Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Back from Camp


Well we are back from MFuge mission fuge camp for our youth in Mobile Ala. I just thought I would share some things about this trip. It has been a busy couple of weeks, so I haven't been on my blog much or even others blogs much either. Well first off, we were kinda late deciding to go to camp. I started to type the whole trip, but it would turn into a book, so let me hit some highlites. Salsa sales to raise money turned out to be a God thing. Our church support is a God thing. At MFuge we and our kids go out in the community to serve. It is an eye opener to our kids and us too. I was in the Childrens ministry track. So we got to work with kids. I got to witness to 6 kids, one was allready saved and the other 5 got saved. Only God can change a heart and this was the harvest that came from a summer of hard work by other campers that had been showing them God's love. We had one of our own get saved during our church group devotion. The one thing that really hit home to me is that of the 6 kids that got saved, when I asked how to get to heaven, they all gave works based answers. These were like, you have to be good, or keep the 10 commandments, etc... The answer is only in accepting the free gift of salvation that is available because Jesus died on the cross as a substitute for our sins that we were supposed to die for. This has been in the forfront of my mind since we got back. I saw God get real in some of our kids lives this week. I pray that they will be serious about God and desire Him above all else. I saw a moving of the Spirit in our group devotion the last night that I had never seen in my kids before. I was truly blessed. God is Awesome. I will try to add some other things later.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Michael Jackson's Body is Missing!!


Well I went to check out of the grocery store today and as I approached the register a couple of little boys were running around and suddenly stopped in the aisle to read a headline on one of those Enquirer type publications. One of the boys read the headline on the front with a surprised voice. "Michael Jackson's Body Missing"!! He was surprised and his buddy responded with as much of a surprise. "OH NO!!" Well I couldn't help but laugh under my breath. Well this got me to thinking though because of something I had heard earlier in the day on a religious program. They were talking about how people look at the Bible as truth. He said "It seems as though, the Bible is looked at as though it is guilty until proven." The Bible has never been proven wrong and many times over been proven right. But yet we are quicker to believe article like these from publications like these that are constantly proven wrong. Sorry, I believe everything in my Bible as truth, not just out of blind faith, but because I have studied it and have seen it proven right time and time again. Thank you God for your word you gave to us.

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Independence Day at Lake Claiborne


We have had fun this weekend at Lake Claiborne. I just thought I would make some notes about our weekend there. First we went in the afternoon and passed out flyers to let the campers know we would be offering worship services for the on Sunday morning through our sponsor Rollling Hills Ministries. Each weekend a different church volunteers to do the services. The first weekend of the month falls to my church, Weldon Baptist Church. Walking the campgrounds is a hot one. Sweat, Sweat and Sweat. Did I mention Sweat. But we have a great time. Lots of really really really nice people there. Every once in a while you run into an interesting situation. One of the cabins I stopped at had a lot of drinking going on. The person who accepted the flyer and invitation was nice. But as I turned to leave someone in the background yelled that I had come to the wrong place today. Basically, he was saying my efforts was wasted on them, cause they were gonna drink themselves into oblivion. I guess the next day they would be bragging about how much fun they had throwing up and how great it is to wake up with a headache. The campground was full as usual for this weekend. My wife is still recovering from surgery so I kept watch over her and didn't want her to overdo. And so after the first campground walkthru I was able to convince her to drive and me and my daughter passed out the rest of the flyers. Afterwards we move to the swimming area and unloaded stuff to cook. Not much, just a couple of burgers and weiners. We were eating when my son and his wife showed up. I was pleased see them. And had a great time visiting. Around 7 we moved to the campground so we could watch the boat floatilla. I got about 40 photos of different boats coming by and throwing beads and a couple of water balloons. Then a great fireworks display. We got home around 1030 and I had lots to do for the next morning. It was about 2 before I got to sleep and back up at 630 and to church by 7 for men's breakfast and to load up the sound equipment and back to the house by 8 and at the lake by 845 and equipment set up for services by 9. We have the sound equipment setup down to an art. At 9 people just started coming out of the woods it seemed like. We went from 0 to 55 in about 5 minutes it seems. This is a load of folks. We sang a couple songs and I preached on our Declaration of Independence. Here it is. We make a declaration of independence from sin and death when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior. But we also declare our dependence on God. Compare that to the language you find in the declaration of independence I posted on the previous post. But I don't know how well the sermon was, but one elderly woman came forward to talk at the end and said she was going through a divorce. I asked her if I could pray with her and did. I believe it meant a lot to her. We got done, loaded up, headed to Pardon's paradise as usual for something cool, back to our church in time for worship service. It has been a full weekend and we enjoyed it. God bless all. Sorry for the blurry picture. Oh and last note. I notice that I went over 3000 visits. Yay!!!!

Saturday, July 3, 2010

The Declaration of Independence

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.


The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton

Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton

Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean

Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark

Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton

Friday, July 2, 2010

Things to do when a coworker goes on vacation.

















I just had to post this. I thought it was funny.

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About Me

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Born again at 40 in 2001, though I practiced Christianity since I was 13.