that came back yesterday after attending last week for the first time.

-As so often happens after a large children’s program the children’s attendance is down significantly the week after. Our worship attendance was still nearly 50 more than this same Sunday a year ago.

-The prayer requests we have been receiving are really taking a turn for the better. They are becoming deeper and more significant. They are expanding beyond just illnesses, and now include relationships, decisions for the future, and burdens for unsaved family and friends. I am very encouraged by this and by the number of people that are joining the ranks of those praying faithfully.

-My life is about to take an interesting turn.  I announced yesterday that I accepted an appointment from our District to begin pastoring a second church. It is another church in our town. I will be preaching at the other church and then coming to the church I am currently pastoring to preach. Being in the same town will make it much easier as far as travel and I already know many of the people. But it may cause some confusion at first for myself and others. I am excited about the opportunity to minister to more people and I have a passion to see local churches make an impact in their community. But it will be different. I have always loved challenges and as I told my Dad, our life is not going to be boring.

-I will be on duty as the Chaplain for our local hospital on Christmas Day. We are getting with our kids and grandkids who are in the states the week after Christmas so this doesn’t really change any of our plans.

Here’s hoping you are not overwhelmed this week. Here’s hoping that you see the real reason for the season and take some time to celebrate the birth of our Savior this week. Here’s hoping that you realize you matter.

Dennis

Yesterday was fun, it was exciting, it was exhausting, it was encouraging, it was frustrating and it was life changing. How is that for a Sunday? As for my musings …

-Our Children presented the Christmas story in song and drama yesterday. They did an outstanding job. It was lively, very clear, fun and very energetic. Our preschoolers were exactly what you expect them to be, cute, funny, and we had a few microphone stealers and a couple of runaways.

-Our kids did a great job inviting friends and family to come to their presentation. We had the largest attendance we have had in my almost 2 years. It was 30 more than we had on Easter Sunday.

-The best part about the large number of visitors was how many of them are from our community and that myself and many regular attenders, were able to have some great conversations with them. We are praying for the seeds that were planted and for those who embraced the message. We are now seeking to reach out to many of those who attended and build those relationships.

-We had to bring in extra seating, even after the service began. Thanks to the guys who brought extra chairs in and also put them away.

-I love that the Christmas story, of the Savior being born in a stable and the shepherds being the first to get the news is awesome. It is not a perfect story by human standards, but it is perfect because it shows that a Savior was born to all of us imperfect people who have messes in our lives. The children’s presentation brought that point home in a powerful way. Thanks kids.

-There was a lot of chaos as everyone was getting ready yesterday. There was a lot of chaos as people arrived early (that never happens on a regular Sunday) and rushed to get the seats up front (that never happens on a regular Sunday). This caused many regulars to have to sit somewhere other than their regular spot, I loved it!

-Our revamped sound system was tested severely yesterday with the kids program. It passed with flying colors. I shudder to think of what we wouldn’t have heard if our new system had not been installed in time for the program.

-I just heard a report of a someone who attended yesterday and said that the message of the kid’s presentation spoke powerfully to them. I love it!

-It did seem a little odd to have our Christmas program when it was 62 degrees outside. But I am not complaining, just observing that it seemed odd. I could get used to odd. (I believe there are many people who would comment that I got used to odd a long time ago.)

-It was funny to see my steps total from yesterday was 2,000 less than a normal Sunday. Why? I didn’t preach yesterday.

-My wife was the leader of the kids program this year. She is going to be mad that I mentioned this, I am hoping for a little grace to be shown. She recruited a lot of great helpers, but I know she is very relieved that the program is over and that it was so well received.

-Unfortunately I did have to spend some time taking care of some stuff that someone else was supposed to have done before Sunday. However, it comes with the territory many weeks.

-I am very excited to preach this next Sunday. I am excited because I didn’t preach yesterday (I did a brief wrap up of the program near the end) and I am excited because I am really into this Christmas series on the “Secret Wishes at Christmas”.

-Missing my kids and grandkids who are ministering in Kenya. This is their 3^rd Christmas in Kenya, but for some reason I am missing them extra this year.

Here’s hoping you are excited as you look forward to this week. Here’s hoping you find an opportunity to bring some encouragement to someone today.

Dennis